Cambodia

The trip up the Cambodian side of the Mekong river took several hours, but it was fascinating seeing the differences in the landscape. The countryside was more open along the river banks except for banana and coconut trees planted around the houses. These are traditionally built on stilts and most are either made of wood or panels made from palm leaves. Every now and again we would pass large pagodas which were painted bright yellow and red. The last part of the trip was by bus and by the time we ended up at the Okay guesthouse in Phnom Penh it was dark. The guesthouse didn't live up to its name - there were some dubious goings on and the plumbing wasn't up to much. However, next morning we found somewhere better and spent the day looking round the royal palace and the silver pagoda. We also went to the so-called Russian market where knock-offs from Cambodia's clothing trade among other things can be bought for a song. The beautiful sunset over the river was enjoyed from the balcony of The Foreign Correspondents’ Club with a large G and T.

Phnom Penh is a beautiful city with much of its colonial architecture and wide avenues still intact. There's much less traffic than in the Vietnamese cities – fewer motorbikes except for those pulling tuk-tuks. Cambodia is noticeably a poorer country, and there are plenty of land-mine victims begging and people from the countryside looking for a better life living on the streets. But the Khmers seem to be a very open and relaxed race. And given their recent past it is amazing to us that the country has got back on its feet so quickly.

On our second day in Phnom Penh we took a tuk-tuk out to "the killing fields" of Choeung Ek and the Tuol Sleng museum, a former High School that the Khmer Rouge turned into the most notorious prison in Cambodia. In the course of three and a half years they killed an estimated 2 million people -15 percent were tortured or beaten to death and the rest died of starvation. It made an enormous impression on us walking round former prison and seeing the fields of Choeung Ek, where those of the mass graves that have been opened still have pieces of bone and clothing sticking out of the ground. Our guide told how his parents, both doctors, and the rest of Cambodia’s educated were beaten to death with clubs and farm implements in a mad attempt to create an agrarian state where everyone did as they were told.

From Phnom Penh we headed north by bus to Siem Reap, a town that is growing at a tremendous rate owing to the increasing popularity of the Angkor temples. Angkor was the capital of the Khmer empire and dozens of temples were built over a large area between the 9th and 15th century. We spent three days exploring the most important temples using various methods of transport – tuk-tuk, car and bike. Angkor Wat, the largest religious building in the world, is the one that is perhaps best preserved, and was a stunning sight at sunrise.

Many of the temples are in a ruined state but still have the most exquisite relief carvings. Others are being torn apart by enormous trees and have been left to their fate in the jungle. A glimpse of monkeys between the trees, elephants being led along the road and the sound of landmine victims playing traditional music to earn money, makes it all a mystical experience.

We also visited the landmine museum nearby that is run by a former Khmer Rouge soldier who was recruited as a child to lay mines. After being captured by the Vietnamese he was trained to use his skill to disarm mines, and has since spent his time making amends by trying to disarm as many as possible and looking after victims.

From Siem Reap we travelled north by taxi to the border, where we walked across into Thailand. Then it was a 4 hour bus journey to Bangkok, where we met up with Kirstin and Rory before travelling to Koh Chang. The “elephant island” is where we are going to spend Christmas.

Southern Vietnam

We left Hoi An on the "sleeper bus" - one of those experiences you can tick off and say you've done but don't want to repeat in the near future! We were assigned cotlike affairs with reclined backrests which were built for Vietnamese-sized people. The trip to Nha Trang took 12 hours and we had 3 stops (the third one was just 15 mins. from our destination - apparently he'd been driving too fast?). However, after finding a friendly hotel owner that let us shower and leave our bags, we headed for the beach. Nha Trang is one of Vietnam's big holiday spots and has a stunning beach. It was a sunny day, the first they'd had for a while as they are now heading into their rainy season. We spent a pleasant morning wandering along the front and in the market, before heading to the station to catch the afternoon train to Saigon. Time is beginning to run out and we have to get to Bangkok by the 19th of December.

