Dates and places are a little vague on this route since we didn’t take notes or upload any posts, so pictures and a brief description will have to suffice.

Once we crossed the Rockhampton border and headed for Agnes Waters it was like a switch being flicked; the clouds cleared, the sun shone on the sand and there was no mention of box jellyfish so the beach was an all go area. We camped in Agnes Waters for a couple of nights chilling while watching the surfers – wow, for the first time we felt like we were actually in Oz and on the east coast.

We were expecting the whole of East Coast route to be close to the beaches – which is not the case (so far) – you are on average between 17 to 35km inland, so taking a quick look en route is out of the question.

Having watched the surfers I had convinced myself that the whole process was mere child’s play and set about getting a board – watch this space.

Apologies for the lack of updates in recent days (or even weeks), on the road in the van it’s difficult to get a connection without having to visit the internet cafes – no free wifi like Asia – and neither of us can muster the enthusiasm to fight the town or city traffic.

We are able to upload a few posts today as the campsite we are staying on has a connection.

All the best from the Gold Coast of Australia.

When the weather is cooperating, sailing the Whitsundays could be as about as dreamy as it gets.  In Oz summer months it can be about as miserable as it gets and why we’ve re-named it Wetsundays.  Others, more critical, were calling it Shitsundays!

We spent 3 days looking out the misty port hole of a bedbug ridden stomach churning catamaran.  Even the chef spent 3 days throwing up so that’s saying somthing.  If it wasn’t for our fantastic multinational group, it would have been sucidial.  Five Canadians had worked and saved for three months with one day off to to gather enough cash for the trip.  They made the most of it and drank throughout.  The best buch you could spend time with, jaw ache from laughing.  On our last night we stayed up till some ungodly hour finishing off our booze – for us it was 4ltrs of cheap red wine – greast head the next day!

In saying that and having looked through the pictures for this post, they don’t seem too bad and certainly don’t reflect the weather conditions we endured (who takes pictues in the rain!).  The brochure promised ‘the scub-diving trip of a lifetime’ so I signed up for my PADI Advanced Course.  Not quite what I had expected and visibility was no more than 5 meters, but at least I’ve done it and now have the ticket!  Sam done the free 20min dive and left it at that, as did everybody else, much to the disgust of the commission hungry instructors.

As we docked warnings of cyclone Airlie were being broadcast from the radio and was due to hit in the next day or so.  Thankfully we were on land and driving in the oposite direction towards Fraser Island.  If the Wetsundays are anything to go by, maybe we should give Fraser a miss.