Cinema Patrons Must Declare All Weapons

Besides eating at the Woolshed and playing endless games of cards, Sian and I also discovered another way to pass some time in Cairns. We wanted to watch a movie, but this can be quite expensive in Australia ($15 admission fee), so when we saw a movie marathon advertised for $20 for three films we thought why not?
The three films were Sweeney Todd, I am Legend and Rogue, the latter is an Australian movie about a giant crocodile attacking unsuspecting tourists in the Northern Territories, it made Anaconda look like a work of art.
The first film started at 11.30pm, so we took a rucksack full of sugary snacks and fizzy drinks, the only chance of us falling asleep would be if we fell into a diabetic coma.
We arrived at the cinema entrance to a scene that suggested the sale of Nimbus 2000's, every teen in Cairns was queuing outside the cinema.
It was as we stood with some teens that we noticed the security. There was not only the cinema's own crack security team, but also police officers on patrol. Our first thought, "are they going to make us pore away the Pepsi?" Actually this was my first thought, being somewhat of a Pepsi Max addict. I thought "they can prize it from my dead cold hands".
Once we'd stood around for about an hour, we made it to the security post, an officer was checking all liquids for alcohol. One canny young scamp had filled his camelback with vodka, I thought he should have been admitted for his ingenuity alone.

Breaking through security

The timid looking officer searching Sian's bag was horrified to discover a mini pink Swiss army knife, he immediately impounded it, god knows what stabbing frenzy she may have committed if he wasn't so vigilant.
When we eventually made it into the theatre we were surrounded by teenagers all yakking themselves into a frenzy. A cinema official took to the stage and for the first time in my life I was warned inflating condoms and hitting them into the crowd would result in me being ejected from the cinema. Damn they were onto me, my usual entertainment was foiled. What could I do now, watch the movies and concentrate on staying awake? How boring.
I'm not sure if I did fall asleep or not, but I'm pretty sure I am Legend had no middle or end.
At almost 5am we walked in a daze back to our hostel, having collected Sian's collection of weapons and vowing never to return to a movie marathon in Cairns.

Cairns

Sian and I arrived in Cairns (pronounced "cans" with a nasal accent, if you will) on a lovely sunny day. We returned the camper and checked into a hostel in the city centre. Now I say city, but if you are reading this from the UK think town, if however you are one of my loyal American readers, think metropolis!
I needed to find work and Sian decided to take a week to hang out with me before heading off to Indonesia. I was very glad of the company, however the mocking of my series of crappy jobs was unwelcome.
I first found employment in a large food court in Cairns Central shopping mall. It was hardly a rigorous recruitment process, I asked if they had work, they replied "when can you start?"
I should have taken a closer look at the food outlet before I so eagerly agreed, but funds were so low I would have considered selling my spleen. The following morning I arrived at "Bucking Bulls" for my first day of work. You know you are off to an auspicious start when after 20 minutes of work, you are sitting on a upturned crate in a cramped kitchen listing your known health conditions.
I don't know if it was the heat, the relentless slabs of beef staring up at me from the hot counter or the fact I haven't maintained a job in a long time, but I felt faint. I had worked for approximately 20 minutes when I had to return to the hostel and lie down. Sian thought it was hilarious.
I woke the following morning, thinking, hey I can do this, it's just short term. I headed to Bucking Bulls, donned the synthetic baseball shirt that made my hair stand skywards, the black Bucking Bulls cap that flattened my Einstein hair down and created a layer of grease. I was feeling and looking good.
The menu at Bucking Bulls largely consists of beef, pork, lamb (which to my vegetarian eyes all look the same), vegetables cooked to a soggy substance with no nutritional value, chips, wedges and gravy. The management frowned when I asked a customer, "would you like a heart bypass coupon with your Beef and gravy? Or perhaps a side of beef?"

Hard at work, got to sell that beef

Customers became frustrated watching me massacre a side of pork, and watched in disbelief as I then weighed the disheveled slice of meat, that after my efforts looked more like roadkill, before stuffing it in a bread roll and selling it at an extortionate amount. Bucking Bulls is a franchise, so every slab of cow has to be weighed. The company policy, when asked by an alarmed customer, "did you just weigh that?" is "yes, we at Bucking Bulls want you, the customer to receive a full and delightful portion of cattle", all with a vacuous tone and a wide gracious smile.


