kerryanne and paul great world adventure

We crossed the border after we had our garlic taken from us. We have this theory that the guards at the border take what they need for their dinner that night.

Our first stop was Kunanurra, a small town where we got stuck for over a week while our car had a new 5th gear fixed. Vara left us and got the bus to Broome. We stayed at a nice campsite that had a great swimming pool which cooled us down in the 40 degree heat. There was a chicken at the campsite which laid an egg every day in a ladies car. We went to the Zebra rock mining which was really good, the rock is so nice. There is only one other place in the world that mines it and that is South Africa, but it is a different colour. We managed to get out the town on the 9th May. We drove along the Gibb river road to El Questro, on the way we saw a dingo,typan snake and loads of black cockatoo's we stayed at the campsite for 2 nights and did some of the gorges around the area. Zebadee springs was great we ended up going there twice, The water was nice and warm and we got a free skin manicure and pedicure from the cleaner fish. We then drove to El Quetro gorge, it was a tuff walk over boulders that had washed down in the wet season, but it was well worth it. The views were lovely and the cold swim in the pool at the end was refreshing. We also went to Emma gorge, it was very hot that day and the walk was very hard work. We went for a dip in the pool at the end, but it was bloody freezing so we did not stay in very long.

Our next adventure was the Bungle Bungles. We both had such a good time. I had the fun of driving our 4x4 through the river, which was a challenge as the water was over the bonnet and you could not see the boulders under the water. We stayed there for one night and went to all the nice gorges. Cathedral gorge was a nice walk and so was Echidna casim. The different kinds of birds were great so colorful and pretty.

We then drove back on to the 4x4 Gibb river road and went to Tunnel creek. It is a walk through a cave so we took our head torches and walked right the way through. We had to take our shoes off for most of it as you had to wade through water. The water had these black fish and when you shined a light on them a gland under their eye lit up red - pretty cool!! Windjana gorge was great there was loads of fresh water crocs in the river and all the walls around used to be coral reef in the sea.

We made it to bell gorge in the dark, after Paul drove the wrong way for over half an hour. Bell gorge was really nice once we got there. We had a very eventful walk down to the water. We had to cross a flowing river and the rocks were really slippery so Paul told me to go across first so i could put my bag down, well i know why he said that now i fell into the water fully clothed then slipped another 3 times. Paul was falling about laughing of course. We then walked the wrong way, but eventually got a swim. It had a lovely waterfall. We then got asked if we could pose for some photo's for a New Zealand magazine, it will be very funny if they publish them. We left the Gibb River road and stayed a night at Derby, so we could clean all the red dust out of the car. As we left Derby we stopped at a prison boab tree, where they kept aboriginal prisoners.

We made it to Broome on the 16th May and stayed there five days. We spent most of the time chilling out sunbathing on cable beach. We also did the camel ride on the beach, which i will advise you all now not to do with a hangover. There are dinosaur foot prints on one of the beaches so we went down and checked those out. We watched the sun set at cable beach, it was very nice but then an army of mosquito's came out so we had to dive in the car. We advertised for some people to travel down to Perth with us and got a reply from Kerstin and Chris from Germany.

We left Broome and the four of us drove to eighty mile beach, where we camped the night. The sunset was amazing it reflected of the wet sand. We stopped at Port headland and then drove to Karajini national park. We had a great time at Karajini, the gorges were amazing, the best National park i have been to. We did the spider man walk which was was great fun, we all had to wade through freezing cold water and then climb along a wall with a stream of flowing water below us. We camped there for two nights and i spent those two nights in the car as it was cold and uncomfortable in the tent. One of the nights we had a pack of dingoes howling by our tents, which sounds a little spooky. We went for a four hour walk through one of the gorges, which had amazing views and we were able to go for two swims in the pools.

