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Chris and Charly Down Under

a travel blog by chrischarly

Bye bye tuk tuks
Bye bye negotiating
Bye bye, 'Hello Mister'
Bye bye long bus rides
Bye bye heavy backpacks
Bye bye savings...
And G'DAY 'down under'!

After plenty of time spent in South East Asia, we have just left Australia after having an amazing time driving around for almost 3 months in a camper and are now in New Zealand doing the same :)


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A load of wildlife

Bega, Australia


Playing on the swings

Beach

Continuing south we found a nice little beach to walk along and climbed over rocks. We saw black swans, a bright red octopus, a stingray swimming in the water and some other pretty fish in the gorgeous clear water.


Beach

Waves


Rocks

Awesome beach


Black swans

Red octopus

On our way to find a campsite we took a turn off to a National Park to try and spot some wild koalas unsuccessfully but did see some kangaroos really close, one with a joey in her pouch.


Kangaroos

Baby joey getting in pouch

Mother and joey

Chris walking to get fuel

Then on our way to Bega to stay for the night we ran out of petrol so Chris walked the 300m to the petrol station. Almost made it!

permalink written by  chrischarly on November 23, 2011 from Bega, Australia
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Cheese factory

Eden, Australia


Cookaburra

Cookaburra

Went to the Bega Cheese Factory this morning before driving to Eden where we had fish and chips over-looking the harbour.


Our camp site

Our van

Didn’t do much else during the day but found a lovely place to stay in the evening in the middle of the Forest completely to ourselves alongside the Ada River.

permalink written by  chrischarly on November 24, 2011 from Eden, Australia
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We struck GOLD!!

Club Terrace, Australia


Chris looking for gold
Woke up and re-made our fire to cook some breakfast before making a make-shift shower doing it the old traditional way of heating up water on the fire and washing with a cup.

Chris' fish
At least we had the campsite and forest to ourselves so we could do it. Chris took a walk down to the River and we found lots of small pieces of gold sitting at the bottom of the River and a pink Crystal! We then drove further on to find another nice spot and Chris fished once again catching many fish but all too small for dinner so instead of fish to eat, we had egg sarnies.

permalink written by  chrischarly on November 25, 2011 from Club Terrace, Australia
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Koalas in the wild!

Raymond Island, Australia

We left the wet and cold stop at the side of the Snowy River, after the rain keeping us awake all night. It was a pretty grim day, but we headed to Raymond Island just off from Paynesville to go and see our first Koalas in the wild!


To go to Koalas

Sleeping Koala


Mother and baby Koala!

Sleeping Koala


2 koalas up a tree

Koala!


Koala having a nap

Koala


Such a cute koala
It was awesome and we saw 22 in total all spotted by ourselves up in the Eucalyptus trees.

Koala
After about an hour walking around we ran to the Ferry headed for our next stop as quick as we could trying to avoid the thunder storm brewing. This was an okay stop at the side of another River just near Rosedale. As usual Chris found someone to talk to while I setup the van, this guy was a local cherry farmer who had setup in the roadside stop with a sign off the road. He did pretty well and Chris promised to get some in the morning before we left. It was pretty cold and wet still, so we just played cards and then went to our nice warm bed early to watch a film.

permalink written by  chrischarly on November 26, 2011 from Raymond Island, Australia
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Flat tyre...

Walkerville, Australia


We've got a flat

Chris finding the spare

Completely destroyed tyre
Not the best start to the day by getting our first flat tyre on the van, in the middle of nowhere, but luckily we had a spare and I suppose we’re even luckier as it is our first one we’ve had so far, but Chris soon fixed it so we were back on the road again. After finally finding our campsite at Bear Gully Reserve, a little way west around the coast from Wilsons Prom, we found a great spot with a campfire already lit from the previous residents.

Setting up camp
Chris ran round and gathered a good pile of wood people had left behind and got the fire going well for the evening. Chris then disappeared to the beach rod in hand, but returned about an hour later with no fish. Apparently it was too rocky and he couldn’t get out without getting snagged up. He did manage to cook an amazing butter Chicken on the camp fire so it all ended well in the end.

permalink written by  chrischarly on November 27, 2011 from Walkerville, Australia
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Wilsons Promontory

Foster, Australia


:)

Wilson Prom


On the beach

Norman Beach


About to cross the tidal river
Left our campsite this morning and drove to Wilson’s Promontory and it was nice to see some sunshine for a change!

