It’s Christmas time, and there’s no need to be afraid…

Our destination for the night was a caravan park in Chinderah, the home town of my friend Darren, who I had met and spent a lot of time hanging out with in LA. What we had to find out during the course of the day was where Darren was that evening, how to get there, and then how to get to Chinderah Lakes.

An accident about 20 km outside Brisbane slowed us down for an hour or so, and the traffic was quite heavy, what with it being a Friday afternoon. Oh, and it was the last Friday before Christmas too, so we were surrounded by vehicles packed to the gills with bags and camping gear, heading off for their Christmas breaks. We left the M1 and hit The Gold Coast Highway, which luckily enough took us to the Gold Coast, and Surfer’s Paradise. Now, I’m not much of a surfer, but I would imagine that a ‘surfer’s paradise’ would involve good waves, plenty of space, some beer and a place to hang up your wetsuit. Not a collection of high rise hotels, fast food chains and millions of tourists, which is essentially what the place is. We didn’t stop.

We did stop at a little place called Kirra Beach, and found a bakery at which to buy lunch, while calling Darren to find out where he was drinking. He gave us directions to Rainbow Bay, and after we parked and walked over to the Surf Club Building, there he was, leaning over the balcony shouting ‘Stevo!!!’.

I met Darren while staying at the clean but soul-less hostel in Santa Monica 3 years ago. I told him about this cool place in Hollywood, so we packed our stuff and headed back to The Orbit, him carrying his surfboard, on the bus. We spent the next few weeks hanging out, together with Aussie Nick, but were both as bad as each other about staying in touch after we both eventually went home and probably haven’t emailed or phoned for a couple of years.

When we had planned this whole thing a while back, I emailed Darren to say we were coming to Australia, and had got no reply. I assumed he’d changed his email address, and as I didn’t have his postal address, figured that I just wouldn’t get to see him. A week after we arrived here, I got a reply. Turns out he just never checked his emails. We exchanged phone numbers and spoke a couple of times, and I found out that he now made surfboards for a living, and lived in Chinderah. The only day we could meet up was his last day at work, and he would be on his works Christmas Do, so he invited us to the party. Never say no to a party, right?

We signed in to the Surf Club and headed for the balcony. We had a big hug, and I headed for the bar as Michelle sat down to chat. We were introduced to his friend Arron (I know, Darren and Arron…) and his work colleagues Ian and the boss, whose name I have unforgivably forgotten. Beer was drunk, garlic bread and oysters consumed, although not by us, and eventually we snuck off to go and find our cabin, following instructions from an increasingly drunken Darren. After driving around Chinderah four times, we found the street we were looking for, and booked into our ‘basic’ accommodation. Keen to get back to the Surf Club, we headed back, and found that we had been joined by Arron’s wife, Amanda, and Darren’s fiancé, Nicole.

This, I must confess, came as a bit of surprise. Darren had shown no signs of wanting to ‘settle down’ with anyone in LA. In fact, quite the opposite. Still, here he was, introducing us to his wife-to-be. She seemed very nice, was very small, incredibly well made up and very smart. Apart from the being nice bit, essentially the opposite of Darren, who was (to utilise a cliché) so laid back he was horizontal, and generally looked like he’d just got up. And had slept in his clothes. But the important thing was that they had found each other and seemed very much in love. Michelle and I have an invite to the wedding in March but we’re not sure if we can make it or not…

We carried on drinking and chatting, all the Aussies attempting English accents to varying degrees of success, while listening to the solo singer guitarist inside do a great version of Hotel California. With the solo. As he packed up we went over to say thanks and he turned out to be a Mexican, who’d lived in England, with the surname MacDonald. Darren got his card, thinking he might be good for the wedding, but Nicole’s face told a different story. I think we know who wears the boardshorts in this relationship. By about 11.00pm, the place appeared to be closing down, and we said our goodbyes to all, making plans to meet in the morning. As we got to our car, I noticed that the ‘ute’ (a pick up van) next to us had the door open. I went to close it but couldn’t, as the owner was laying, drunk, across the seats with his feet hanging out. We got in the Renault and left, deciding that we needed to be careful on the way home. His mates might have managed to start their cars…

The next morning Darren phoned early, found our camp site, and then led us to his parents place, where he had a separate house in the grounds. We thought he’d been burgled, but it turns out he’s just a bit messy, so we went into see his parents and have a cup of tea. We spent a couple of hours with Darren and his parents, had a quick drive in the 1968 Pontiac Darren had bought in LA and shipped back to Australia, and eventually set off on our way down the coast towards our planned stopping place, Nambucca Heads.

We had better hopes for this part of the coast, and got to Byron Bay around lunch time. Having lost my sunglasses a couple of days before, I found some groovy big shades for $15, Michelle found a bikini that cost a bit more, and we felt really comfortable here. It seems like a calm place which, although full of backpackers, doesn’t have the nauseating smell of people drinking themselves into the ground. The beach was full, the shops busy and the restaurants looked inviting, but we decided to head further south for brunch, to Lennox Head.

By taking the wrong turn when leaving Byron, we found ourselves heading up a one way track which led up to the Cape Byron Lighthouse, some spectatular views and the most Easterly point on mainland Australia, and by taking another wrong turn on the way back down we ended up in Watego’s Bay, the most beautiful beach and little village which seemed stuck in the seventies. In a good way. To use a travel writing no-no, We will definitely be going back there.

When we reached Lennox Head, we were glad that we had held out this long for brunch. After a very good brunch at a cheap but classy looking café, the beach was our next item. In contrast to Byron, it was empty, but twice as beautiful. A horse-shoe shaped bay, the sand was soft and the wind blew as we walked along, deciding which of the beach-front properties would suit us best. Up in the town we bought fruit from the local grocers, and when he asked where we were from we answered ‘Ipswich, in England’, which had become our standard reply. ‘Is that near Hadleigh?’ he asked, and went on to introduce us to his son John, who had played cricket for Hadleigh for the last three seasons. We promised to go and see him play next year (it’s a good job I’m writing all these promises down, eh?) before heading off for the long haul to our cabin in Nambucca.

An uneventful drive meant that we reached the small town early evening, and finally found our cabin as it got dark. The beach was right behind us, the moon was bright and high and bathed the area in a blue light, and we sat outside eating take-out pizza listening to one of our campsite neighbours play Latin-American guitar.

