No alligators but some hungry birds: Home Hill - Alligator Creek

Leaving Home Hill bright and early we arrive in Ayr and decided to buy some new super dooper water proof bags. They are what we have decided on instead of getting a trailer. They fit perfectly on the back of our bikes, will easily carry all the extra weight and they don't come with any fiddly bits. They do make our bikes look very overloaded and we could run into some issues with handling but HOPEFULLY they were a good investment.

Today we didn't cycle too far but went to Bowling Green National Park, which is right outside of Townsville, so we can have a quick ride into to Magnetic Island tomorrow.

The water at Alligator creek was a refreshing afternoon cool down and 100% free of any toothy reptile killers. Although the Brush Turkey got into our fruit and bread as I left them unattended to watch a little wallaby joey jump in and out of its Mumma's pouch (too cute and totally worth the wasted food).

No danger here!

Anyone know what sort of bird this is?

Groggy, quite literally: Collinsville - Gumlu

Today we road on some really beautiful back roads! My view all day was similar to this

Herding cows

Which I can't all complain about because it was really relaxing. It was good as well though since we both woke up with some sore heads from the wine the night before. We didn't have much but I don't think our bodies are used to the alchohol.

We did a lot of cow herding today and managed to scare the life out of most things that we past. At one stage it was like being in the middle of a stampede of cows! It would have been scary if the cows didn't seem so afraid of us!

Jake looking proud

We are starting to feel really strong and we are just pumping through the kilometres with less needing for stopping and resting. It's good.

And the crazy wins: Eungella - Exmoor Creek

Everything that goes up has to go down, right? But does it have to be on horrible dirt roads that hardly allow a bicycle to past.

This day was a toughy. The road honestly wasn't that bad but after 2 days in a tent we started to go a little crazy I think. It was a hard emotional day in all honesty but we made it through and we remembered that although this does get hard we always have each other the keep us going. We didn't get anywhere near as far as we wanted and we are honestly down to our last biscuit but we should make it into Collinsville tomorrow to stock up on supplies.

Putting on a brave face - Atleast the scenery is nice!

This night was also mark by setting up our tent a few times on funnel web spider traps! Really getting rural now, living life on the edge.

Going a little Stir crazy: Eungella Rain Days

Spent the last two day in the tent avoiding the rain.

All in all this is a beautiful place to be but it is just WET. Although we did get to see a PLATYPUS!!

This is a video summary of our days!

View from the top end: Eton - Finch Hatton Gorge

We flew in the morning towards a town named Marian and then Mirani (honestly confusing). We stopped at Mirani for some morning tea then flew on towards our destination.

Im sick of this I'm going home

We didn't stop once until we got to our campsite for the night. So. Effing. Beautiful.

Finch Hatton Gorge was a haven for beauty. Surrounded by rainforest the camp site itself was set up with no electricity (the water was heated by woodfire) and therefore is was not inhabited by any of the usual pest that come with camp grounds. The showers were open air and you could see the rainforest whilst you were washing yourself. There was a beautiful creek to swim in which (although cold) was a refreshing dip. 

Excited for a refreshing dip

We spent the afternoon climbing up to the beautiful waterfalls in the area where Jake and a icy cold dip and I just put my feet in. Met a lady who said she was happy to put us up at her home in Atherton so we made a useful connection. 

This honestly is one of the most special places in the world! So lucky to come here.

Waterfalls

First photo of us together

Another crazy person: Carmila Beach - Eton

Woke up to the sounds of the beach and looked out to find that the water (which was a few kilometres from the camp ground last night) had come in all the way to the foredune with the tides! Crazy amazing!

Beautiful Carmila Beach!

Aiming for Mackay we were happy to roll into Sarina and find that they had a big shopping centre so we could probably bypass Mackay. 

Getting erroneous advice from the information centre we headed to a town called Homebush for a free camp site but came to a very small and free-campless town so had to push on a little further (slightly painful after a big day) and just set up tent in the local park on advice from a local. Not the best camp but it was somewhere for the night.