Chris squeezing through
We drove to Tidal River first and went for a nice walk through the Forest a little before coming to the North of Norman’s Bay and we walked down the end of the beach, crossed a small River and went back to the car before visiting ‘Squeaky Beach’ named after the fine sand that when you walk on it, it squeaks, and then to Picnic Bay.


Tidal river

Lovely beach to ourselves


Chris

Entering the 'Prom'

Great day, but sure enough before it was over it started raining again, which was pretty irritating, but I suppose expected as we are now near Melbourne. We then headed back to the same campsite as last night and posted our van for sale on Gumtree hoping we will be able to sell it, but not too soon so we can go down further south.

permalink written by  chrischarly on November 28, 2011 from Foster, Australia
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Penguins!

Cowes, Australia


Penguins
Woke up this morning to find 3 missed calls on our phone- looks like people are interested in the van already! That was quick, was hoping we could have it a little longer. Meeting a guy called Tom tomorrow who seems uber keen on buying it, so Chris dumped me off in MacDonalds whilst he went searching for a spare tyre and somewhere to get it serviced before tomorrow.

Penguins
Then after getting everything ready for the van, which by the way nothing was found wrong with it, which is great news, we rushed down to Phillip Island to find the cheapest place to stay before going to see the penguins. Being super keen to get the best spot to see them, we sat out in the cold for almost 2 hours before the first one appeared, followed by the masses.

Penguin chick
They are so funny to sit and watch waddling up the beach to their nests and also so tiny being the smallest breed of penguins their maximum height being 1ft or 33cm! We even got to see some baby chicks feeding off their mothers, but the babies are so fat and fluffy they are almost twice the size of their parents, which looks pretty funny! Unfortunately though we weren’t allowed to take any photos of them outside of The Entrance, which sucked, but was worth going just to see them so the photos here are of pictures inside.

permalink written by  chrischarly on November 29, 2011 from Cowes, Australia
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1st viewing on our van

Northcote, Australia


Black swan
Had a pretty long a stressful day today. Woke up early with tons of rain and thunder storms. Perfect weather for gutting out and cleaning the van! Typical. Luckily at the campsite the lady took pity on us and didn’t make us leave by 10am, which is checkout and said we could stay longer so at midday we set off for Northcote in Melbourne to see Tom, praying that he would want it, even though we have had other people phone up interested.

A blind dog on the back of a bike
He did fall in love with it at first sight which we knew anyone would, but he wants his friend to look it over on Saturday and a few other checks done, so as usual things don’t turn out as easy as we hoped, so still searching for more people in the meantime… After driving for a couple of hours east of the city for a free campsite we realised it would’ve just been cheaper to stay in the city than use loads of petrol! We never learn. Anyway, rubbish site and pouring with rain again.

permalink written by  chrischarly on November 30, 2011 from Northcote, Australia
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We sold the van! :) Will miss it though :(

Melbourne, Australia


Just need to see a wombat!
Woke up to a dry day and after talking to a local Chris realised that we might not have enough fuel to make it to the next fuel stop and was told to go and ask nicely at the local shop. He did and the guy gave us 5L for the tidy price of $2 per litre. Better than running out, but after 2 months we should be better than this at planning!! We headed back into Melbourne to St Kilda to show the van to some Canadian guys that Charly didn’t think would buy the van.

Pretty parrot
They rolled up on skate boards and checked out the van and seemed to love it. Told us they had some more to check and would call us later. We decided to stay at a delightful roadside stop on the motorway between Melbourne and Geelong. Not our finest spot but close to the city and free. Chris made an amazing corned beef hash and we chilled waiting for a call. The Canadians did call us back and bought the van, yippee, but they want it on Monday (2 weeks before our flight), bugger! Oh well at least we sold it, and relatively hassle free.

permalink written by  chrischarly on December 1, 2011 from Melbourne, Australia
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Koalas at our campsite

Apollo Bay, Australia


Gorgeous!

Entering the Great Ocean Road

Went into Geelong to meet the Canadians and get a Deposit, all good. Then we headed, for our FINAL stage of our amazing journey, down the Great Ocean Road.


The coast

What an amazing road!


Campsite

Driving along the Great Ocean Road

The weather was great, at last, and the scenery was beautiful. Found a great campsite half way, with koalas in residence, ate some fire cooked pasta and chilled with our Aussie neighbours for the evening.


The Koala at our campsite



permalink written by  chrischarly on December 2, 2011 from Apollo Bay, Australia
from the travel blog: Chris and Charly Down Under
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