The next morning we packed up and left early, stopping at a café in town for raisin toast and coffee, and swapping Fawlty Towers quotes with the owner, before attacking the 500 or so kms we had to cover before getting to the outskirts of Sydney, where our next hosts, Kirstie and Manu live. Rain peppered the journey, and we stopped just the once to swap driving/navigating roles, hitting the city at about 4 o’clock in the afternoon, and phoning our hosts to find out where to go. Manu talked us in, and before we knew it we were climbing the steep drive to their house in the suburb of Wahroonga, North Sydney.

And what a house. Some friends from Ipswich had been to stay a year or two back, and had told us it was a fabulous place, and they told no lies. We were shown into our wing at the bottom of the house after the regulation hugs and hellos, and then the tour of the rest of the mansion. We also got to meet the newest arrival in the house, 3 month old Summer, who shares my birthday, albeit 42 years later. She was a bit sleepy, so we agreed to chat later and sat down with good wine, good conversation and a fantastic curry. Manu knows his way round the kitchen, and had been cooking most of the day, save for the bit in which he fitted a shower, the shower door, and the bathroom floor. And went shopping for Christmas presents.

I hadn’t seen Kirstie for a couple of years, since her last visit back home, and hadn’t seen Manu for a good seven years. Both had worked (independently) with Michelle, and both had also belonged to running clubs with her back in the UK, but following her own travelling time Kirstie decided Australia was for her, and Manu joined her a year or so later, commuting between Singapore and Perth. They eventually settled in Sydney, and both had worked for big name companies until Summer came along in October. Now Kirstie was avoiding any questions about going back to work, and Manu seemed quite happy with that.

We retired to our section of the house eventually, with a plan for the next day, and slept like the proverbial logs. We woke and figured that we were ok for time, what with it being 8.15am, and leisurely got showered before heading upstairs to greet our hosts and have breakfast. After some toast and coffee it was time to head into the city centre, and Manu, who had to call in at his work, came with us in our hire car, which we had to return by 1.00pm, to guide us in. The plan was that Kirstie would then come in on the train later with Summer, we would all meet up, and then return on the train later. What we didn’t know was that New South Wales, where we now were, operates Daylight Saving Time, whereas Queensland, where we had come from, doesn’t. We were an hour out, and only when Michelle noticed the cooker clock did we twig.

It was fun driving into the city centre, driving over the famous Harbour Bridge, and we dropped Manu off downtown before following his careful directions to the car hire place. We walked back into the shopping district where we had about an hour to buy presents for the three of them before meeting up for lunch. Christmas Eve is as busy in Sydney as any other city, but for us it was a different, and good, type of busy, as we only had three presents to find. Kirstie called, we met up, bought lunch in a food court and headed down to the circular quay to sit and eat.

When you are away from home, you sometimes you forget exactly where you are, and need a reminder. Something like sitting eating your lunch while looking at the Harbour Bridge on your left, and the Sydney Opera House on the right, will do it, and I permitted myself a little smile. 6 months ago we were thinking about spending C*****mas in Devon, and here we were, C*****mas Eve, having lunch in the sun in Sydney, with two of the most famous pieces of architecture in front of us.

Kirstie took us to the Botanical Gardens, and we met up with Manu for coffee before heading back to the train station to go back to Wahroonga. We stopped off at the shopping centre to pick up seafood for the next day, and toddled off to their house for an evening on the balcony with a beer or three.

It’s C*****mas Day tomorrow, and I have a bit of sunburn on my foot. How cool is that?

Finally – a day on a beach!

If you can imagine such a thing, we were playing volleyball on the best beach in the world. I mean imagine the beach, not that I was playing sport, but maybe you have a point…

We’d managed to get up, shower, go out and have breakfast, pack, and be out of the Cairns hostel by 8.15 in the morning, ready to board the Greyhound. It was already quite warm, and we made the most of sitting outside the coach before boarding at the last moment. We settled in, with books, iPods and sudoku, and the trip passed quickly enough. By 3.00pm we arrived in Townsville, about half way through our journey, and had to switch coaches, and drivers, which turned out to be a shame. The new coach must have been one of the oldest they had, if you see what I mean. We were sat in row 2, and the AC was barely reaching us. Imagine what is must have been like at the back of the coach. Michelle hadn’t yet noticed, as she was in the middle of a hot flush herself – three blonde surfer boys had got on the coach at this stop, and she was still trying to look as if she hadn’t noticed. Still, I think it helped her get through the 5 or so hours we had left…

We arrived in Airlie Beach on time, to be met by a horde of backpackers eager to get on the coach. Little did they know they would roast. Incidently, what would be the collective noun for backpackers? A ‘dorm’? A ‘wasted’? Perhaps a ‘stirfry’? No. An ‘Ollie’ of backpackers. There always seems to be an ‘Ollie’, with his mates Jem and Seb. And they were always ‘So wasted last night, they can’t remember what they did…’ Bless.

When we checked in to the hostel, which overlooks the beach and the lagoon, we had been upgraded from just a room to having our own bathroom too. This is a nice luxury, and we are both thankful, having spent 11 hours on a coach. It turns out that the rooms are all part of a shopping centre, and we have to go through the Thai restaurant we ate in last week to get to our room. Which is a little strange. We venture out for food, and find that the town is much quieter, and consequently much nicer, than it was during our last visit. We are back in the room by 10.00pm, and fall asleep quickly to the sound of people cooking in kitchens.

At 5.30am we are woken by the sound of people cleaning kitchens, and drilling, and sweeping, and after half an hour of trying to get back to sleep we give up and get up. Just before retiring the previous night we had stuck a load of washing into a machine in the Laundromat downstairs, so Michelle went and moved it all into a dryer for half an hour before we went out for breakfast. It did feel a little strange wandering around at 7 in the morning, but there were so many people around we quickly forgot what time it was, and nearly missed our pick up time.

Today is our trip out to The Whitsunday Islands, and Shane picks us up outside the hostel to take us down to the harbour and board the ‘Voyager’, our boat for the day. About 35 people are with us on the trip, and there is plenty of room aboard as we leave the harbour on time, under the command of Captain Stefan and his crew.

We leave the closed in air-conditioned room downstairs and set up upstairs, in the open air. As we sit waiting for the off, I hear a familiar tune – The Church’s Under The Milky Way is being played on the ship’s system just before departure. I wasn’t expecting that.
Once the vessel has cleared the harbour walls, it speeds up and the breeze upstairs is fantastic. We get the feeling that it could go a lot faster, too. Every so often Captain Stefan tells us to look left or right at this island or that island, and Michelle is chatting with a bloke from Sydney, while I sit and watch the scenery. After an hour or so we reach our first stop, the world famous Whitehaven Beach. We are all issued with stinger suits, and told that if we go in the water we should wear them, and then we are directed off the boat via a ladder into the shallow water at the beach. Within three steps you are on the beautiful white sands. It is the finest sand you will ever feel beneath your feet, and a totally unique experience. The beach itself is over 5km long, and for about 20 minutes us, and our fellow travellers, are the only ones on the beach, and Michelle and I go for a walk along the water.