Quite deep into the stretch: Marlborough - Waverley Creek

This is for our Trivia friends:

Good advice!

Riding was boring today so not much to stay. Stayed at a free camp outside St Lawrence I would suggest it for anyone!

Starting the stretch: Rocky - Marlborough

Said good bye to our fantastic hosts with a possibility of seeing Johnno down the track to do some riding with us (fingers crossed). The beautiful road gave us a fantastic ride out of Rocky - hopefully a good sign of things to come!

About 10 km's out of Rocky we got a little worried as a car pulled over and out came some guy waving a big package about but it was only our wonderful host Johnno who had driven after us with a parcel that my Mum had sent up! What a guy! And now I get the luxury of wearing sunglasses - 8-)

Shoulder that goes on forever

The road is honestly quite boring which nothing other than flat cleared land and road to keep you company. We play very short games of "I Spy" which normally run out of option after 3 turns and we can understand why people suggested not riding this road.

Something we find is really funny/cool if the existence of pay phones all over the place. The reason you can never find one in any city is that they have all retired and moved to the country.

Typical landscape

Got some delicious pineapple and tomato relish at a road side vege shop (love the fruit and vege black market in Queensland) and called into Marlborough pub for the cheapest/best camp we have paid for yet! 

Also got a cool show of the bats moving out to feed on sunset.

Day off! Rockhampton

Treated ourselves to a delicious french toast breakfast due to the comforts of a real kitchen AND fridge (luxuuuuuury).

We spend the day doing our normal day off-y things - clean bikes, fill up grocery supplies, wash clothes - and stumbled upon a disastrous fact! There are NO more Aldi's until Victoria. Aldi's (although for some reason we never shop there in Sydney) has been our life blood for most of the trip which us regularly indulging in their exactly-the-same-but-different-brand super cheap products.

Also have definitely realised that country towns are NOT for pedestrians. Most of Rockhampton doesn't have sidewalks and the grass probably has never been mowed. Walking around these towns are not too fun!

Leave the clubs for Kings Cross: Biloela- Dululu

Worst. Night. Sleep. Ever! I would never suggest anyone to camp at the Boomerang park at Biloela. Not only was there a nightclub across the street which blared music til 3am (and no one suggested maybe trying to move as far away as possible) but the tent site which we were allocated was right next to a light which stayed on all night, we had the toilets next to us (where I couldn't even lock any of the toilet doors AND the showers were a little below luke warm) where it seemed nearly ever person in the caravan park decided to go for a midnight shower/vomit/coughing club. Someone had the consideration to come home after the club was closed (at 3am) and blare their music for the next few hours RIGHT NEXT TO OUR TENT. 

We left Biloela tired but relatively chipper especially considering how low our morale was after the horrible night sleep. Although we got a free pineapple as Woolworths charged us the wrong price and therefore gave it to us for FREE. We have decided to start budget time, we are now on the strictest budget and we are not going to be taken for chumps (ie. last caravan site).

FREE PINEAPPLE

The ride was quite uneventful but very pretty before we got to Dululu for our camp for the night. Dululu was tiny but had a good free camp and there was a raffle on at the pub for a cooked chook - due to budget limitations we did not enter to win said chook.

A lovely afternoon tea: Dawson Highway- Biloela

Woke up to the sound of the road getting busy so we knew it was time to move on. It was a really good climb over the hills with easy incline the entire way, I would definitely suggests this way for anyone who is riding around the Rockhampton area.

Something we have noticed cycling on this trip is the the large amount of crap on the side of the road. No matter where you are there WILL be some form litter there. We have also taken notice about the large percentage of this litter to be Ice Break Ice Coffee bottles. I don't know what it is about people who drive the roads in Queensland but they love ice coffee and they love throwing them out of the window.

You know the ones.

We honestly think that these bottles account for more than 50% of the trash on the side of the road by weight - that is including all the coke bottles, Maccas bag and crashed cars.