The train journey was interesting as we got to see more of the countryside than when travelling by road. Vietnam is very built up along the roads. We were the only westerners in our carriage which also made a change from the tourist buses. We arrived in Saigon late in the evening both ready for a good night's sleep.

Saigon (or Ho Chi Minh City) is Vietnam's commercial centre. It was the capital of the French colony and built up a lot of commercial contacts during the Vietnam war. It seems a more gracious city than Hanoi in many ways and despite there being about 6 million motorbikes on the roads here, the traffic is less overwhelming. There are lots of buildings from the French colonial period which have been restored, among others the main post office and the former "Hotel de Ville" which is now the headquarters of the Communist Party. And as in Hanoi and the other towns in Vietnam, life is lived on the street - people cooking, eating, meeting friends, playing games or doing business along every pavement.

I spent the next couple of days exploring some of the city on foot or by cyclo while Kevin struggled with a stomach upset. The Reunification palace built by the South Vietnamese government is pure 1960s architecture. They didn't get to use it much apart from when they surrendered power to the Vietcong. After that I went to the Museum Of HCMC, a gracious old colonial building which in addition to being an interesting little museum also appeared to be a favorite spot for couples to take their bridal pictures. I also visited the Emperor Jade Pagoda, where the chinese community in Saigon worship. It was very beautifully decorated, at least what could be seen through the clouds of incense. The main streets and shops in Saigon were busy getting their displays ready for Christmas - polystyrene snowmen, tinsel Christmas trees and "Rudolf the red-nosed reindeer" in Vietnamese!

From Saigon we took a bus to the Mekong river delta. It's an area that is heavily populated with lots of small towns and villages, some of which are actually floating on the river. The river divides into 9 tributaries and pretty much everything that's going on happens either on or around the river. We visited one small village by boat where they made coconut candy and rice paper and another which had a fish farm. We spent the night in Chau Doc near the Cambodian border.

It was an early start the next day to be paddled round one of the floating villages before setting off on the slow boat for Cambodia; a 10 hour trip in the sun - very pleasant watching all the activities being carried on along the river, although not exactly a comfortable journey. Much of the area along the river still bears scars from the war when much of the jungle was defoliated and then cleared with Napalm bombs to smoke out the Vietcong. The only large trees are fast-growing and hardy eucalyptus trees donated by the Australian government. We had one stop along the way to eat lunch before carrying our bags across the border, getting more stamps in our passports and continuing on to Phnom Penh.



We now have a week in Cambodia before we meet up with Kirsty and Rory in Bangkok and spend the last week of our trip on Koh Chang island in Thailand. I'll write the Cambodian instalment, but I expect most of the people reading this will probably be too busy with Christmas preprations to have time to read it. So thanks for all the comments and mails we've received - we've been amazed at all the interest. We don't have access to everyone's email addresses, so we would like to take this opportunity to wish you all a happy and peaceful Christmas and we look forward to catching up with you in the New Year!

Takk til alle venner og kollegaer som har vist interesse for reisen vaar. Vi oensker dere alle en hyggelig og fredelig jul med bra skifoere og masse familiekos. Naa gleder vi oss til norsk grovbroed med norvegia og selvfoelgelig til aa se dere alle igjen! GOD JUL!

Sapa to Hoi An: mountains and paddy fields

We took the night train from Hanoi up to Lao Cai on the Chinese border in north-west Vietnam. The early morning air was a chilly 3 degrees when we arrived in Sapa, which was a shock to the system. But it was great to breathe in after the fumes of Hanoi. The bus ride from Lao Cai to Sapa is 38 km of winding roads that climb steadily uphill. Halfway along the sun came up and the views of the mountains and valleys below were just breathtaking. The paddy fields are terraced up the hillside and there are small villages where hill tribes live dotted here and there. Sapa itself is a pretty little mountain town which thrives on taking tourists trekking in the mountains and selling the handicrafts made by women from the local mountain tribes.