A couple have put on their suits and are in the water. The bloke beckons us over as we pass, so we put our suits on and wade into the warm water to stand beside him. We look down and see a large number of silver fish, nearly a foot long, with brightly coloured tails, swimming around us. There’s a moment, I can tell you.

We wander back and sit down on the beach, and official photographer Marie gets us to pose in the water for some pictures for which we imagine we’ll have to avoid the hard sell later on, before Carla, the crew member on the beach with us, talks us into playing vollyball with three others.

The ball ends up in the water a lot, and running in to get it is the only way to cool down, and before we know it the boat is back and we wade in and up to the ladder and get back on board.

Lunch is served, and the salads are excellent. We eat as we are taken to the second destination, Hook Island. Everyone gets off the boat onto a jetty, which leads to an undersea chamber, which is incredibly claustrophobic, but offers some great views of the bottom of the sea. We board another vessel which has a glass panelled bottom, and go out to see the reef, and some of the wildlife. We see parrot fish, sea snakes, turtles, and even Nemo’s cousin. Apparently. Although how they could tell, we just don’t know…

Back on Hook Island there is snorkling to be had, and Michelle decides to give it a go, but comes back early because she just can’t do the breathing thing. I had tried before, so knew I couldn’t get on with it, and relaxed on the beach as most of the others went out.

By the time we got back on board the photo’s that Maria had taken were being shown on a big screen, and with no hard sell at all, she handed out cards and told us to let her know if we wanted any of the pics. We loved most of them, and settled on three, which were not only really good, but cheap too.

The last destination was ‘Dreamland’, essentially a resort destination, so we swam in the pool and chatted with a number of our fellow passengers. I’d agreed to go on this day-trip to keep Michelle happy, not really seeing it as an essential part of our trip, but I had to admit that afterwards I would have paid the fee just to ride around in the ‘Voyager’, let alone experience Whitehaven Beach and see some amazing creatures in the waters. After returning to dry land we ate early and cheaply, before both falling asleep exhausted, again to the sound of diners and kitchen workers.

The next day was flight day, so we checked out, dumped the bags in storage and set off to try and book a car for a couple of days time from Brisbane to get too Sydney in time for Christmas with Kirstie and Manu. Not as easy as it sounds. As we keep forgetting, it’s Christmas, and apparently all the people that live here like to have a few days off too, and go home, and consequently all the flights and hire cars are booked up. Europcar has a car, but want to charge us $150 for the priviledge of driving it one way to Sydney. Michelle’s not having that, so we spend two hours trying all the other companies, with no luck, concluding that it’s either the expensive car or back on the greyhound. We go back to Europcar.

We manage to squeeze in some breakfast before being picked up to go to the airport for our flight back down to Brisbane. All the way through the process no-one looks at our passports, and after an hour or so on the plane we get off and walk straight into an arrivals lounge to be met by our friend Annette, and her two kids, Declan and Kayleigh. We’re staying the night with them, and once we’d collected all the luggage, we all jumped in the car and hit a traffic jam heading into Brisbane.

Tom was already home by the time we got to their house in Mount Gravatt, south of Brisbane, and we caught up on news before he and Kayleigh took us up to the actual Mount Gravatt, from which views of Brisbane can be had while avoiding the various mountain bikers, tourists and snoggers that inhabit the area after dark. Back at the house, a fantastic takeaway curry was had on the verandah, with a few beers and lots of chatting before we retired to our bed – a mattress on the floor in Declan’s room.

Before going to sleep I flicked through a book published by Tom and Annette’s friend, based on his hitch-hiking trip around Australia. For each hitch he wrote a short story about the people, and took pictures, and as soon as I find out what it’s called I’ll plug it here.

The next morning Tom had gone to work but Annette and the kids had plans for us. After toast, coffee and showers we jumped in the car and drove out to Daisy Hill, a koala and wallaby sanctuary in a national park. One koala was asleep in the centre, and another was spotted way up high in one of the surrounding trees. On the short walk around we came across a pair of wallabies, and trying to respect their habitat, watched them eat some grass and look around. Just at this point a family sat down at one of the many picnic tables in the clearing nearby, spread their food across the table, and the wallabies shot off. Not back into the undergrowth, but to the table, where the family ended up feeding them pretty much most of their picnic.

We wanted to buy lunch for our hosts, so we headed for the Alibi Rooms, where our friend James had left details of how to get to the other koala sanctuary. He’d also left instructions that we were to have a $30 tab, too – proving what a nice bloke he is – which we used to buy a selection of food for us, Annette, Declan and Kayleigh, before waving goodbye and heading back to the Bowen Terrace, where we started our visit to Brisbane all those, er, days ago, for a one night stay. Tomorrow we begin the trek down to Sydney, and Christmas on the beach. Yet again our hosts had been fantastic in giving up their time to show us around, feed us and let us sleep in their house. We already owe a lot of people a lot of return visits, and there was more to come…

That evening we walked down Brunswick Street and found an organic burger joint in Fortitude Valley called ‘Burger Urge’. Michelle wisely suggested we share a mushroom burger having seen the size of the plates of food coming out of the kitchen, and we still struggled to eat everything on the plate before waddling back to our room, which this time had French doors opening onto a balcony. We sat outside - me writing and Michelle reading - while possums and bats battled on the roof and in the mango tree which overlooks the garden. No, really.

The next day we met up with James again at The Alibi Rooms and had some breakfast before saying goodbye and getting the bus into the city. I called in to see a friend of Tom and Annette’s called Rick, who ran a second hand CD store in Queen Street called Egg Records, while Michelle went off to see the gardens near the central train station. Rick was way more of a music nerd than I could ever hope to be, sorted me out with some Church CDs I needed to complete my collection, gave me some tips on which bands to try and see in Sydney, and made me promise to go back soon. We had booked our car for 1.00pm, so we walked the length of Queen Street to the Europcar office, where we got upgraded (for nothing) to a brand new Renault Megane, with 10km on the clock. It only took me three attempts to get in the correct lane before we stopped going round in a circle, we picked up our bags from Bowen Terrace, assured John and Lauren we would be back, and set off for the M1 south.

