Roadtrip Australia

We left Michelle in Brisbane to study for her last finals and rented a camper van to tour the coast of Australia north of Brisbane. We went with Wicked Campers, which as it turns out is not as cheap as we would have hoped (after adding in taxes, insurance, etc.) but since we can sleep in it and it includes a stove to cook on I think it will be fine.

The Wicked Campers are painted all crazy; ours has guns all over it which is kind of annoying, but I think it does make people give us a wide berth, which is useful since I often forget which side of the road I'm supposed to be on.

From Australian Roadtrip Part I

We cruised up the coast, stopping at the beautiful beach in Mooloolaba before camping for the night at a road side rest stop. Australia is pretty friendly toward camper vans and at the rest stop we were at there were several other vans staying for the night. It cools off at night and the van was actually pretty comfortable so we slept well.

The next day we continued up along the coast, stopping at a Sunday Market in Peregian Beach, just south of Noosa National Park. We sat on the beach for a while and got back into our van just before the rain came. The weather was not that great but the van was comfortable for sitting and hanging out.

Going north some more we went to our couchsurfing hosts for the night. They live outside of Bundaberg in Coral Cove. What an amazing couple Ely and Val are. They live right on a golf course and we went for a nice walk with them along the water when we arrived.

From Australian Roadtrip Part I

We had a nice dinner with them and they introduced us to a couple of their favorite Australian TV shows: Border Security and Rove. Both shows were very entertaining. We especially got a kick out of the fact that Val's 75 year old mother (who lives next door with them) got excited for Border Security. The show is a reality-type show about the customs agents in Australia. In the show we saw, an Indian couple got fined $220 each for bringing in contraband food and a man from Taiwan was trying to export live snakes and lizards in his checked luggage. Scary stuff!

Here's a map showing our stops in Australia so far. Australia is a huge country. Our plan is to drive north to Townsville (you'll have to zoom out to see it) before turning around to head back to Brisbane.

View World Trip in a larger map