I spent much of the first day in bed nursing a cold, shivering and admiring the view through the window, while Kevin did some walking. The next day we hired a guide and set off on a 12 km trek down to a couple of the local villages. There are lots of different ethnic minorities living in the area: Black H'Mong, Red Dzao, Zai (Chinese) and Thai among others. Our guide Dung (pronounced Zum) was a lively Thai wearing a green pith helmet! We were also accompanied much of the way by a couple of the women from the Black H'mong tribe. It was glorious weather and despite the air being cold it was fine walking in t-shirts. The women were wearing local dress like all the others, and they told us a little about their families.
Not all the children go to school as the parents can't afford to send them all, so the girls sell handicrafts and the boys help their fathers take the buffalo up into the higher pastures. On the second half of our journey we were followed by a couple of 6 year old minxes trying to sell us things in persuasive English, but they were eventually bought off with a packet of sweets each!

From Sapa we headed south to Hanoi on the night train again. We shared our carriage this time with 2 men, one Vietnamese and the other Japanese. The couple of hours before going to sleep were enlivened by playing a bizarre form of charades in an effort to communicate. The Japanese guy showed he had a sense of humour when the Vietnamese man told him he needed to shave off his beard and lose the scarf if he hoped to find a wife!

The express trains run mostly at night so we booked a sleeper from Hanoi to Hue, and spent the day visiting the ancient citadel of Hoa Lu and the river caves in Tam Coc in the Ninh Binh province. The landscape here is much like the rocky limestone outcrops in Halong Bay, and we had a pleasant cycle ride through the countryside from Hoa Lu to Tam Coc. The boat trip to the caves in a sampan was spoilt by the constant pressure to buy stuff, both from the couple doing the rowing and from sellers in other boats.

Hue in central Vietnam, our next stop, has an enormous citadel built mostly in the 18th century. Much of it was ruined during the Vietnam war as Hue is close to the former Demilitarized Zone (the border between North and South Vietnam). What's left shows that it must have been a stunning sight in all its glory. We spent the day walking around looking at the ruins and at the local market, which was tightly packed with stalls stacked high with wares of all kinds and people desperate to sell to us.

We took the bus the next day to Hoi An, a hundred or more kilometers further south past endless rice paddies. The road follows the coast and goes through a dividing range of mountains before going past more paddy fields. Hoi An is a charming little town which has been a major trading post for centuries. Its architecture is inspired by a mixture of Japanese, Chinese, Vietnamese and French influences. Many of these lovely old buildings have green moss growing up them, a result of the almost annual autumnal floods which sweep river water into them. Nearly every other building seems to house shops selling silk and lacquer ware, and there are endless places to get clothes or shoes tailor-made at less than one would pay for clothes bought off-the-peg back home. So we did what most people do in Hoi An and ordered some clothes, which meant we had appointments for fittings to keep in between the sight-seeing. Hoi An is also known for its various specialities in the food line, and has a range of good restaurants to try out. Many of them also offer cookery courses, so being a good wife I've sent Kevin on one. I'm looking forward to tasting the results!

Tonight we head on down to Ho Chi Minh City, or Saigon as most people still call it.

Hanoi

Well, we were lucky! Half an hour before we were due to land in Bangkok, our plane was diverted to Singapore owing to riots in Bangkok. As you probably know, Bangkok airport was closed by anti-government protesters and has still not opened. On arriving in Singapore, we were able to organise a night in a top-class hotel and a direct flight to Hanoi the next day, all courtesy of British Airways!

Hanoi, Vietnam's capital, was a culture shock after the wide open spaces of Australia. There are over 80 million people living in a country the size of Norway, and a lot of them seem to be here. The roads are packed with cars, scooters, mopeds, bicycles, women carrying baskets on yokes and people everywhere. You take your life into your hands every time you cross the road dodging the traffic. Amazingly enough there are few accidents, they seem to have perfected the art of weaving in and out of the traffic around them in the most nonchalant way. The pollution is such that your airways notice it almost immediately, and many people wear masks covering their nose and mouth. Having said all that, it is also a fascinating place once you get used to it. There's so much going on. People preparing meals on the pavement that smell wonderful, others sitting around chatting, a constant racket from tooting horns and calls from street vendors.