Like we hadn’t driven far enough yet…

Early to Airlie…

Q. Why do all the fish stop swimming up the North coast of Queensland?
A. Because they’d end up in Cairns.

The first day with the campervan was an introduction to all the pluses and minuses of the things. Essentially, this is a white VW van, nearly 3 metres high and 6 metres long, with a shower, toilet, kitchen, fridge, sink, air conditioning and double bed / seats and table. (See Michelle eating toast at a stop above!) It’s very well kitted out in the back, with pretty much all mod cons, but when you’re up the front end driving, it’s a white van. All that’s missing is the questionable attitude and a copy of ‘The Daily Sport’ folded up on the dashboard.

The pick-up is a long winded exercise in which our $5 a day hire goes up to $25 a day after insurances, and after getting there at 9.30am, we finally get going at around 11.00am. We don’t complain about the money, not because we’re English, but because it still represents one hell of a good deal, considering they are also giving us $250 worth of fuel, the sites we’ll be staying at will cost $30 ish a night, and all this adds up to our daily budget not even being half way in sight. Which is clearly a good thing.

We are directed out to the M1, also known as the Bruce Highway (insert Aussie joke here about Bruces and/or Sheilas) and head north. The M1/A1 is the only road that goes all the way up to Cairns and beyond, with all the usual tourist stop-offs simply a branch off to the right if it’s on the coast or the left if it’s inland. For about 10 km it’s a dual carriageway, then it is single lanes with overtaking sections every few kms, which then get less and less frequent. The speed limit is mostly 100 km/h, and the van can do this comfortably, but on the single lane sections a bit of traffic builds up behind you. However, when you get to the overtaking sections, they all just stay behind you, comfortable with the speed you are going. Takes a bit of getting used to, but it makes driving all the more pleasant. It also illustrates the amount of traffic once you leave an urban area. Like I said, this is the main, and only, route north. It’s not exactly like our M1.

The first stop is Noosa, and this also presents us with the first problem. Parking a 6 metre van. After taking way too long to drive round the car park and not finding any convenient double spaces, we end up a mile down the road, and by the time we get back to the beach area we need a drink. The weather is beautiful, the beach is beautiful, the bottle of cold water is… well, you get the idea. Later, when we look at our pictures, the first one we took on Noosa beach is bright, blue and beachy, the last one as we left Brisbane was grey, dull and ominous.

Michelle takes the wheel as we leave to get to Hervey Bay, where we’ve booked a powered pitch at a campsite by the sea. She takes to both the van and the driving like a natural, apart from the first time at a hill start. The handbrake is too low down for her to operate both that and the pedals she needs, so we manage a team operation, and apologise to the people stuck behind us. They seem to understand, and we think it’s something to do with the van being plastered with logos and free-phone numbers for the hire company. Kind of marks us out as tourists, really.

We get to the camp site at around 6 in the evening, reverse into our allotted space next to four other vans with the same logos, and begin trying to remember all the stuff we’d been told 7 hours ago about water, power, air conditioning, give up and walk down the road to the local store, where they sold fish and chips. You know the cliché about Aussies – wife-beater singlets, beer stubbies with those cooler things, vacant stares? And that’s just the women? This is where it started. Probably. We get our supplies and walk back to the site, remembering to book a couple of hours online wi-fi time, which we figure we ought to use up. It’s gone 9.00pm by the time we head to the computer room, which we find shut. We also notice that we seem to be the only people around, so we sit down by the open air pool and surf for a couple of hours. On the laptop, not boards that is. Returning to our van, we notice that every other van, tent and cabin on the site has their lights off, so we quietly put our bed together and sleep as soundly as we ever have.

The next morning we wake early, at 6,30, shower, pack up the van and head the 2 kms along the esplanade to the pier. This pier juts out into the sea for just over 1 km, so of course Michelle wants to walk all the way along it. I’m glad we do, because the view is fantastic, if not the smell – there must be 30 fishermen chopping up bits of fish for bait – and we head back into Hervey Bay for breakfast by the sea. As we begin on our raisin toast the rain begins to fall and the waiters efficiently move everyone inside the restaurant with the minimum of effort.

The next target for us is a place called Rockhampton, chosen mainly because it’s 380 km from Hervey Bay, and we’ve split the journey up as equally as we could, and it’s got a campsite listed in our travel guide.

On the way we call into a supermarket and stock up on pasta, fruit, water and coffee, planning on utilising the cooking facilities on our van, which we do – after going for a swim in the site pool, and then having a beer at the ajoining bar. It’s still only 9.30 when we sit in the van all tidied up, and decide to hit the sack, again, sleeping really well until the rain wakes us at 5.30 in the morning. We cook scrambled eggs for breakfast, tidy up and shower before hitting the road. Now we feel like old hands at this campervan lark, and decide to head for Airlie Beach, the set off point for trips out to the Whitsunday Islands, which we plan on visiting properly on the way back down. It’s a monster 500 km drive, so I do the first stint and by the time we stop for lunch in a little town called Sarina, we’ve covered 300 km. Michelle takes over after our ‘comfort stop’, and it’s my turn to phone ahead to book our pitch at a campsite. After our, by now, well rehearsed and well executed arrival routine, we head for the bus-stop outside the site and take the 20 minute journey into Airlie Beach for some evening food and to check out the place we’ve booked for a few days time.

I’m not sure why, but I was in a bit of a bad mood by the time we got into the town, and as we realised it was Friday night, we walked past bar after bar of loud, obnoxious backpackers – including one who was drunkenly trying to get in a cab, not realising there wasn’t even a driver in it.

We found a relatively quiet bit of town near the lagoon, which luckily also housed the hostel we had booked for a few days time, and had an expensive thai meal before jumping back on a bus and getting out of there. This wasn’t boding well for our return.

The campsite, like all the others, had such excellent facilities that it was hard to see any need for families, which made up the majority of it’s demographic, to even leave the grounds. The shower blocks were so clean, with hot water and well designed cubicles (you could shower in one bit and then dry and dress in another), that I pretty much forgot how much I loathe the concept of camping, and really began to enjoy myself. Our van had become our home, and we had very quickly settled into a routine.