Jake and I decided that we should play a game coming into Biloela and start counting them from about 25km. We said if we got to 20 we would buy one and see what all the fuss is about. We counted 104! That is on ONE side of the road and those are the ones we could see! 

We tried the coffee (not too bad) and were the first people ever to chuck it in the bin which our lunch in Biloela. In Biloela we had been given invitation by Jeff and Val to come over to have afternoon tea (we met them in Calliope) and after riding after half of Biloela to try and find their house we saw Jeff outside his house waving us down. We thought it would be a quick half an hour tea but we ending up chatting and chatting about everything and stayed much longer than we planned - enjoying some delicious homemade coconut cake. 

We the looming clouds we decided to stay in a Caravan park even though it was severely out of our budget ($20!!).

Pretty hard life 

Getting lazy: Calliope - Dawson Highway Camp

I think from the moment we woke up we were not feeling like moving so it was no surprise that by the time I looked at the clock it was the ungodly hour of 9! We very slowly packed up all our things and took an incredibly quiet route out of Calliope historical village to avoid these things:

Triple the lane size!

Atleast today there was no more Bruce Highway riding and we were on the much quieter Dawson Highway. We knew before we even got going that there was no chance of us making our Biloela aim for the day so we thought we would check out Krombit Tops national park.

Took the turn off. Got to the road. The whole national park is closed.

Had to turn around and jump back onto the highway to try and find a stealth highway camp for the night.

Luckily we found a relatively nice camp halfway to Biloela at the foot of the hills - we really are getting the hang out this cycling thing again and it's feeling really god damn good!

Anzac Day: Miriamvale - Calliope

This morning was a 4:30 start so we could get to the Anzac day ceremony at Bororen. Riding along the Bruce Highway in the dark was terrifying!!

We got shouted our shotgun breakfast by a lovely lady we met in the queue who wanted to show us some country community spirit, it even came with a free shot of rum!

We avoided the urge to have a beer at 7 am like everyone else was doing and rode on down to Calliope historical village which had a beautiful free rest area for us to enjoy the rest of the afternoon.
We met two guys named Harry and Cameron who were planning on doing a trip to Brisbane from Gladstone on electric bikes. They were a bit of a comedy duo and made us laugh a bit as they push and pull them and their dog around the campground.

Dinner was a lazy sandwich dinner, real boring.

GETTING CLOSER TO CAIRNS

Sharon Gorge - Miriamvale

Up nice and early (like always - i swear half my blogs start with this) to try and do some decent km's before the sun got to hot. We went on a really nice detour through the canefields - but then again the area around Bundaberg is 90% canefields so it would have been hard to avoid them.

We stopped for some lunch at Rosedale which was a tiny town about 60 km's down the road. Had a nice chat to some rail worker who begifted us with some mandarins. Not sure people understand what these little sentiments mean to us, even if it just was some bloke who didn't want to eat his lunch fruit.

Today was a race again the clock, we have an hour til dusk and still 26km to ride which is a decent effort especially considering the terrain we were covering. We came into town with just minutes to spare and we honestly were pooped. I could hardly say goodbye to my parents on the phone (they leave for Europe today) whilst Jacob put a beer in my hand and I realised the day was over.

We met Barbara the newly appointed publican who let us set the tent up at the back and have a shower. So needed. Tomorrow is Anzac day and the anzac day ceremony is 13km's away so tomorrow blog beginning will we Up REALLY nice and early...

There are no photos from today. But here is one of Jacob's hat he made!

New shower methods: Sharon Gorge rest day

So relaxed today. Rode into Bundy to stock up at Aldi with super cheap supplies. Found a new way to shower - collect cold water at the hottest part of the day, put on your swimmers and have a water fight.

Good clean fun.

Here's a clip of me trying to save a fly.