Welcome to Bucking Bulls, how about some cow?

I'm amazed by how popular the menu is with customers, even the baked potato with beef, peas, carrots, sour cream and gravy was a big seller! Actually I don't think I was meant to add sour cream, my mistake.
Let it be noted I lasted two whole days before I quit, but am still haunted by the experience, I feel faint when passing farm animals. Selling my spleen was a far better option than previously thought.
I soon found a job cleaning in a hostel for accommodation. Although I still needed paid work, I figured it was a start. Unfortunately I was working for a woman who has no concept of personal space and would give detailed instructions with her 60 a day fag breath blowing directly into my innocent pores. However this job did last slightly longer, I found the two hours of work a day fitted with my work ethic perfectly.
Sian and I had discovered the Woolshed at this point, a local bar with very cheap meal deals. For ten Australian dollars (today the cost of a Ford Galaxy in the States and a child's pocket money in the UK) we could gorge ourselves on a large and nutritious meal, dessert and a drink (not so nutritious but very tasty), in an agreeable setting. It became the highlight of our day, we would spend hours deciding on the evening meal, will it be fish of the day or filo parcels? Oh but what about the Greek salad?

Self-timer madness at the Woolshed

Sian was now considering extending her stay in Australia, the idea of leaving behind the Woolshed was so difficult to comprehend. Somehow she managed to board the flight to Bali.

North to Cairns, Bowling Green NP, Jourama Falls, Mission Beach and a night in a car park, oh and the town Hollywood forgot

Sian and I set off from Airlie Beach in the camper van Sian had travelled up the East Coast in with her parents. The plan was to take a few days, trying to stop at "cheap" or free sites, before arriving in Cairns, where I would look for work and Sian would head to Bali from.
We spent the first night at an idyllic campsite in Bowling Green National Park, wallabies hopped around the site and finally it stopped raining. On the way to the site we stopped in Bowen, or at least close to it at a really beautiful bay. Baz Luhrmann was meant to make a film in Bowen with Nicole Kidman and Russell Crowe, it was going to be the biggest thing that ever happened in Bowen. The town erected a welcome sign to the cast and crew and changed the large Bowen sign to the one below, all rather prematurely. Unfortunately the film was never made and the investment expected never arrived, but the signs remain.


Australia's Hollywood, Bowen!

Rose Bay, near Bowen

Townsville

A giant mango! Australia has a strange obsession with enlarging ordinary things to give ordinary places something to make them less ordinary.

We found another great campsite the following night at Jourama Falls. The falls were a short hike across a stream (I almost lost a flip flop to), the views were really spectacular.

Sian saves my flip-flop! It was touch a go for a while

Jourama Falls

We were the only people at the campsite, the National Park sites are often pretty empty. We did have to drive through a stream to get to the site, had it rained heavy we would have needed to drive out and fast, a ranger had warned us the stream can leave campers stranded for days.
The facilities were basic, the toilets are really glorified holes in the ground, but there was running water and an outdoor shower, that after the hike to the falls was the perfect temperature.

Jourama Falls Campsite

For our final full day in the camper, we arrived at Mission Beach, named after a group of missionaries that lost there lives in a, eh big storm, some time in the eh, past. My research skills are unfortunately deteriorating.
The weather changed again and the sea looked less inviting. You can't actually have free reign to swim off Mission Beach because of the stingers at sea, they do have a giant enclosure for swimmers, but it didn't look inviting.

Mission Beach

Unfortunately for our last night in the camper, we couldn't find a good camp site (by good I mean free) so we ended up in a car park, in the ugly town of Innisfail. We were happy to be only an hour or so drive from Cairns and the next day returned to the camper van. It was a great little trip and we were able to see so much more thanks to having the freedom of a camper, in my opinion the best way to travel.

