Dazy, Hazy and Lazy

So Grafton, Grafton, Grafton, ahh the place brings back such fond memories! As you are all aware we were stuck in Grafton, A place that if it was to put in the dictionary would be described as backwards. So we had checked out of the hotel to be met by the man at the garage with a self assuring smile that our van would be definately ready for lunch time that day. Lunch time = no van a promise that it will be 5 o'clock that day....................Sit and wait some more. 5 o'clock = no van and check back into the awesome motel. We decided best not to venture into the pub again so i could save face from the one armed man that was sure to be there!! So angry phone calls to the van people and the garage people and nothing was sorted...Sweet! We finally got so scared of the local people we literally sat in the garage waiting room just sitting and being a visual annoyance to the man that kept feeding us bull s#$t excusses. Eventually after three days of waiting (and hiding from the locals) Shazzam was given some serious CPR and she lived another day. Seems our annoying questions and waiting had paid off and the fat (didn't mention that before) balding man let us on our way/ Fixed it to get us out of his "hair". Joy the adventure continues...............

Heavy wheel spins and 120kph we were out of there without even looking back!

The plan was to try and get back to the original plan and save a day here and there. So we trying to power through and drive straight to the gold coast. Night fell and we stopped and Byron Bay (pretty famous) It was pretty much dark when we got there so we just pulled into the park and crashed. Relax we were back on track. Up early to see what Byron had to offer and it was a really cool place (if not a pricey) but the surf was good to watch (we had not time) and there was a really cool lighthouse up on the hill which seemed to attract alot of people! So after a morning roaming around we decided to continue to the gold coast.

Surfers paradise was the destination and we were properly looking forward to it. Our campsite we were heading too even had a crazy golf course! Lots of fun to come. However surfers paradise was not really that much like paradise. It was the biggest city we had come across in a long time. Several skyscrapers and eveything. It was pretty much a wash out. It was also huge, although there was lots of surf spots there were so far apart it was like driving for a couple of hours just to get to a decent beach. The caravan park was not on the sea as it was lead to be believed by the pictures and description in the book it was on a river and quite far north of everything. So get ready for it.......................................We snubbed the Gold Coast and mainly Surfers Paradise. Wiped off the itinerary, moving stright past.

So we arrive at Noosa, now in the sunshine coast and this was looking more like our cup of tea. Nice campsite lots of little beachs and a trendy little town, (with some pretty big name shops, i.e Hugo Boss) suddenly the reality of being on a backpakers budget was depressing. So we headed to the beach to revive our excitment for the surf!! The beach was really cool. Still pretty busy (school holidays again) but we found some little breaks and had our surf spot. The weather was becoming more and more mixed with tropical storms for hours then clear blue skies in the afternoons then rain again. Got us down abit because it get dark so early here you kinda have to make the most of the daylight. You will all be shocked to hear that our body clock now consists of getting up at 6:30 - 7 ish and going to bed at 9ish (well the going to bed isnt so much of a shock for those of you that knows lea's sleeping patterns) so we were really missing our mornings. We make a big decision towards our surfing careers and decide its time to sell our soft top surf board on and try and pick up a couple of cheap fiber glass ones. Big decisions coming ahead!! Lots of shopping around and we eventually go on lea's instint and get an amazing deal for it. Now comes the hard part trying to get the new ones......We rent some to give them a try and hope for good weather so we can use them!! Dreams come try and we were blessed with a short spell of good weather. So after shopping around abit and trying some differnt boards the following day the worst happens.................... (well not the worst there were no sharks involved) Lea picked her wave, rode her fate and lost, surfing right up onto the rocks, OUCH! Well not for her really more the board. To say the damage was light would be lying. Lots of nerves about what they would say at the hire shop when we return there board with a 20 inch gouge through the bottom of it. Worried scared (well lea was, my board was fine ;-)) we head back to the van to pack up and try and sort it out....................."STRUTH MATE WHAT HAPPENED TO YOUR FISH" from afar a random man had picked us out of the crowd due to the injury (to the board) 'MAN MY SON IS GONNA SPEW" turns out he was the dad of the guys who hired us the board. I mean what are the chances, more importantly to us, why was this middle aged family man at the beach surfing in the middle of the week day, and not at work like most grown ups!! Any way after pretty mush telling us how trashed the board was and how much he thought it was gonna cost we were on our way........ Arriving at the hire place i take the good board in first, even before i got a hello, or gooday mate. "My dad already phoned me and told me about the fish" What the hell we got ratted out by his dad, Started to explain a little more why he wasn't at work!! So after a long wait and people telling me how messed up it was (all in surf language by the way, so i didnt understand most of it anyway) we got stung with a massive repair bill. Oh yeah a little detail i forgot to mention about this whole ordeal, Lea was abit to scared to face the people in the shop so i had to sort it all out, shocking display of burrying your head in the sand miss pike, but it worked out for the best in the end, They assumed Lea was hurt (who was i to correct them) and i got to blame Lea, as she wasn't there. Moving on...........

Next up was Frasers Island, a biggie, and we were both really looking forward to it. We had stayed longer in Noosa so we could try and let the bad weather pass for Frasers. We hit a long drive up to a place called Hervey Bay, Basically a town purpose built as a pass through to Frasers Island. Nothing special there much like a mediterrain holiday location. Lea enjoyed her first subway though, and loved it. Our campsite was really nice though. So we booked a one day trip in the end and decided not to camp on the island over night. Up early and ready for the long day adventuring.
Frasers was abosolutly amazing, the island is pretty mind blowing (the story of the island was very well told by the crazy man in the photo's, Captin Kangeroo) From the beach's to the Rainforest to the sand roads (that had to re-swept every day because the sand moves that much) The one day trip consisted of a small loop around the main attractions of the island. The road systems on the beach were pretty wierd and made us glad we hadn't opt'd fpr the self drive, the beach was the road and also the run way for the planes that was also the beach and people had right of way over the plane, busses and 4x4's!! Accident waiting to happen. Lake Mckenzie was by far the most amazing beach/lake i have ever been too. The water was spring water so you could pretty much drink it..................... part two coming later (we thought we'd lost this draft but we found it again! woo ........matts sarcastic comment here is "obviously!" oh yeh quickly have to say we have just done a bungy jump ahhhhhh crazy!!!)




lea chilling (hervey bay)


lea chilling (DHL)


rainbow beach (we took a short detour - lea (the nav) says its only a few mins away ended up being 2 hours......all cause she liked the name of the beach......matts isnt bitter!


wheres matt......


noosa beach full of spoilt rich ozzie kids!! ahhhhhh


us in the gorgeous lake makenzie - fraser island! bliss


lea splashing in a creek (fraser island)


us up the creek.......


the rainforrest (fraser island)

mother mn\



A real frozen shark at the shark exhibition airlie beach!!!ahhhhhhhhhh (si are you ok?)


Our new van!! and to stace and sam - is that


matts baby feet in talc! (fraser island)


lake makensie


another whale beaches at fraser island...... (lea had that smile on her face the whole time we were at fraser island lush!!)


whitsunday islands - whitehaven beach in the rain still pretty amazing!


please use your imagination for this one.......


matt takes a nap (the lago



oh no it got lea!


bit of a kodak moment for the website ;-) but stace inpaticular check out lea's dance moves!!!haha


lea on whitehaven beach (doing some kind of strip act?!)



the sun breaks through after the rainy start!! yay!!

lea splashing AGAIN!


white


us in our stinger suits!!!!!......................................


bit of an arty one - its been a while! (whitehaven beach!)


it all got to much for lea


"we have no jobs.....our pets heads are falling off........" so this is what we have been doing for the past 3 months!