Our next stop was Exeter. Where we had another problem with our car, so had to wait 3 day's to get it fixed. In those three day's Paul, Chris and I went whale shark snorkeling, which was amazing. The first day we went out we did not see any, but we did see manta ray, loads of tropical fish when we went to the snorkel sight, rays and a leopard shark. The next time we went out we saw two whale sharks, they were about 7meters long and they just didn't have a care in the world just glide passed you quite graceful. We also went to turquoise bay, the snorkeling there was really good, you went in the drift and went with the current. We saw an octopus, black tip reef shark, puffer fish, turtle and loads more.

When the car was fixed we drove down to Coral bay. Well it was the worst place for flies down the west coast. We went on a 3 hour kayak trip to the coral, it's the clearest sea we have ever seen, it was just like an aquarium. We saw reef sharks, loads of puffer fish, a turtle and loads of bright and colorful fish. On the shore Paul came across a lion fish, which was very impressive.

We stayed at Durham for a night before we made our way to Monkey Mia. I had my birthday at Monkey Mia. I fed the dolphins on my birthday morning,which was really nice. Paul also managed to feed the dolphins too. We hired a kayak for a few hours and went to the red cliffs, on the way there we saw a baby shark, but thank god we never saw the mother. The flies were extremely bad by the red cliff, so we took a quick photo and paddled very fast back out.

When leaving Monkey Mia we stopped at Shell beach, it is 10ft deep of shells. The flies were unbearable and Paul had lost his fly net, so he was running around the beach trying to get away from them, not that it worked, but it was very entertaining. We then stopped at the stromatalites which are the oldest living organisms on the planet.

We made it to Kalbarri national park on the night of my birthday, so Paul took me out for a nice meal. The following we went in to the national park and went to natures window. It is a rock with a hole you can see the great view. Then we went to the Z - bend, a quite impressive gorge.

We then drove down as far as the Pinnacles. We watched the sunset, which changed the colour of the pinnacles and looked really good. It was our last night camping and we had gale force wind, so we were suprised when we woke in the morning to still find the tent in one piece.

We finaly made it to Perth and stayed in a really nice hostel for the remainder of our stay. We met a really nice group of travellers and went out with them a few times. The night life was quite good. We went to freemantle a few times and had a tour around the old prison. We managed to sell our car which was a great relief. I did some shopping in the town, with the promise i would not spend too much. We got the bus up to Kings park, it had the most amazing views of the city. We fed the birds by the pond and got attacked by a black swan. We decided to leave Australia a week early and got a flight to Auckland New Zealand..........................................................

Well we arrived in Melbourne for a few nights, stayed at a good hostel called greenhouse. A group of us from the hostel got together and went and watched the first ozzy rules game of the season, it was quite hard to follow the rules to begin with but we thought it was a good game. The hostel also arranged a bike ride around the canal, me and Paul decided to take the tandem bike Oh big mistake!! the chain fell off about 10 times then it snapped so only the person on the back of the bike was able to cycle, so i'm sure you guessed who that was, Paul he did a great job while i sat on the front seat steering the best i could with a few close calls.

We headed to Adelaide by over night bus. We stayed at the YHA which was a really nice hostel. we got the tram to Glenelg where the beach is, we took a picnic with us and sat by the beach. We managed to get a lift through the centre with Ronny from Holland. He had a very old 4x4 so we were hoping it would get us there. There was also Stefan from Germany who was traveling with us to. as we drove along the Stuart Highway there got less and less life and more red dust. The fist stop was Roxby Downs a small town in the middle of nowhere, it was also the start of mosquito bites. The drive to Coober Pedy was an experience it was on a dirt road through the middle of nowhere, extremely dusty and bumpy. Coober Pedy is an opal mining town, a very strange place with most places under the ground because the flies are so bad and it gets pretty hot. If you don't have a fly net on, you would have about four flies trying to get up each nostrel, at least 20 in your mouth and eye's also a swarm in you ears, i thought i was going to lose my patience. We stayed at the under ground camp site for the night, we were like cave people. The town had no colour at all, no trees, plants it was just dust and piles of dust from the mining. We saw the spaceship they used for the film Pitch Black and we went to the real crocodile hunters home (the film was based on him) he died not so long ago. His house was under ground and only women were allowed in, he collected bra's. He even had one of Tina Turners bra's but someone stole it.

