New Year’s Eve

We celebrated New Year’s Eve at Paradise Point, where we set up our picnic table at the water front to watch the fireworks. The forecast storms fortunately held off until after midnight and then nature demonstrated how a sound and light show should really be done!

Lamington National Park

Will and Morgan have now gone back to Sydney, closely followed by Olivia and Ben, so we just have James and Chantal with us now.

So, today we headed for the Great Dividing Range for a walk through the rainforest in Lamington National Park. The altitude and the canopy provided cool relief from the heat. It was a lovely walk past numerous waterfalls and a variety of wildlife, including leeches, snakes, exotic bird calls and bizarrely a couple of blue spiny crayfish which live in the pools at the bottom of the waterfalls.

Boxing Day Afloat

Our family gathering is now complete with Chantal’s arrival.

We hired a boat to explore the waterways around Hope Island and with Captain Ben at the helm we made it across the Broadwater to South Stradbroke Island (Saath Stradie, mate).

The island is quite narrow so we were able to walk across to the ocean side and enjoy the surf, although this did involve wading through a jelly-fish infested swamp and then leaping across hot sand.

Ozzie Christmas on the Beach

Champagne breakfast followed by barbequed prawns for lunch and games on the beach. In the early evening we packed up and went back to the apartment to open our presents. It was then a dash to airport to collect Chantal who had flown in from the UK for a second Christmas!

Pelican Feeding

Busy today with last-minute shopping for Christmas. We did, however, take some time out to watch the lunch-time pelican feeding at the fish market.

Mount Tamborine

We took to the hills today into the ‘hinterland’. The scenery is beautiful up here with sub-tropical rainforests, waterfalls and cooling rock pools.

Australian Outback Spectacular

Last night we went to an Australian outback show based around various outback legends. There was some outstanding horsemanship and Australian daring-do, accompanied with superb bush tucker and endless beer and wine top-ups.

Will and Morgan Arrive

The Robinson gathering is now complete, apart from a surprise guest appearance expected on Christmas day (and no, it isn’t Santa Claus).

We picked up Will and Morgan from the Gold Coast airport and had lunch in Coolangatta followed by a stroll along the beach.

Surfer’s Paradise

Our local beach. Does what it says on the tin, although the surf was rather messy today. Fortunately it’s possible to get away from the excesses of the town itself as the beach stretches as far as you can see in the opposite direction.

Ben and Olivia Arrive

The gathering of the Robinson clan continues this morning with the arrival of Ben and Olivia. Erika invited us over to her apartment for a get together (Ben’s already falling asleep from jet lag).

James Arrives

We went to Brisbane today to collect James who is arriving from New Zealand. We took the opportunity to do some Christmas shopping at the Queen Street Mall.

Hope Island

Continuing north into Queensland we had a date with Ben’s mum (Erika) and Sebastian. They took us over to the apartment where we’ll stay over Christmas and New Year. Most importantly, we needed to meet and make friends with our hosts.

Wal and Jenny

After just 3 days in Sydney, it was time to head north and to visit Wal (Ben’s dad) and Jenny in Nelson Bay. Jenny treated us to a lovely lunch and dinner and Wal took us around the local bays and view points. We even got Wal to walk up one of the pointy hills overlooking the coast and inlets.

Back in Sydney

So, here we are back in Sydney, ready to start another Ozzie adventure. It was great to see Will and Morgan and to catch up with their news. We didn’t have long in Sydney, but it was enough for a quick surf on Bondi Beach (in less than ideal conditions) and to take advantage of a couple of a couple of eateries.

The End of a Journey

And so we find ourselves back in Sydney and a farewell dinner at Will and Morgan’s flat.

We feel a little like we’ve completed a loop in more ways than one. The mutton birds (short-tailed shearwaters) which migrate from Alaska to the south coast of Australia of which we saw casualties of their long flight on the beaches of Eastern Australia but saw their breeding grounds along the Great Ocean Road. On their migration they cover about the same distance that we did (17,000km) We saw the bogon moths (an Aboriginal delicacy) in the tropics and went to where they migrate to breed around mount Bogon in the Victorian Alps.

We feel sad about going home, but we know that there is plenty more to explore in this vast country.

So, that’s all for now folks……

Mount Buffalo Plateau

We moved on to another area of the Victorian Alps called the Mount Buffalo Plateau, where we ascended a lookout above the plateau giving fine views of the mountain we climbed yesterday and even as far as Mount Koszcioscou which had climbed in November.

The next day we did a circular walk on the plateau, with some more lookouts across the plateau.