Shoulders of an Ant: Apple Tree Creek-Sharon Gorge

Treated ourselves to a delicious breakfast of fried mushys, tomato and noodles as we had the full use of a BBQ at Apple Tree Creek campsite. We also spent part of the morning organising and reorganising the panniers so that hopefully we open less panniers at night. We are really starting to get into the groove now of how things work again and there isn't as much stress anymore.

The Isis highway was a particularly bad road for riding on. It was super busy and there was no should what so ever! We asked a lady about 10 k's in how we could get off the highway asap she suggested to go through South Kolan and avoid Bundaberg all together. Sounds good!

About another 15 k along we stop at a rest area so we could feast on our delicious pineapple from Nikenbah markets. After the feast a man name Graham came over and gave us a really good (if not too intensive) description of all the ride north til Cairns on the Bruce Highway. He let us know all the good rest stops and told us that the road between Rockhampton and Mackay is a good road - we were going to catch the bus. Now it seems Jake will get his way and we will ride.

We turned of to South Kolan not long after and had to cross over the Burnett River. For those of you who read the new you know that recently central Queensland experienced really bad floods. These photos really do not do justice of the extant that it looked like a huge bulldozer came through the landscape. The water must have rose over 20 metres high to be able to do the devastation we saw!

Burnett river crossing South Kolan

Even the trees to my right had debris in the highest branches

Tonight we are staying just outside Bundaberg in a little town called Sharon. Tomorrow will be a rest day so we can restock.

Let me introduce you to Bruce: Hervey Bay - Apple Tree Creek

Got up really early and headed out to the long pier at Hervey bay was an extremely cold task to undertake before 7. Even still we had breakfast out on the pier just to say that we did it. Sadly we went through the last of our rainbow bread and we have to buy another loaf of normal bread. =( I don't know why more towns don't make fun bread!

Longest pier ever!

Going away from Hervey bay we bump into the best markets in the world! They were huge and had such cheap food and goodies. We picked up a 50c pineapple, 50c/kg sweet potatoes, some delish relish and I got some bed socks!

After lunch in the sleepy town of Howard we were on the dreaded Bruce Highway. Honestly - not that bad! We had quite a nice shoulder and the traffic was no where near as bad as the traffic on any NSW highway so we quickly made our way into Childers.

Childers is probably mostly known for having the big backpacker fire in 2000 where 15 backpackers were killed. The hotel has been rebuilt as a art gallery and memorial which was quite interesting to go through. The town itself was very cute and quite historical. Jake got to doing some drawing whilst I went and explored the old buildings and they even had a real life cannon!

That night we stayed at a free camp called Apple Tree Creek and bumped into a guy who had recently rode his bike from Brisbane to Gladstone and gave us some advice. Really loved the pub at Apple Treek Crek (only one pot of beer for us) but there were some old dudes jamming like crazy which put us in such a good mood (or maybe it was the pot of beer).

My booties were the best value and I am NEVER going to let these touch anything but the inside of my sleeping bad. THEY ARE SACRED.

BED SOCKS!

Big spender day: Maryborough - Hervey Bay

Woke up early to walk into town to pick up a few supplies and watch the motorbike show (might as well make the best of it) and go to the markets that were being put on in town. I had also promised two little girls at Rainbow that I would take a photo of myself and the Mary Poppins in the middle of town.

The parade had lots of sparkly shiny bikes which apparently are worth more than more cars and it seemed to  go on forever (apparently there were about 3000) but we were more excited by the existence of rainbow bread, which is possibly the funnest bread ever.

Fun in a bun!

We also got my photo with my new mate - Mary Poppins!

Not the warmest lady but you can see we became close fast

We went on a shopping spree and bought all kinds of things and it was only when we were on our way back to the campground that we were questioning weather we went a little big town crazy!

Moisturiser AND a new tooth brush! 

We finally headed off to Hervey Bay at about 2:30, lucky it was only 40 kms and had to hide out in the bush on the beach as the whole beach was pretty much developed. Had a really nice day and night though, even have some Rainbow bread left over for breakfast!