After a good night's sleep we met up with another of our nephews, Lawrence, who is travelling through Asia at the moment. We spent the day feeding him up and giving him some culture, as well as organizing tours to Halong Bay. We visited the Temple of Literature and wandered through the fascinating back streets in the old quarter of Hanoi. There are streets which just sell shoes, others which sell only hardware, toiletries, clothes, spices etc. and of course those selling silk and lacquer ware. We ended the day watching a performance of the Water Puppets. This is an amazing puppet show conducted in a pool of water beside which a traditional Vietnamese orchestra plays.

The next two days were spent in Halong Bay, a 3 hour drive from Hanoi. The bay has almost 2000 small islands and islets like wooded mountains rising straight out of the sea. Legend has it that a dragon came down from the mountains and ended in the bay, and the islands are the spines on his tail. It is a magical place despite the amount of tourists that insisted on accompanying us! We spent the rest of the first day on a junk sailing round the islands, kayaking and watching the sunset from Titop Island. We also spent a chilly night on board the junk. After breakfast our lovely little guide Nga took us to Hang Sung Sot cave, an amazing series of limestone caves with among other things a rock called "the penis rock" - it looked just like one too! Then it was back to the shore and the bus to Hanoi.

I started today early at Hoan Kiem lake, which is in the centre of Hanoi. It was just after sunrise and the park area around the lake was full of people walking, running, sitting and meditating or playing badminton on any available paved area. There was a group of old ladies in their winter coats and hats doing Tai Chi, old men flexing their joints and a whole crowd of younger women dancing to Boney M. And for once there was almost no noise of traffic on the streets. After breakfast we went to see Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum and the Presidential palace. Many of the people queueing up to see Uncle Ho were Vietnamese, he very obviously plays an important role in their national identity.


Tonight we take the night train to Lao Chai and Sa Pa where we are going to do some trekking in the mountains. It'll be the first time we have to put on our winter woolies! After that we head south.

The red centre - Alice and Uluru

Alice Springs is situated pretty much in the centre of Australia, surrounded by mountains and deserts. Flying there from Adelaide and then back to Sydney, you see vast areas of red nothingness crossed by the occasional track and creek. However, we were in for a surprise when we landed as "the red centre" had turned green! Alice Springs has been experiencing a series of rainstorms, the first rain for 2 years, causing the rivers to flood and everything to spring into life. It was amazing to see the speed at which things can grow and the variety of flowering plants, desperate to produce seed while they have the chance.

Alice was built originally as a telegraph station linking Adelaide to the far north, but has grown into a sizeable town. It is the first place we have been since Cairns where the Aboriginal people have been so apparent around the town and though the two communities seem to live parallel lives, we saw several signs of cooperation. Among other things, a lot of the art work produced by local indigenous communities is sold in Alice Springs in cooperatives as well as in more upmarket galleries. We spent our first day wandering round town looking at the art work, booking a trip to Uluru and then wading back through the river to our motel.

Next morning it was up early to start our trip. Having limited time and with unpredictable weather and road conditions we ended up with a two day tour, which was not what we would have chosen, but can't complain! We drove the first 250 km in a coach before transferring to a minibus with six other people and a very enthusiastic tour guide who drove us a further 200 km to King's Canyon in the George Gill range. There we spent the rest of the day walking the 6 km round the rim of the canyon. The temperature was in the low 30s and a clear blue sky, so it was hot climbing over the rocks.
However, the views were beautiful and we saw various lizards and loads of flowering plants, such as the desert tomato and the chocolate acacia.

We spent that night at a roadhouse owned by the Aborigines but run by white Australians. It was the only building for miles, but had all we needed - most importantly a hot shower to wash off the dust!