Airlie Beach

The rain continued to fall, but my bus arrived in Airlie Beach without a hitch. I met up with Sian and her parents and we all ended up in the same hostel.
Airlie Beach is a springboard to the Whitsundays, a group of islands with white sandy beaches and beautiful clear waters. Or so I'm told.
I didn't make it out to the islands, in part due to lack of money, but also because of awful weather I hung around Airlie Beach instead. The week before the area had been cut off due to flooding. Although this is the wet season (December to April roughly), record levels of rain have fallen. A few weeks ago a yacht sunk off the Whitsundays, there were no casualties.

The Marina near Airlie Beach

I met some great people at the hostel I stayed at, but apart from that my stay in Airlie Beach was uneventful. I chatted with an Australian girl travelling the East Coast (something of a novelty) and she told me to try Moreton Bay Bugs. They are a local seafood speciality, she described them as being similar to mini lobsters.
Moreton Bay Bugs are not within most backpackers budgets, but thanks to the offer of lunch with the Harrisons (yes still on the "monsoon tour") I was able to try them.
I can't say they reminded me of lobster, I think they were more like prawns. I had them in a really spicy sauce and they were delicious. Sian's parents were leaving later that day and from Airlie Beach, Sian and I would travel to Cairns in the camper van.

Me and my Morton Bay Bugs.


The Harrisons!

Mackay, unlucky seat 8A and the Harrisons.

47 hours or so on the Premier coach (the cheapest way to travel the East Coast) from Brisbane to Mackay and it rained most of the way. I understand it's the rainy season, but expected this to change upon my arrival in the region or for the rain to only fall at night, someone didn't get the message. Of the 48 seats on board, I managed to choose the one with a leak above it. I woke up at 3am from a dream about falling into a waterfall to focus on a steady stream of water dripping onto my knees from a vent above.
I managed to climb over the person next to me, who had set up home somewhat like an underpass dweller in some inner city, who regarded me with disdain as I struggled past her and her belongings. I told the driver, who was wearing the regulation uniform of ridiculously short shorts, (what is it with Australians and Benny Hill style uniforms?), that I had a leak above my seat. His reply, "8A? Yeah I know the one." Great.
The driver had two empty seats behind him with his personal belonging on. I asked (being English and ridiculously polite) if I could remove myself and my belongings from the wet seat and move to one of the lovely dry seats behind him. He crumpled one side of his face and told me that the seats behind him are reserved for emergencies. I scowled and didn't wait for a reply, but collected my things from 8A and tried to get back to sleep (unsuccessfully) in my new seat.
We pulled into Mackay at around 8am. I have never before seen so much rain, getting off the bus and stepping onto the pavement had the same effect as taking a plunge in the Thames.

The rain falls in Mackay, check out the uniform.

I couldn't get a seat on the coach leaving Mackay for Airlie Beach, as the road had been closed due to flooding the day before and too many people where waiting to get out of Mackay. I was about to see why.
I checked into the oddest hostel yet. As the rain continued to fall and the ground water rise, I waited in a communal room of the hostel trying to watch a TV that kept loosing it's signal because of the rain. Yes it was raining THAT much.
I discovered no other travellers in the hostel, only miners. Everyone was friendly, actually in a "friendly way" that borders on obsession and causes a deep seated fear for one's life.

Another photo that fails to capture the amount of rain falling.

Sian and her parents where staying at a campsite on one of Mackay's Northern beaches. After some texting back and forth, Sian suggested I stay with them that night. I ran for my life, okay slight exaggeration, but it really was a creepy hostel. I even left without informing the management, I was so shaken, or was that concerned about having to pay for a night?
Anyway the rain stopped, so Sian and I walked around Mackay and discovered there really isn't much to see in Mackay, sorry Stu I know you want your "namesake" to be a hip and interesting city, but it just isn't. It was obviously founded by the uncool arm of the Mackay family, with little imagination and a genuine love of the grid system.
I met Sian's parents, who kindly took me in. I had to hide in the back of their camper van as it is illegal to have more than 3 adults on board. I felt like a hostage and began to try and memorise the glipses of passing scenery I could see from my hunched position on the floor by the sink, the Harrison family were surprised when I rolled out the back of the camper bound and gagged.
The campsite was by a great beach, the tide was out and a huge expanse of sand and creatures were on display. I don't know why but I have no photo's, so you can use your imaginations.
The rain started again and there was real concern we would be trapped in Mackay! I was due to take the Premier bus the following morning to Airlie Beach and the Harrisons (calling them that makes them sound like a 70's Folk band on a revival tour) would leave in their camper van.
Sian and I intended to sleep in a tent next to the camper van, but after a few hours and several feet of water, we feared we may be carried into the sea and moved into the camper van. We slept in the "children's" area above the main bed, while Sian's parents tried to sleep below. Despite the storm going on outside and sleeping on my back with my legs bent at the knee, I actually had an amazing night's sleep.
Thankfully we were not trapped in Mackay and could make our separate journey's onto Airlie Beach. To be continued.