The early morning starts continued the next day as we headed further up the coast to Mission Beach. We had both liked the sound of this place after reading about it in our book, and during the drive up that day elected to not book a site but find one when we got there. Once we left the main road and headed for the coast, the vegetation got much more green and lush, the road much more hilly, and the drive got a lot slower. Arriving finally, we pulled into a site across the road from the beach, and within 15 minutes we were walking along the sandy horse-shoe shaped bay, watching the waves move into the beach, and resisting the urge to run into the sea. This far north, you don’t swim in the sea during summer. At least not without a stinger suit, which is like a thin wetsuit, and protects you from the thousands of deadly jellyfish that take over the sea at this time of year. There is a little netted off area with a lifeguard, but it’s not quite the same, is it.

We eat in the van again, and plan to walk down into the town for a beer later that evening, but the rain falls again, we don’t fancy getting that wet, and so another early night is voted in, with a bit more wi-fi time bought so we can do a bit of banking, uploading to the blog and catching up on the news, except we forget to catch up on any news. We’ve been away for 17 days now, and have no idea what’s going on. Right now, we kind of like that way.

It’s dried out by morning and we pack up the van for the last time, check out and drive down to the village where we look around the local market, Michelle buys a very cool hat, we have breakfast and head off to Cairns, where we have to drop off the van. It’s only 130 or so kms, and we think we know where everything is and have a plan. Cairns seems like a huge place compared to the villages and towns we’ve seen in the past few days, and Michelle navigates us to the hostel we have booked for this evening. We drop off our bags and then set off to the van drop off, near the airport. Once negotiated, a kindly cab driver takes us back to the city, telling us all about how brilliant Melbourne is for most of the journey. When I ask him why he’s in Cairns if he likes Melbourne so much, he tells us that he’s divorced – and this is as far away from his ex-wife as he could get!

Cairns seems like a lovely place, and we head down to the lagoon, where there is a large fresh water pool right next to the sea (remember, too many jellyfish in the sea to swim in it), and have our sandwiches we had made with the left overs in the van that morning. There is a band playing, people walking by the sea, lazing around on the grass, and it seems like an idyllic Sunday afternoon in summer. Which it is, only it’s the 18th December, and these people have shopping bags with pictures of snow, and Santa, and Rudolph, and have to go home and wrap presents.

The only worry we have is how we are going to get back to Airlie Beach tomorrow. We ask around a number of places and it seems that there are no cars available. Not one. Why? It’s Christmas. So, at 9.45pm in the evening, we book two seats on our last resort – the 9.00am Grayhound Coach, which arrives at Airlie Beach at 8.15pm. That’s 11 and a bit hours on a coach. To make us feel a bit better we go and find a $5 special at the local Chinese restaurant, and visit the huge and very corporate looking Irish Bar for a Guinness before setting our alarm for early, to Airlie.

Is it Brissy? Or Brisso? What ARE the rules?

It’s not called Christmas here. It’s Chrissy! And it’s not Dave. It’s Davo! “Come and get your chrissy cards at Davo’s chrissy card store! They’re bonzer!” Actually, I made up the last bit – nobody has said ‘bonzer’ anywhere near us, but the rest is a radio advert, almost verbatim. It has to be said that advertising in Australia is not going to win a lot of awards, but they get their point across with very little messing around, which can also be said for Aussies in general. And that’s a good thing.

The 15 hour flight was fine in that we didn’t crash, we got quite nice meals (well, you know), a few bottles of wine were had, I got to watch ‘Superbad’, ‘The Simpsons Movie’, ‘The Darjeeling Limited’ and four episodes of ‘Two and a Half Men’, as well as listening to three of the radio channels and reading half a book. And, as you might be able to tell, I didn’t sleep. Following the usual nervous routine of shutting her eyes and hoping for the best, which is always followed by a look of surprise when we actually leave the ground, Michelle watched approximately 10 minutes of, oh, it doesn’t really matter does it, before dozing off and waking only sporadically to either eat, go for a walk or start another movie to fall asleep too.

So, when we landed (with the same nervy routine, only with a surprised look when both wheels touch down and clearly haven’t fallen off in the middle of the Pacific Ocean), Michelle was a lot perkier than I was, and saw a lot more humour in the customs officer’s question about whether we’d walked through any fields before we left the UK. I was about to explain to him that “not all of us drive tractors you know, mate, and another thing…” when she dragged me through the door, and we were in Brisbane.

We’d booked a van to take us to the hostel, and I was really struggling to stay awake while we stood outside the airport, sweating at 7.45 in the morning. When a van with the company’s name pulled up, I raced over with our cases, keen not to miss out, and the driver asked me “Where are you off to, mate?” “Central Brisbane, er, mate” I answered. “Not with me, you’re not. I’m going to the Gold Coast. Your bus is over there. Now pulling away.”
When we finally got to the hostel, our host John was sorting our room out, and we decided to have a shower and go for a walk to pick up some drinks and snacks. When we got back to the hostel I think I sat down for a second, and woke about 9 hours later. We made it down the road for an hour to eat some pizza, but headed straight back for more sleep, hoping to make it through to the next morning, which we nearly did – both ending up wide awake at 3.30am.

I’d never felt so jet-lagged before, and didn’t like it one single bit. Michelle, who suffers a lot, took it in her stride (like most things) and managed to get back to sleep. Did I mention that I’m not smoking on this trip? This was day 7, and was truthfully the first time I’d wanted one very badly. How nice would it have been to go and sit on the balcony overlooking the garden, next to the mango tree, and have a smoke…

I got through it, although I’m not sure how, and we got up at a more reasonable time – to rain. Brisbane is the state capitol of Queensland, and water supplies were getting so short that the powers had decreed that showers should take no longer than 4 minutes. The first morning we’re in town? It bloody well rains. By about 10am it had stopped, and the temperature was crawling back up. We took the scenic boardwalk along the river into town, stopping off for breakfast on the way, and after a 15 minute stroll found ourselves in a very attractive city centre, full of busy and attractive looking people, rushing around looking attractive and busy.

To encourage public transport, the local authorities provide a free bus service that loops around the city, and we decided it would be a good way to get our bearings. We jumped off at the main shopping centre and went in search of a mobile phone store. The first one we found told us that the cheapest deal he had for a pay-as-you-go was $130, so we moved on and found ‘Crazy Johns’. Christos sold us a phone, sim card and $40 of credit for $60, which we put together and tried in a café ten minutes later, getting through to our friend Kirstie at the first attempt.

Across the river is the Modern Art Museum, which is like catnip to me and grass cuttings to Michelle. We came up with a plan which gave me a couple of hours there, but once we’d realised that there was a major Warhol exhibition going on, I talked her into coming with me. She loved it. 300 of his most famous pieces in one place, put together very well, and I didn’t force her to see any of that Pollock stuff either! The picture at the top came from a photo booth at the exhibition.