We were picked up next morning by the coach which was chauffered by two extremely knowledgeable and amusing guides. We were taken first to Kata Tjuta (the Olgas), four humps pushed up out of the ground millions of years ago, and then on to Uluru (Ayer's rock). Both places are sacred to the local Aborigine tribes and the national park is run by a group of indigenous and non-indigenous people. Uluru means meeting place and the caves and waterholes around the base provided food and shelter and a place where they could come together and celebrate.
It is a place that has its own mystique and significance for all who come there, though I have to admit that it was lessened for me by having to trail after 40 other people and having it portioned out by someone else. We ended up at the sunset viewing place where our guides provided us with champagne and a barbecue. There we sat together with hundreds of other people waiting for the setting sun to shine on the Rock - how bizarre? However, the champagne helped us to see the funny side, particularly as there was no sunset - the sky was covered in clouds! After a 5 hour coach trip back to Alice we sank gratefully into bed.

Our last day in Alice we spent at the desert park, which shows the fauna and flora living and growing in desert sands, desert river and woodland areas - very interesting. Afterwards we happened on a posthumous exhibition of a well-known aboriginal painter who started painting in his 80s and lived to be 100 years old. His family, friends and art critics were gathered there to celebrate his work.

We are now back in Sydney for our last couple of days in Australia. We are staying with Kirstin, who has finished her masters with distinction. We've had a great time here, travelled over 18,000 km, seen lots of amazing things and met so many interesting people. I hope one day we can come back. Tomorrow we take the plane to Bangkok and then on to Hanoi and a new adventure!

Melbourne to Adelaide

We entered Victoria when we crossed the Murray river at Albury. The landscape changed from flat open fields to rolling hills with areas of forest. On our left we could see the Australian alps in the distance. We spent the night just north of Melbourne in the vine-growing Yarra valley and had a memorable meal at the Balgownie estate vineyard's restaurant.

Rain followed us down into Melbourne, but cleared up later to show the city in better colours. Melbourne has a more Victorian English feel to it than Sydney - it's where the old money is. The centre is full of trams and lovely old-fashioned alleyways with cafes, restaurants and shops, though there are plenty of more modern buildings too. We haven't quite made up our minds about the newly-built cultural centre by the Yarra river!

After Melbourne we headed for Torquay and the start of the Great Coast Road. The road which covers nearly 200 km of the coast between Melbourne and Adelaide was built after WWI by ex-soldiers in memory of all the Aussie soldiers who lost their lives.
Despite having seen endless pictures of it beforehand, it is a really spectacular coastline, and the pictures cannot convey the relentless force of the ocean. Particularly the Twelve Apostles and London Bridge - two areas where limestone stacks stick up through the sea - were stunningly beautiful. There was a bracing wind blowing from Antarctica most of the time and the temperature was only around 15 degrees so I was glad I'd brought a pair of jeans!


We spent a couple of days driving and stopping along the coast enjoying the views and walking in the Otway national park. One of the places we stopped the woods were full of koalas sleeping up in the Eucalyptus trees, waking occasionally to chew a leaf or two.




Then we turned north and drove up through the Grampians, an area of sandstone mountains. We stayed the night at Halls Gap, a pretty little village in the mountains and woke to the calls of parakeets, lorikeets and corellas. We spent the morning walking up to one of the peaks, which gave a stunning view over the mountains and down to the valley below. Kevin ran a good part of the way, past endless groups of very unfit Australian schoolkids who were being forced to take some exercise.

At one of the picnic spots in the area we sat for a while watching a mob of kangaroos lazing under the trees before bounding off to find better pastures.
And so on through the Wimmera and endless kilometers of wheatfields before crossing the border into South Australia, where everything was noticably yellow and drier until we neared the Adelaide Hills. The countryside here is much more lush, with wooded hills, the famous Barossa Valley wineries to the north and a pretty coastline. Adelaide itself is a city with a rather gracious but provincial feel to it - much smaller and quieter than either Melbourne or Sydney, except when there is a test match or festival on!

Tomorrow we fly to Alice Springs and Uluru - our last week in Australia.

New South Wales

We spent the weekend in Sydney staying with our nephew Dan and his wife Kerrie in their apartment by Sydney harbour bridge - if you crane you neck you can see the bridge fom their window! The weather wasn't great, so we did city stuff - ate dinner at Darling harbour and went shopping in Bondi with Kirsty and friends.