We aren't apart of the right club of bikes: Rainbow Beach - Maryborough

Sadly leaving Rainbow beach today (probably if we hadn't run out of water we would have stayed) but we did it in good spirits, lots of energy and super early as it's 100 km to the next town at Maryborough. It was almost funny how different the hills were going out of Rainbow beach. Whereas we struggled on the way in we would have called the rode easy on the way out. It just goes to show how different your mood and energy level are at different points of the day and how important a rest day is!

Today was our first encounter with super huge trucks, I forgot to take any photos but along the Cooloola coast drive there were these HUGE logging trucks that flew along at 100 km/h!

We flew like crazy through the 100 km into town. The only set back was a small monster tracking me down and attaching itself to me which led to the fastest hill anyone has ever ridden as I wanted to get to the top so Jake could save me from it. It was pretty terrifying. I was pretty brave.

Vicious creature

We got into town at 2:15 feeling pretty impressed with ourselves for the speedy trip and treated ourselves to $3.50 fish and chips! Someone mentioned in passing that the Ulysses club was having their annual AGM in the town that week but we shrugged it off as a small event and nothing to be worried by.

We looked around town and found some beautiful parks before heading up to the showgrounds to stake our claim to some ground and showers. Arriving at the showers we saw it was tent city and were stopped by a very serious security lady at the entrance and told we weren't on the right sort of bikes to have entrance to the grounds. Going back to the information we were told the entire of Maryborough was booked out and there was possibly only a few tent sites left. Dismayed we headed to one of the campground were we forked over an astonishing $26 for a campground (he did left us charged our phone) and quickly had dinner (fish with curried potatoes) and fell asleep.

Find the Averill!

Gold at the end of the Rainbow Beach

Our day: Slept, ate, swam, walked, read, hid from lizards and got sand into every single possible place imaginable. I think that we will have sand in our panniers for weeks after this.

Pancake flat: Gympie- Rainbow beach

For breakfast we were spoilt again - home made south african sausages with eggs and toast! Yummy! A fantastic breakfast for our biggest day yet.

Bryan and Tertia had convinced us abandon our previous plans of going around the back way to go further north and go to Rainbow Beach on the Fraser Coast.

This was one seriously flat ride. And we got a serious flat tyre. Even after all that we got the the last 30 km's which even with the flat riding before hand was a bit of a push continuing along the undulating landscape into the small town of Rainbow Beach.

For the last 9 km stretch from the town to Inskip Point I filled my bike with close to my full capacity of water and it was HEAVY. Lucky the ride was flat and we finally were sitting on the beach enjoying the sunset with our tent only 20 metres from the beach.

Enjoying the beach, disregarding my Coastal Resource Management teachings

We went a little loco for dinner and had Mexican night! The beach really was as beautiful as Bryan and Tertia said and we could even see Fraser Island from the camp site. Definitely a rest day here tomorrow.

Fig Tree Walk-Gympie

We have realised, atleast in this part of Queensland, the morning is like sitting in a cloud. You wake up and you can't see more than 3 metres in front of you and everything is soaking wet from dew.

We bought a whole bag of custard apples for $2 from a farm stalls (theres all the wooden boxes and the front of property with honesty jars to take a bag of fruit/vegies I'll try to get a picture if I get a chance but they are possibly the best way to buy food!) and this morning one was ripe enough to eat! It was amazingly delicious and it was the final straw that made me fall in love with the area.

Custard apples far left

The ride today was quite beautiful as we took the back way through little towns called Imbil, Kadanga and Brooloo on our way to Gympie. We have been warned against Gympie and how it really isn't a town that you would consider bicycle friendly so we were a little worried about going there - especially with the big black storm clouds on the horizon!

We opted for the showgrounds tonight with the storms but the showgrounds were closed to camping, we took advice from a few other cyclist and jumped next door to the Wesley Methodist Church to ask if we could set our tent our in their large back yard. Not only did they say yes but one of the church goers said we could go back to hers for the night!!