From the Museum we walked along the South Bank to the artificial beach, which is an amazing thing to see in the middle of a city, stopped for a chip butty (or chip ‘sango’…) and then caught the speedy ferry back to New Farm, the district we were staying in.

Some noodles for dinner across the road, and an early night. All that walking…

The next morning and we head for the Alibi Rooms, a coffee bar down the road from the hostel, because it does breakfast, and has free internet access. We order breakfast, but have trouble getting online, so I ask one of the guys that is working behind the bar. James, a man covered in very cool tattoos, spends half an hour trying to connect us, before calling his provider to be told he wasn’t online. We chat about Macs (both agreeing that the Titanium Powerbook is by far the best looking), music and graphic design before he goes back to work leaving us to start planning the next bit of our trip. Over the next three hours, and six coffees, we book a campervan, a flight and three hostels while chatting with James from time to time. He offers to take us to a koala sanctuary outside Brisbane, and we swap numbers. We’d certainly like to try and fit that in, and we pencil in next Thursday, when we’re back in Brisbane for a day or two.

By the time we get back to the hostel it’s early afternoon, and we have an early evening date booked with Tom and Annette, so we sit around reading and snoozing, and it’s nice to just, you know, sit…

We met Tom and Annette about 20 years ago. They were friends of my good buddy Steve Mears, and had followed him to the UK after his permanent move a year or two beforehand. Tom wasn’t around as long as Annette, who worked in Ipswich for a while, and even came to our wedding in, ahem, 1988. They settled back in Australia and now have two kids, a classic car and a classic Rickenbacker bass, and had offered to take us out for the evening. It’s always a bit weird meeting up with people after so long. Neither of us had seen or spoken with Annette since she left the UK in 89, and I had briefly met up with Tom a couple of years ago, but all fears were swept aside almost immediately and they took us firstly to a bar under the huge bridge into the city, then back to theirs to meet the kids Declan and Kayleigh before hitting Fortitude Valley – the hip part of town.

The first thing we saw was an extremely tall transvestite, and the second was one of the singers from ‘The Veronicas’ – apparently. We eat food, drank beer, and they dropped us off at the hostel after making us promise to stay with them on our way back through. It was great to see them, and we look forward to meeting the kids again next week!

So, this campervan. One of our fellow plane passengers had told us about this website which lists all the hire vehicles that have been left in the wrong place after one-way deals, and for nominal fees the companies get people to drive them back to the right place.

We’d found a campervan which needed driving from Brisbane to Cairns, in 5 days, which was going to cost $5 a day, with gas paid for. So we booked it. Our journey will take around 400km a day, and to fit in with everything else, means we have to find a car from Cairns back to Airlie Beach to get our flight to Brisbane. Phew! So much for sitting on the beach…

The next morning we picked up our ‘campo’ (maybe we should call it Ivan) and set off towards Hervey Bay, with Michelle on the phone trying to find us a campsite for the night. And yes, it’s raining…

Who walks? We walk!

Just before falling into bed after the Mexico trip, we said our goodbyes to Jana, who was off early the next day on a work trip, leaving Nigel to entertain us on his own. The lovely man took a day off work to be with us, so the least we could do was drive to our selected destination – San Diego Zoo.

I have reservations about Zoos in general. The last time I visited one, in Barcelona, I was so shocked at how badly the animals were treated (they all looked unhealthy, the place was a mess, none of them had any room) we left quickly and I vowed not to go to another one. The last time we were in San Diego Michelle talked me into going to Sea World, which seemed much better, although the whale show left me a little cold. It really is the only way most of us will ever get to see these beautiful animals, but is it really fair to keep them locked up and make them do tricks? It’s not on a par with the cruelty to bears and monkeys in Africa and parts of Europe, admittedly, but still…

So I thought it would be fair to give San Diego Zoo a go. Like all American Theme Parks, it is incredibly well organised for a start. Loads of Parking, clear signage, loads of entry gates, and more information than you can reasonably take in.

We started with the monkeys, who had a lot of space, but seemed a little lethargic. The birds in the next-door aviary seemed happy enough although I’m not sure how an unhappy bird sounds to be honest, and the gorillas were laying around or performing for the few people they had. We watched one of them pull a branch from a nearby tree and delicately pull each leaf from the branch and eat it. By the time we had seen the meerkats with their keeper, I was sold on the concept of a ‘good’ zoo, until we got to the big cats.

I have a soft spot for big cats, and having seen film of jaguars, lions, tigers leopards and lynx in the wild, it’s clear that they need space in which to run. These guys didn’t. However cool it is to see a fully grown jaguar a couple of feet away, it’s still not right for it to be cooped up like they are. The leopard was pacing up and down, and looked frustrated. So we carried on, visiting the elephants, koalas, and polar beers, all of which were either asleep, or busy elsewhere. I did enjoy the visit, and it raised my hopes for Zoos in general – if every Zoo was as clean, well organized and informative as this, I could be convinced that they are necessary so us ordinary folk get a chance to get close to these fascinating animals.

That evening we walked down Orange Avenue to the Coronado Brewing Company, sampled a couple of the Micro-Brewery’s range of beers and bought Nigel dinner. The very least we could do, considering the fantastic time he had ensured for us. The next morning we said goodbye and thanked him, and headed up the road – destination Huntington, and our friends The Harding Family.

We took the 5 until we hit Dana Point, where we headed back to the coast and PCH1. We stopped off at Laguna Beach, and hit Huntingdon right on time, giving us a chance to pick up some flowers and fruit for our hosts from the street fair we found on Main Street. It had been a couple of years since we last visited James, Kayce, Hannah and Sophie, and the girls had not only grown but apparently swapped personalities. Sophie, the shy and quiet one last time seemed to be the more dominant of the twins two years on, but according to Kayce they swap around regularly. We dumped our bags and piled into the family sized SUV to head back to the coast, and Ruby’s at the pier. The girls filled us in on what they’d been up to over the last two years, and occasionally James or Kayce got to tell us something too, and before we knew it we were back at the house, the girls were in bed – having first given us a rare performance of an elaborate Harry Potter joke – and we all admitted defeat. These people had to be at work the next day, and in Kayce’s case, much earlier than we would be around so we said our goodbyes. We got to hug the twins before they went to school in the morning, and James was meeting his friend and builder Tim first thing, so we got an extra hour with him before again heading north on the PCH towards Santa Monica. We made loose plans to see them again in March on our way home…

We had agreed with the car hire firm to drop the car at their branch on Wilshire Boulevard, just round the corner from the hostel we had booked on 2nd Street. Finding it was another matter. Of course, because I ‘knew’ the area I just assumed we’d see it, rather than, say, write down the actual address so we would know roughly where to look. That would just be far too easy. It was on the third trip back down one of the main streets in Santa Monica that Michelle spotted the tiny logo above a tiny office, and an even smaller sign directing us down a tiny side street. They didn’t seem to mind too much that we were nearly an hour late, and even offered us a lift to the hostel. Our driver, Chris, had spent a year studying in Kensington, London, so understood when we explained where we lived. He recommended we try a local beer called Firestone, brewed in Santa Barbara, after we had the usual ‘what is it with the warm beer?’ conversation.

