Peter William Anderson

We spent 2 days in Mackay. The most culturally exciting thing that Mackay has to offer is that some famous opera singer (name already forgotten) spent 1 whole year here before deciding she didn’t like the climate and moving back south. One year! And you get to walk around the house that she lived in the that whole year…exciting stuff…
Thankfully for any non Australian old school opera fans there is also Eungella National Park nearby. Walking through this rainforest was a great experience, especially as we got to go platypus watching at the end! To be fair, Mackay is also a sugar growing region, and driving through field upon field of cane is a very relaxing experience, and the little railway lines and massive processing plants make for interesting distractions.
Overall 2 days were more than enough for Mackay so we took an 11 hour bus ride up to Mission Beach.

We spent 5 relaxing days at Agnes Water, mostly just lounging around on the beach. We did take a couple of day trips though. Firstly, we took some walks along (another) beach in Deep Water Park and then a kayak through a Tea Tree lined river. It was incredibly peaceful as we were the only people there!

Our second trip saw us visit the Great Barrier Reef from Lady Musgrave island. We were very lucky to have a calm 1.5 hour crossing and then spent the morning snorkelling from the pontoon. We got to see some great fish, turtles and a shark! In the afternoon we took a walk on the island and a few glass bottom boat trips. Overall a fantastic trip, definitely one of the highlights of Australia so far!

Fraser island saw us spend 3 days flashpacking at the lovely Kingfisher Bay Resort. Most people take a 4×4 tour of the island, but instead we decided to relax and enjoy the various ranger activities on offer. On several walks around the island we learnt about bush tucker (and then sampled a whole load that evening including emu, crocodile and kangaroo), the night wildlife and took a sea kayak into the mangrove lagoon. Not too many photos, but a few good ones of the spectacular sunset enjoyed from the beach.

Once again a little behind with uploading the photos… At the moment we are already halfway up the east coast of Australia. (More photos coming very soon!)

We had a great few days in Sydney. Climbed the Sydney harbour bridge (thanks for the tip Neil!) which was fantastic. We also went to a concert at the Sydney opera house, went up the Sydney tower and met up with friends of Friedis, Karl and Lydia (great meeting you guys!).