On Sunday we picked up a rental car and took off to the Blue Mountains with Dan and Kirsty to do some walking. It was a beautiful sunny day, but the air was cooler than anything we have experienced here in Australia - more like spring in Norway. Just perfect for walking. The Blue mountains are spectacular and there really is a blue haze over them. Once you get away from the crowds they are still an almost untouched wilderness. However, it does feel like upside down walking - all the roads and settlements are at the top of the mountains and you have to walk downhill first! We spent the night in Katoomba having put the others on a train back to Sydney, and carried on exploring the area the next morning. The views around Blackheath, another small village in the area, were even more spectacular. It also has an enormous Rhododendron garden, which was in full bloom at the moment.

After that we drove inland though the mountains into sheep and cattle farming country to a farm near a small town called Dunedoo. The farm is owned by some friends of my family, and we were made welcome in true Aussie fashion by Gail and Ross. We spent a very interesting couple of days there being shown around the farm, herding sheep on motorbikes and generally learning a bit about farmlife in Australia. They primarily produce lambs, but also have cattle and crops. Harvest-time starts in the next couple of days, so they have plenty to keep them busy now. On our last night there we had one of their lambs roasted in a wood oven outside - mmm!

After leaving them we drove south through New South Wales and more heavily populated farming country (though not by English standards). The towns are larger and closer together, still with the distinctive Australian one-storey buildings. Lunch was in Cowra by the rose garden. Cowra had a massive Japanese breakout from its POW-camp during WWII and many prisoners died. They have since made great efforts to achieve a reconciliation with the Japanese people.

Then on through Cootamundra, the birthplace of the legendary Don Bradman (Australia's greatest cricketer), to Wagga Wagga, Austalia's largest inland city, which just happens to have the National Art Glass Gallery. Wagga is a pleasant town based around the Murrumbidgee river, where the trees are full of cockatoos.

Today we head on down though the Yarra valley vineyards to Melbourne and the state of Victoria.

Queensland coast: Cairns - Brisbane

Since leaving Cairns we have travelled 1700 km down the Queensland coast to Brisbane on the Greyhound bus. The bus journey takes about 30 hours if you do it all in one go, and is mostly used by backpackers half our age looking for the beaches and party scene! We quickly decided that we needed to break up the journey to make it as manageable as possible in the time we had.

The first stage was a short hop of two hours to Mission Beach, where we spent four days at The Sanctuary, a beautiful place at the top of a hill covered in rainforest and with its own private beach. The Sanctuary has small cabins set in the rainforest with walls made of screens so that you are surrounded by the sounds of the wildlife living there. The restaurant in the main building opens out on to a veranda with a breathtaking view of the coral sea. The walk down to the beach to the beach was an adventure every time, wondering whether you would meet a cassowary (enormous birds) or not. We spent our days there mostly relaxing on the beach, apart from the day we took the local ferry to Dunk island. There we did a 12 km walk in the rainforest round the island - a bit claustrophobic really, especially when we came face to face with a hand-sized spider hanging above the path, but with good views from the top of the mountain.

From Mission Beach we did a a 9 hour stint on the bus down to Airlie Beach. Airlie itself is very touristy and aimed at backpackers. However, it is the gateway to the beautiful Whitsunday islands, named by Captain Cook for the day on which he first saw them. Our lodgings this time were in a backpacker resort, but the kids were very friendly to a couple of oldies!



We took a day trip on a sailing boat out to a tiny island/reef in the Whitsundays with Reg, an interesting Dutch ex-colonial who has spent years sailing the Pacific ocean. There was only one other couple with us, and we had a fantastic relaxing day sailing the boat, snorkeling around the coral reef and swimming with turtles. Lunch on the beach was provided by Reg's wife.


From Airlie we took the bus down to Rockhampton, the beef capital of Australia, situated where the Tropic of Capricorn crosses the coast. Most people don't stop here as it's not much of a tourist attraction, but rather like a midwest town in the States. The Criterion hotel that we stayed in is one of the oldest buildings in Rockhampton built on the site of the original Bush hotel.