The hostel, part of the Hosteling International chain, is very clean, organised, and just a little soul-less – but it’s very close to everything we needed and by the time we’d checked in, dragged our bags up to the fourth floor, we both fell fast asleep, waking up late in the evening which made it hard to find somewhere to eat. We ended up in Barney’s Beanery sharing a huge pizza and drinking Firestone, which I’m glad to report lived up to Chris’s recommendation.

The next day, and the rain is threatening. So what do we do? Yes, that’s right – we hire bikes, and set off on the beach path south. Our intended destination, Manhattan Beach, was still a good 3 miles off when we finally gave up due to the wind blowing us back where we’d just come from, and the ride back got quicker as the clouds got blacker. We’d still covered a good 26 miles, and immediately celebrated with muffins and coffee.

We’d already decided to treat ourselves that evening, so we headed for the hip new vegetarian restaurant in town, the Real Food Daily, or RFD. This, could be the most perfect place for us. Michelle could have lentils, rice, runner beans and carrots, and I could order a tempeh roast, with onion gravy and mash. It was, of course, all too good to be true, and just as we were plowing through the houmous and pitta bread starter, Chelley started feeling a bit faint, like she was in one of those Merchant Ivory films. It was quite warm in the restaurant, and after a few minutes we decided we had to leave. Thankfully even posh places in the States will pack up your left-overs, even if you haven’t actually started, and within a couple of minutes we were walking, slowly, back towards the hostel, carrying our meals. She felt much better as soon as we had got outside, so we sat in the communal kitchen amongst students and eat our fantastic RFD meals.

Our last day was a long one. The flight to Brisbane left at midnight, and we had to check out of the room by 11am, which left us with 9 hours to fill. Luckily the morning downpour had given way to sun by the time we ventured outside.

One of the areas of LA I hadn’t really given much time too was Venice. The Beach area is just a bit too gaudy, and tries a bit too hard to be ‘wacky’, for my liking, and so I’d never been to the area inland. The ‘Big Blue Bus’ company runs regular services around Santa Monica, one of which goes into Venice, so we jumped on and decided to ride the whole route before getting off along the main street, Abbott Kinney Boulevard.

This plan worked fine until, slightly distracted by the fact that we had driven passed Venice High School – used as Rydell High School in the movie ‘Grease’ – we heard the driver announce that we all had to leave the bus. We asked if we could get back on, and she asked if we were lost. After we explained our plan of seeing the neighbourhood first, she told us we were more than welcome to get back on the bus, but we’d have to wait outside for ten minutes. While outside, Chelley was approached by an old Chinese lady, who asked for help undoing the top button on her trousers. You wouldn’t say no, would you?

Also waiting to get on the bus was a young guy with a skateboard, who, after noticing me looking at his board explained that he normally skated to work, but he didn’t fancy the puddles today. He also went on to tell us that he was from Florida, his Gran owned about twenty houses in Venice, he’d been a driver in the military but had got shrapnel in his leg while serving in The Congo, he’d studied Nutrition and Massage at college, and he worked in one of the numerous bong shops on Venice Beach Front blowing glass. And he looked about 19 years old. When we got off the bus he gave me his card. He was called ‘Fish’.

The wind was getting really strong, so we took refuge in a number of the fantastically varied stores along Abbott Kinney, before finding a coffee shop and eating Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwiches.

Venice is called Venice because it is actually built around a series of canals, modelled on the Italian city of, ahem, Venice. And it is very beautiful. The American one, not the Italian one. Well, I’m sure the Italian one is very beautiful…oh, you know what I mean, right?

We walked the two miles back to Santa Monica and decided to go the movies. ‘The Golden Compass’ has caused a bit of a rumpus, what with the book’s author telling everyone that the book is about organised religion, so we got in on the opening day. You know what? It’s a great looking film, the acting is fine and the story bounds along quite nicely even before you start in on the whole meaning. Go see it!

We have a bus booked to take us to the airport, and the driver tells us that his friend started a radio station, he came to the States as a student in the 70’s, he’d been an engineer, he loved classical music… everyone shares here. As we line up to check in for our flight, we reflect on the fact that it’s only a week since we left England, but it seems like a lifetime already.

Brisbane, here we come!

Catching up with ourselves...

We just spent three hours plus sorting out our plans for the next two weeks to take us up to Christmas in Sydney, and we have to get moving so there won't be an update for a couple of days about the last few days, if you understand that!

But here's the highlights: San Diego Zoo, Huntington Beach with the Hardings, Bikes, Movies and walking in Venice in Santa Monica, Warhol and rain, river cruises and coffee houses in Brisbane and much, much more...

It's all to come, if only we could stop to write about it.

Oh, and we have a camper van to deliver in Cairns in four days. We'd better go...!

It never rains in Southern California…

It never rains in Southern California…

I didn’t mention the weather, did I? On the descent into LAX last Friday, the pilot announced that it was cloudy, and a little cold. And raining. Bear in mind that when we left Heathrow it was sunny, and rather warm. For the time of year, that is.

The rain stopped by the time we had been dropped off at the hostel and I had lost my wallet, but it was still a bit of a shock to see the streets wet. Not as much of a shock, it has to be said, as driving into San Diego the next day in the rain. We were fine – it’s not like we’ve never driven in rain before – but the locals? All over the place. Their windscreen wipers are for clearing insects, not water.

Local news channel Fox announced an 11 o’clock special report on the rain, and by the time we arrived in Santa Monica on Wednesday, some residents in the canyons east of Orange County and in Malibu were being warned about the incoming storm, and how large amounts of rain would cause landslides in the hills. The reason for this? The fires 6 weeks ago burnt all the trees and bushes, which means that there is nothing holding the ground together. Out of the frying pan, into the landslide.

