Queensland Adventures

Well now, I have under 2 weeks remaining of my 1st stint in Queensland before heading over to New Zealand. And yes Im now bowing to pressure from friends back home to turn away from Facebook for a while and do a blog! This will hopefully cover my week-long tour of the east coast of Qld from Brisbane up to Cairns and the wedding I flew back for at crazy-o'clock the following saturday!


To start with here's the pool in the backyard of the house I've been living in with Dan & Chris Webb

A brand-spanking new Queensland Rail train.... Virgin trains HERE IS THE FUTURE!!

ANZAC Square in Brisbane, I've consumed many lunches here! So I completed my 'oz experience' tour with the final leg from Brisbane up to Cairns, passing through some nice and some average places, day 1 went through Noosa and Rainbow Beach (I wasnt impressed by either, glad I wasn't stopping), ended at Hervey Bay which was described by our driver as "the place old people come to die in", day 2 we passed through Bundaberg ('Bundy'), here's the town hall which I think deserves to be glorified in photographic form! Day 2 the cheesey music continued on the bus, Chumbawumba's "Tubthumping" was a hit singalong as was Aqua's "Barbie Girl" since we had 2 danish girls onboard! This day ended 35 km in 'woop-woop', aboriginal for 'the middle of nowhere' on a cattle farm - we were well-fed, surrounded by flies, learnt to lasooe, crack a whip (im AWESOME at this!), ride mechanical bull (26s 4 me), goat-rodeo, dodgy drinking games then left the next day headed, via an afternoon game of lawn-bowls...... to Airlie Beach......... not a nice place unless you're young and wanna drink/party alot or have money to sail to/arounf the WhitSundays! So I stayed one night, this photo is of the lagoon there which, by day, is quite nice Day 4 I met 3 cool people, Brian, Karlyn and Sam, we became a close group for a few days as we stayed on Magnetic Island, near Townsville (which is a lovely town... with Great Dividing Range nearby), - fotos below (anyone else agree the girl on far left looks like Mena Suvari from 'American Beauty'?) We then headed on the 5th and final tour day to Cairns together, via a cool Croc-Farm run by the orignal Mick Dundee (they moulded the movie character round this guy)..... got to hold a baby croc with jaws taped shut, it kinda went mad when I also had snake round my neck! Cairns began with partying and drinking rather alot of the free alcohol the bus driver bought us (all harmless fun but some viewers may not be amused). Needless to say I spent the next day recovering/sleeping. I'd been comfronted by temptation but did not succomb! My camera broke but my lovely parents agred to fund a replacement since I was going to Green Island on the Great Barrier Reef next day....... such a beautiful part of the world as the following photos will prove: Over the course of this 1 week I made a dozen or so new friends, some of whom Id hope to see again back in UK, or Canada......... you may know I used to have a thing for Canada being my favourite country until I discovered the great places and girls of Australia, well I met a gorgeous Canadian lady named Tara (pronounced Te-ra) and found it hard not to be attracted to her, don't think she's a christian which kinda goes against the understanding Id come to that dating a woman whose life is lived for God is the right way for me to go. Since being back in Brisbane she's moved down but havent really seen her and realised that this isnt the right time in my life to have anything more than friendships..... God has someone for me but in his time not mine! Anyway my last night in Cairns I got about 3 hours sleep between partying again and waking ridiculously early for a 6am flight back to Brisbane so I could attend a wedding of 2 friends from VACC Church I go to here.... a beautiful wedding....the groomsman Nick even sprang a suprise by singing Snow Patrol's 'Chasing Cars' after he and Suzie were married! SO cool and as usual all the guys and girls looked great!