The hotel still has a look of faded glory and though haphazard attempts have been made to modernise it, it hadn't lost any of its charm. We spent the day wandering in the botanical gardens and trying to find shade from the blistering heat. It was Melbourne cup day and most of Australia stopped up to watch the horse race and celebrate afterwards.



We did the last stage of the trip down to Brisbane overnight, arriving at 06 in the morning to the first real rain we've seen for weeks. Brisbane is the state capital and a very pleasant city which manages to keep the laid-back Queensland feel to it despite being a very modern shopping and cultural centre. We spent a couple of days looking around the city, shopping (OK, it was raining!), cycling along the river banks and visiting a koala sanctuary.


Despite being in the city again we still managed to come face to face with the local wildlife - a few possums playing in the park in the evening near our hotel, half meter long lizards wandering by our table as we ate lunch and birds everywhere.

And so on to Sydney by plane for the weekend before heading south again.

Gulf Savannah country

We've spent the last 11 days travelling in a loop through an area of the Australian outback just south of the Gulf of Carpentaria, and have done about 3000 km. The Gulf savannah is an area of rugged beauty and stark colours with wide blue skies, dry golden pasturelands interspersed with Eucalyptus trees and red soil. It's criss-crossed by creeks and rivers which are home to crocodiles; dry at the moment for the most, but overflowing and flooding once "the wet" comes. The road cuts straight through the landscape like a red spear connecting small towns of 2-300 people with little shops from a bygone era, that lie up to several kilometers apart.


The wildlife is far more apparent than we expected - wallabies, kangaroos, emus and eagles along the roadside; frogs, lizards and toads around the campsites, and a variety of birds in rainbow colours chattering away in the trees. We passed endless herds of cattle clustered round waterholes or searching for shade under the treesfrom the relentless sun. The temperature was mostly between 30 - 40 degrees C. Hot!!

It's been an amazing adventure. We've learnt to check under the toilet seats for green frogs, change tyres in blistering heat (3 punctures in week !) and to take things as they come. In the outback you are expected to help one another, and we have met immense kindness and friendliness along the way. The Aussie expression "No worries" has guided us through.

We set off from Cairns in our 4WD with its tent on the roof (and one in the back for Kirsty) heading west through the Atherton Tablelands. A mountainous area of partly cleared rainforest (part of the Great Dividing Range), which now looks very rural and a lot like England except for the exotic vegetation and the purple Jacaranda trees. Our first night in Yungaburra was punctuated by rain and little sleep thanks to a lively group of Australians!

Once over the mountains the area flattened out into Savannah grasslands as we headed towards the gulf. The road is mostly only one lane with rough trach either side, so you have to keep your eyes open for roadtrains (over 50 m long) and get off the road. We spent the second night in Georgetown. It was Saturday night and the annual "Bushman's Ball", so everyone (young and old) were dressed to kill. Then on to the Gulf coast and the fishing village of Karumba, where the weather was hot and sultry and we watched the beautiful sunset while eating freshly caught prawns.

After that the road turned to dirt track for the 250 km to Burketown (the original for "A town like Alice"). A tiny place, but definitely the friendliest place in the outback, with a pub full of odd and interesting characters who were more than ready to talk to the strangers in town.



We then turned south, still on dirt tracks, heading for Boodjamulla (Lawn Hill) national park. However, a blowout meant a day of waiting by the Gregory river for a new tyre before we could continue. The national park is a remnant rainforest oasis in a gorge with a sizeable river. It was like stumbling on the Garden of Eden, and we spent a couple of days lounging around, swimming, canoeing and walking, in between watching the wallabies and looking for freshwater crocodiles.


Then south again and east through a more arid and dull landscape with larger mining towns. Cloncurry, where the Rev. John Flynn started the Flying Doctor Service, hasn't seen rain for 2 and a half years! After driving eastwards for several hundred kilometers we turned north again. The Undara lava tubes made an interesting stop along the way before finally heading back to Cairns and the east coast.