Brisbane

I arrived in Brisbane in need of a job. I managed to do a little sightseeing while sending out emails and resumes. The central business district is like any other, with a few interesting buildings. The majority of the cities museums and galleries are on the South Bank. I'm not sure if the South Bank was based on London's South Bank, but the buildings are very similar. Not particularly attractive, concrete blocks, but a style I like none the less.

State Library Building at Dusk

Brisbane at Night.

I was feeling rather indecisive about staying for a number of weeks in Brisbane, even though I had some good responses on the work front, I felt I would be spending a lot on accommodation. It's also not so easy to get to a beach or a national park without your own transport, so I would have to spend much of my time in the city. So with that I decided to take a bus to Airlie Beach and meet up with Sian. Sian had been travelling up the East Coast with her parents and had offered me a ride in their camper van from Airlie (where her parents flight departed) to Cairns.
Before leaving Brisbane I managed to visit the world's largest book sale, Bookfest! The event was in aid of charity and took over a huge exhibition centre, I have a rather out of focus shot below. This was one of 8 areas selling second hand books.


I picked up a few bargains and managed a night out in Brisbane before catching a bus north.

Free Champagne for the Ladies at Tinbilly's

Sjenjana (yes trying saying that after a few champagnes) and a really funny Japanese guy.

Sydney to Brisbane Road Trip: Byron Bay

I'm trying to recall Byron Bay, I really need to get up to date, once and for all. I have a million excuses, none very interesting, so here goes.
We drove into Byron Bay (I think I remember that), and booked in to a campsite on the edge of town. It had a large security fence and required a $200 deposit, we wondered what we were letting ourselves in for. A lot of the campground (huge area) was flooded and unfortunately the rain continued to fall.
We set up camp, as usual Paul cooking a great meal and played a game of cards. The following day I decided to do the walk a few people had recommended to me to Cape Byron, to the point where Captain Cook landed and the Eastern most point of Australia. It is also possible to spot dolphin pods, but unfortunately they evaded me.

Byron Bay

The walk was really beautiful and I spotted my first snake in the wild, but didn't stick around to identify it.


Cape Byron Lighthouse

Byron Bay itself is a beach town, with some upmarket "artsy" shops and a lot of bars and restaurants. If I wasn't on a budget I probably would have liked it more.
The guys decided to hit the town for the evening, but I felt like a quiet one, so stayed back at the campsite. Unfortunately it all went a bit wrong at this point. That evening Paul (after a few shandies) got into a fight with a wooden post and lost. The following morning I was really shocked and concerned to see a Paul I didn't recognise, with a swollen mouth and wobbly teeth.
I felt really bad for Paul, but when he looked in a mirror to check out the damage himself and said "I look like the 80's TV character Alf", all I could do was laugh and then feel guilty and then laugh some more.


Gary, Jelmer and Paul at the gates of our campsite in Byron Bay

Gary and I decided to take a little trip to Nimbin. Nimbin is a very small town with a big reputation. In the early seventies a bunch of hippies arrived in the rural community for a festival and never left. They decided to create the good life for themselves. Today Nimbin is famous for being the only place in Australia where the police turn a blind eye to the selling of marijuana. We arrived as many of the day trippers were leaving and some of the scarier looking residents where out and about.


The Streets of Nimbin

I did spot this, and thought of you Mum,


From Byron Bay we drove to Surfers Paradise, which is an Australian version of Benidorm, high rises and a busy beach.

Surfers Paradise

It was at Surfers Paradise that I parted company with the guys and made my way to Brisbane, with the plan of finding work and staying for a while.