Back in Sydney

So it was a sad farewell to our campervan this morning but a welcome return to Sydney and the comfort of Chateau Randall this afternoon, with the added bonus of Richard's 2nd Cousin from New Zealand visiting - Jean-Anne, whom we last saw at Rosemary and James wedding, when Callum was 3 weeks old.

To make it a bit more entertaining and challening we also had a hire car, and this was my first attempt at driving with a Sat Nav (I know very un-techy of me, but I love maps). It took a few blocks to gauge the scale but after that I thought it was quite interesting.
More on driving in Australia tomorrow, but right now need sleep!

Great Barrier Reef

I cannot really put into words the amazing feeling snorkling on the reef had on both Richard and myself this morning. We saw rays, schools of fish coral of all shapes and colours, blue starfish, sea cucumbers and more colours and sizes of fish than I can describe. Callum was not happy to use a snorkel but he had a good go and swam about with a life jacket on and the staff on our trip were amazing at trying to include him and he really had a brilliant time and we even saw some dolphins on our way back to shore. We all managed to find something amazing about the trip. We went with Ocean Safari in a giant rib to get out to Mackay Reef. It was a 25min ride out which we all found very thrilling and they gave really good instructions as this was my first time proper snorkling, and I found it really easy to float about and see the fish. Totally brilliant! We are leaving here tomorrow and heading back to Sydney on Thursday. We will be sad to say goodbye to our campervan.

Cape Tribulation

Well here we are up in Cape Tribulation, which is pretty much as far as you can go up the Eastern coast of Australia without a 4WD vehicle!

The photo above is from our camp site website and shows just how cl0se to the beach we are, and where we have spent the whole day just chilling out today.

And just to rub it in, here is another photo.

Life in the campervan is going well, after a rather fraught first night, where it had taken us slightly longer than planned to resolve the broken sandel crisis (a girl has to have comfortable thongs - yes that is aaussie for flip-flops). I have ended up with a pair of crocs that are not as comfy as my old pair, but nothing but a highly expensive pair of white Birkenstocks came close! Anyway back to the problem at hand, after draging ourselves round the shops to get food, shoes, money and insect repellant we headed north to Port Douglas and stayed in a campsite there for the night, but arrived not really leaving ourselves enough sunlight to get sorted, so a lot of unpacking and faffing ensued while we tried to calm a highly excited but also hungry Callum and get our belonging stowed somewhere so we could bed down for the night.
Richard put his newly found Aussie barbie skills (thanks to lessons from Peter and James in Sydney) to the test and rustled up from sausages, potatoes and spare ribs for tea, while I used all my stowing on boats practice top get the camper ready for sleeping. Suffice to say it was all quiet by 9.30pm!

The photo on the right is our camper (well not our exact one but you get the idea). We have found for driving that it works best with Callum upfront and Richard sits in the back.

We went to a brilliant Hartley Croc Farm yesterday morning and enjoyed seeing some saltwater and freshwater crocs, koalas, snakes and various lizards. It was a great place with a very good cafe overlooking the croc swamp just in time to see the biggest male "Ted" get his lunch too!

So sorry to ramble on for so long but thought I would bring you up to speed. We are now half way through our holiday and feel like we have been gone for ages, but I am sure back in the UK time has passed much quicker. We are off on a trip to see The Great Barrier Reef on Tuesday morning.