As of tonight (Friday) no serious damage has happened, and only small amounts of rain have actually fallen, but more is coming tonight – when we are going to be in a plane, flying out of LAX and into the storm.

Drama? We can do drama…!

Make that four countries...

It's Sunday, and there's three Americans, three Brits, a Greek and a Slovak in this RV, and they head for the Mexican border... I think we've got ourselves a movie! But first, back to Friday.

An uneventful flight passed by slowly. Well, I say uneventful - As we got on the plane and walked down the aisle to the left, we stopped to allow someone to put their bag in the overhead locker. I glanced down and thought to myself, "That bloke looks just like Lee." At about the same time he looked up at me and, I might be paraphrasing slightly here, thought to himself, "That bloke looks just like Stephen." I used to work with Lee back in the dark and distant 90's, before he and his wife Tina (who I'd worked with first) moved to one of those 'outside London but inside the M25' towns, and hadn't really spoken to either much since. I'd heard through mutual friends that they had reproduced a couple of times, and that Lee was now working as a freelance Director for, amongst others, the BBC.

I'm not sure what the chances are of meeting someone you know on a plane, but I'd imagine the odds are fairly high. We agreed to chat later - It was going to be an 11 hour flight - and off we went to find our seats. It was nice to catch up with Lee when we found a couple of empty seats at the back later in the flight, and he explained he was going to LA to do some filming for a documentary he was making for the BBC. We spent a good hour chatting and updating each other before it was time to eat, we promised to keep more in touch, and not rely on chance meetings again.

Oh, and we'd seen Helen Mirren getting on our flight too. But I hadn't worked with her, and so therefore that was less exciting.

Nearly three hours queuing in the Immigration Hall at LAX meant that we actually walked out of the airport at about 5.30 in the afternoon, Pacific Coast time, or 1.30 in the morning Ipswich time, and got on a shuttle bus to take us to the Orbit Hostel. We chatted with a couple on the bus who had been on our flight and were also staying at The Orbit for a few days before flying on to Hawaii as the start of a 10 month trip, and worked out that we will all be in New Zealand at the same time. I think there is much more chance of us bumping into them somewhere in NZ than meeting anyone we know on a plane...

Having checked in and found the room, we dumped the bags and smiled at each other. We had arrived! - until I realised I had no idea where my wallet was, or indeed the last time I had seen it. We emptied all our bags super-quick and didn't find it - so I was straight on the payphone at the end of the hall, calling the shuttle company. It was my first port of call, and having spoken with 'Curly' in the Arizona based call-centre, he passed me on to a lady in the LA office, who found the driver and asked him to have a look. The longest 3 minutes of my life ended with a whoop from the lady telling me he had found out and would drop it off for me within the hour. I wished I'd tipped him now...

Slightly refreshed and very relieved, we met up with my friends Aussie Nick and Brit Gary, and headed off up Melrose Ave to the Snakepit, one of the bars we had used a lot on my previous visit to LA. Being the only LA resident, Gary was of course the only one without the requisite ID to get in the bar, so he went back home with a promise to meet us later at another place. Nick and I ordered Guinness, while Chelle went for a Vodka and Coke. She was already struggling with staying awake, and the strong drink did her no favours at all. We had been up for 26 hours by now, and Chelle was in danger of headbutting the bar. I felt fine, until the end of my second pint, and it was becoming very clear that we were not going to make it to the next planned venue.

We decided to give in, said goodnight to Nick, and walked back to the hostel. There could have been a war going on in our bathroom, and we would have slept through it, until 7.00am local time when we both realised that we hadn't eaten anything the previous night, and needed food. Luckily Farmers Market is only 20 minutes walk down Fairfax, and we were soon tucking in to eggs, toast, potatoes and coffee with gusto.

The car hire place offered a pick-up service, and we were soon sitting in a sodding Chrysler PT Cruiser, or Bread Van as Michelle calls it, wondering how uncool we actually looked. We hadn't ordered one of these (I think a Ford Focus was mentioned), but here we were.

The nice thing about the roads in California is that most of them are straight - either east to west, or north to south, and we soon found our way onto the 405 heading south to San Diego. We stopped off for coffee at our favourite place, Manhattan Beach, and then hit the 5 Interstate, which eventually winds it's way around downtown, before peeling off and over the bridge which heads to the island of Coronado and the home of our friends Nigel and Jana. Nigel is an old friend from home, and Jana his wife. They moved to California a few years ago and, like everyone else, love it.

Coronado is the poshest part of the posh bit of San Diego. It's also right next to the US Navy's largest base, not that you'd know once you're there. These guys have really gone out of their way to help us, and have borrowed the apartment next door to theirs for us to use, as well as organising the night's entertainment. After drinking coffee and eating Jana's fantastic guacamole, we headed over to the South Park Bar to meet Greg and Laurie, friends of Nigel and Jana, along with Jana's work colleague Pia, and watch Greg play with other local Musos.

This turns out to be one of those neighbourhood bars you would never find without local knowledge, and the food is good, the wine and beer flows and the band, despite being of the blues variety, are great. We manage to stay awake a bit longer this time, and during the evening plans are made for tomorrow - we're all off to Mexico!

The next morning we drive over to Greg and Laurie's and all jump into their RV. There is Greg and Laurie, their friend Jesse (the three Americans), Michelle, Me and Nigel (the three Brits), Jana (the Slovak) and Pia (the Greek). It's a 20 minute drive to the border, and then another half an hour to our destination - a little fishing village south of Rosarito. We walk through a myriad of shacks and lean-tos and eventually walk into a building right over the water. The table for eight is soon filled with beer, nachos and various dishes - mostly of fish. Fried, baked, marinated, with rice, and still in it's shell. We have local tequila shots, and before we know it we're walking back up the road, pilling into the RV and heading to Rosarito. A quick walk round a market (where everything is negotiable) and we find ourselves at 'Papa's and Beer' - the headquarters of Spring Break bad behaviour. Only, it's very empty, and the eight of us are the only people sitting on sofas looking out over the beach, sipping bottles of Sol and the sun is setting. It's a long way from Ipswich.

After a detour around some of the less approachable areas of Tijauna, we join the queue to cross back over the border, and while we wait the venders pass by trying to sell pretty much anything and everything. We have churros and cups of corn, and when we reach the border the guard simply cannot cope with so many different nationalities and we get referred to the secondary inspection area. Eventually we get the all clear, and the drive back takes no time at all. We've only known Greg, Laurie, Jesse and Pia for a day, but it's been a long day - and a good one.