Back from Fraser Island!

We spent the last three days in Fraser Island, the world biggest sand island! :D This time was a little bit different as it was a self guided tour! We were with 7 other people (a French couple, a German couple and 3 English guys), and we've been provided a 4x4 Toyota Land Cruiser with a suggested itinerary for the trip! The weather was sometimes cloudy but the landscapes were still beautiful. In particular, Lake McKenzie was gorgeous! The water was clear and turquoise.

The island is also known for its animals, especially the wild dingoes. Unfortunately, we only saw two, and they were not really wild (it was in an aboriginal campground). No turtles, no shark, no dolphin :(  But we saw several monitors (like big big lezards) and two pythons! We also saw the wreck on the beach of an old luxury boat...

It was a really interesting adventure! Driving in the sand was really fun and sometimes scarry! We met nice people and had a really good time!

Whitsunday Islands

We just came back from a boat trip in the Whitsunday Islands. We spend two days and two nights on the Samurai, a sailing boat. We walk on incredible beaches, like Whiteheaven beach which has the finest sand of the world. It was amazing! We also had the opportunity to snorkel at two different locations, saw some nemos, small sharks, turtles, and a lot of corals! Unfortunately, because of the recent cyclone, the underwater visibility was not really good, but we had a good time though!

We are still in Airlie beach at the moment and we'll take the bus tonight to Hervey Bay...

Too many things to fit in the title

Wow it's really hard to actually keep two blogs updated, given the restricted internet access and the free time we have...

So the last episode was our arrival in Adelaide. Then we went to Kangaroo Island for two days, that we accessed by taking a 45-min ferry at Cape Jervis. We saw a lot of seals, koalas, and even more more kangaroos :-) The weather was not always friendly but it was not too bad. We also "sandboarded", which was pretty fun!

We came back to Adelaide and after a short night, we went on a 3-day tour with Melbourne as the final destination. We spent about one day and a half in the Grampians National Park and saw amazing landscapes. We spent the last one day and a half on the Great Ocean Road: it goes along the coast and offers beautiful landscapes on the ocean, like the Twelve Apostles or Loch Arch Gorge.

We spent one more day in Melbourne. Our host had prepared a nice trip for us and we went on a hike on Philip Island. I was very happy as I've been able to see a small part of the Philip Island Grand Prix track :-)

The next day, we flew to Cairns, in Queensland (north of Australia). The weather is completely different from the South, it's really wet and humid. We went snorkelling and scuba-diving on the Great Barrier Reef, it was amazing! We saw several giant clams and we've even been able to touch them and put our hands in their "mouth".

Today, we've been to the rainforests. We had a really nice weather and did several swims, ofter next to waterfalls. It has been raining often recently (wet season) so the water was clear and the waterfalls gorgeous!

Here we are! We're about to take a bus to Airlie Beach, and spend two days and two nights on a boat in the Whitsunday Islands. Let's go!

Last day in Alice Springs, first steps in Adelaide

My last entry was a poor translation, so I'll try to avoid this in the future...

Let's catch up! Our last day in Alice Springs was fun! After some sleeping, we went in the city to relax and shop around. During the afternoon, we attended a free Didgeridoo workshop! We did a lot of noise but definitely had a lot of fun! Then we went up on Anzac Hill, a 5-min hike to see the city from above.

The next day, we flew to Adelaide. It seems that we went on the first flight Alice Springs - Adelaide with Tiger Airways! Once in Adelaide, surprise, it's raining :-( We then spent the evening with our hosts.

This morning, we went to Cleland Wildlife Park to discover Australian animals and approach them. First time we saw koalas (and we cuddled one!), wombats, monitors (reptiles), big kangaroos and a lot of colorful birds! The afternoon was dedicated to the visit of the city center. We were lucky as the city is currently holding a festival, the Fringe 2009. We watched two shows tonight, a Canadian (from Montreal) puppet show as well as a circus. We laughed a lot and had a really good time!

Tomorrow, we're leaving for two days on Kangaroo Island :-) Hopefully we'll see a lot of animals too!

The Rock Tour

We came back yesterday from our 3 day tour which includes a visit to Kings Canyon, Kata Tjuta and Ayers Rock. The tour included a long road trip, several walks (about 3 hours per day at each site). The hikes were not extremely difficult but very exhausting because of the heat! I never thought I would hike with the temperature being over 40 Celsius degrees, under an overwhelming sun, almost no shade and at the worst time of the day! Because there was a guide, I did not search for trouble ... In any case, the scenery was wonderful and it is worth the suffering ... Ah yes I forgot to mention flies that were absolutely unbearable by flying around the face and not moving at all even if you hit them! Fortunately we bought flynets before leaving ... We slept in aussie swags, under thousands of stars, but it was a little bit too warm at night :S

On the way back, we had the opportunity to ride a camel and it was really nice. I hope that I'll be able to do a longer ride in the future!

Otherwise, out of 21 people in the group there were 7 Frenchs (including us), 6 Germans, 3 Malaysians ... In short the majority of the travellers were French!

NB: Linh actually wrote this article in French. The quality of this translation is really bad as I am trying to do it quickly! Sorry!

Melbourne and Alice Springs

Yesterday we visited Melbourne and went shoe shopping. The weather turned to be better in the afternoon which was very nice. Melbourne city is a great city to walk around and the people are very very friendly! We'll hope to see more next time we stop there.

This morning, we had to leave Melbourne already to fly to Alice Springs. It is very very hot here! Tomorrow we'll go on the tour to Ayers Rock and Kings Canyon!

Short stop in Hong-Kong

I am currently in Hong Kong and everything is going well! I had problems in the common transportations in Paris as I was stuck in the RER B for about 50min on the way to the airpot. Then we've been evacuated, walking along the rails. Then, I searched for a cab to go to the airport but it was hard getting one as everybody was in this situation! Eventually, I managed to share one with three other people. Fortunately I arrived on time and everything is now back to normal! I have to go, the boarding starts in a few minutes!