We spent a lovely night staying at Tertia and Bryan's beautiful home (in one of the best beds I've ever slept in) and met a few more people from the church for bible study. It certainly wasn't the way I thought we would be spending the night but we honestly had one of the best nights out yet and can't be more thankful for their generosity!! 

Cheasy Day: Obi Obi Creek- Fig Tree Walk

We had decided to have a nice easy day today and head to Kenilworth where there is a CHEESE FACTORY. We had already had the pleasure of trying some of the Kenilworth Feta and loved it so we were excited to try more cheese.

My day in a nutshell

We went straight to the cheese factory and were able to try heaps of different types of cheeses and yoghurts. We decided on a cheese each to have for lunch AND they had half kilo tubs of yoghurts for $2!! We enjoyed our cheese and talked to some information guys who let us know that not only was there a beautiful rainforest walk south of the town but it also had free camping next door!! Day made.

We took our cheesy smiles and head down to the river for the day to do absolutely nothing except read, drink tea and eat. The walk was also really nice with some pretty impressive trees chilling about. We even ran into the same guy who watched us do our laundry in Maleny the day before and had a bit of a chat.

Kneel down in front so we can see those behind!

Working for Beauty: Maleny - Obi Obi Creek

I think the Cruice Park rooster took our insults to heart and decided to really piss us off by having 50 of his friends participate in the monthly Maleny poultry clubs dawn auction at Maleny showgrounds. Probably good we start training our bodies for 5 am starts.

Much better view!

The weather came out absolutely stunning today so we lay out every single one of our items to dry in the sun and manage to get rid of about 5 kg of useless things we had decided to bring (were we really planning on baking our own bread). The weather put us in a good mood and I even got to get a little shopping therapy by buying myself a cute little elephant purse from the Maleny markets. 

First stop today was Mary Cairncross park which is a nature reserve in the mountains behind Maleny. Atleast this time we could see further than the closest bushes and we able to enjoy the view.

Me navigating the harsh environment of the rainforest

We loved the little towns in the Mary Valley (Maleny, Montville and Mapleton) and we were very sad to leave the area to go camp at the bottom of the mountains.

The road to the camp was all down hill but it was almost harder to ride than the uphill sections! Being gravel the entire way we lost all our hard earn altitude over about 3 kms and a few falls. Cruised into our cute little campsite at Obi Obi Creek. It is a parcel of land that was donated by a farmer to the people so it's a hundred percent free and one hundred percent beautiful.

Masochistic Riding: Woodford - Maleny

Woken up by a little rooster who lives in the rest area. Hatred gave way to admiration as he coolly dodged all the sticks and rocks I could pick up - I don't think I was the first person to throw things at him.

It was a grey and miserable day, so we packed up and rode over to the woolies to buy some supplies, then headed off down a logging trail through state forest.

Perfect riding conditions.

After a lot of mud and rain we made it up to a beautiful lookout, where we could see bugger all due to the thick fog which would hang around for the rest of the day.

This is what we were supposed to see

This is what we could see.

From there, we rode on to Landsborough, stopping for lunch at the bottom of the ascent to Maleny. We managed to pick up some delicious beetroot relish, which fortified us (or so we thought) for the climb ahead.

Sadly, no amount of tasty condiments could prepare us for a long steep climb on narrow roads, with a thick fog and bad drivers. It wasn't much fun.  

The sign on the gate says "Heaven - KEEP OUT"

After battling our way into Maleny, we made it to the showground, where Avey celebrated with the traditional dance and song of her people.

Maleny turned out to be a really nice town though, so it was worth it.

A bit faster - Dayboro - Woodford

Poured down all night and didn't even do us the courtesy of stopping when we woke up or started riding. When we had got the tent out yesterday it had grown some furry friends on all the seams whilst it was packed up at Matt's house and we were really worried that it would compromise the integrity of the waterproofing - atleast last night proved it can handle one hell of a down pour and we will still stay dry!

After grumbling out of bed earlier than we have in a very long time we went into town to find somewhere dry to have breakfast and basically just ended up having breakfast with the rain.

I'm not sure if either of us were really looking forward to the day since it was going to be hill climbing and rain all in the one fun package but after leaving Dayboro the sky cleared a little and the hills never got that bad. I would suggest to any trying out a few day's from Brisbane to do this ride as an introduction into cycle touring. We stopped at a little cafe called the Pit Stop for a milkshake and were very lucky that we did because the second we put our bikes (and ourselves) under cover the skies showed us that they weren't finished yet. We enjoy the rain from the well covered balcony of the cafe and watched the owners sons splashing around in the rain and finding Bandi Bandi snakes.

Stopping for lunch at a lookout we realised that one of the most enjoyable things about hill climbing was badly affected do to the weather - the view. We still enjoyed the downhill ride which we had worked the morning for and rolled quite quickly into Woodford which was 4 km from the campsite.

View from Mt Mee

Queensland is great unlike NSW in that it has plenty of free campgrounds that offer just the basics of accomodation (toilet, bbq) but are perfect for the trip we are doing. Cruice park (tonights free camp) was a little noisy but perfectly appreciated nonetheless.

A slow start: Petrie - Dayboro

After planning on being gone before anyone woke up we were actually the last people to wake in the household and only just got to say our last goodbye before they headed out to work. We still had to get the tent from Jake's uncle's house so I bustled Jake out quickly whilst I tried to get the last minute packing finished up so we could leave asap.

Carrying a lot more weight than last time and after not riding much for the last few months it was very slow going for the 2 km to the station.Forgot how heavy these bikes get when they are loaded!!

Obviously, due to Murphy's law, we missed all the correct train connections and didn't arrive at Petrie Station until 1 pm - so much for getting there at 9! 

Waiting for train at Brisbane wish our fat-ass bikes

The road out of Petrie was exactly what we needed the first day out - nice wide shoulder and minimal traffic. Hoenstly though, after the break and with the weight I was getting sore and tired very quickly! We arrive in our first town stop at 2 and made a direct beeline for the bakery to have what we knew would be the first of many peanut butter sandwiches. 

We decided with rain on the horizon, still a climb and a half to get to Mt Mee that we should call it an early first day, mostly grateful for being back on the road, and set up camp for the day. We stayed in Dayboro showground which was a lovely little spot (with warm showers) made delicious pho soup for dinner and were both fast asleep at 6.

My bike with an angry sky - Dayboro Showground

Feels really good to be back on the road and looking forward to the next how ever many days we get to do this!

Beginning Again!

We know we have been super slack updating our blog, but we honestly never really sit long enough in one place to do so! I will update the section between Sydney and Brisbane when we sit down for longer but for the time being your just going to be happy with Brisbane + the rest.

Spent the last 2 weeks in Sydney seeing family (again), really feels like we have hardly left since we keep popping down to Sydney to see family/friends. 

Before that we spent 2 months in Brisbane waiting for the rains to stop. No one really prepared us for the torrential-ness of the rains in Brisbane. You could basically have fish swimming through the air, the rain is just so thick and it never ends! As soon as the sun comes out it gets really sticky and gross, but in saying that we met some really beautiful people in Brisbane - a special mention to our host Ann who put us up for the entire time in exchange for looking after her garden and chooks.

Spent the last night in Brisbane trying to win the unwinnable trivia night at Yeronga RSL with housemates and still came 2nd - we had about 11 people on our team! We have come 2nd about 10 times but I guess it's just an excuse to return to Brisbane to win.

Other than that we are both really excited to leave again tomorrow, especially since we both know that this time there is no stopping and coming down to Sydney but should hopefully be a minimum 6 months of travelling. Definitely beats any form of working.

I'll finish this blog with a picture of the floods in Brisbane.