We eventually made it to Uluru and what an amazing sight. We have sooooooo many photo's to bore you with when we get home. We were not mad enough to climb it, it was very hot and looks very dangerous. Walking around it was really good there is so much to see. We went there for the sunset and sunrise so we could see the colour change. Oh yeah and thank god for fly nets.

We walked around the Olges which took about 2 hours in very hot weather. They were quite interesting. It took us 4 hours to walk around Kings Canyon which was really nice. The views were amazing. Stefan stripped naked to have a picture which was very funny. We camped at the King's Canyon resort which was full of mosquito, they did not take long to find our blood. We were playing monopoly and a dingo came right up to us.

Before we arrived at Alice Springs we camped at a meteorite crater, it was quite interesting but i have never seen so many mosquito, they were biting us through our clothes. We all went to bed about 7:30pm just to get away from them. Rainbow Valley was really good the rocks are so many different colours.

We arrived in Alice Springs on the 10th April and checked into the Malanka backpackers. The town was an eye opener. There were lot's of Aboriginy people either fighting, drunk or passed out on the street, they don't put that in the brochures. The following day Johnathan from Barcelona drove a group of us to Mcdonnal ranges, It was really nice but the lake was very cold, it was great for the very bad hangover i had though. While we were in Alice we dicided to buy a Mitsubishi Pejero 4x4, so we could drive to everywhere we wanted to go. We wanted two people to travel with us so the petrol and food cost would be cheaper. We travelled up the centre with Stefan and Vara they are both from Germany so they had to put up with our towel and being first for everything jokes.

Our first stop was Devils marbels which was really interesting. The land went from flat to loads of round rocks scattered all over the place. The roads were just so boring just miles and miles and miles and miles of nothing. We stopped in Mataranka for the night and got completely surrounded by cane toads which got quite interesting when we saw one try and eat another one. We were sitting by our tents having a chat when this massive bright green cricket landed on my chest, i was very brave and did not freek out until it crawled up to my shoulder then walked down my arm and clung to my fingers. Paul and Stefan decided at 11:30pm to go on a night walk so i tagged along. We saw an owl, kangaroo's, fire flies and even a crab on the side of the road next to the hot springs. In the morning we walked to the river and went for a swim in the nice 35degree water. We arrived in Katherine and went to the Katherine gorge view point, it was quite a steep climb but well worth it when we made it. We arrived at the camp site in the dark and discovered it was right next to a river so there were millions of mosquito. Paul was spraying on some repellant and realised he was standing on a red ants nest so they bit all his feet. The grass had little flashing lights, when we had a closer look it was these spiders.

We spent 3 days in Kakadu national park which was plenty. All the waterfalls were closed due to the monsoon season, so we only got to see the Aboriginal art, which of course has a story to it:- Paul, Nouk and Vara were walking along infront of me when we heard a loud crack, a massive branch fell from a tree, I shouted run to the other three and they scattered as the branch hit the floor and hit Nouk in the face they were so lucky none of them were seriously hurt. (a lesson never trust an Australian tree!!). We stayed at a nice camp site the first night which had a lovely pool, we drank beer while chatting to some people in the pool. (do not do this at home very dangerous if you drink too much!!). The second night we stayed at a free camp site with a couple from Holland (It was in a croc area no wounder it was free). We had a bbq and spent the rest of the night putting on repellent to keep the mosquito away and the boy's made a camp fire. I was kept awake all night by the buzzing of mosquito all around our tent, when i finely fell asleep i got woken up at 4am by a pop noise, We had left a candle burning in one of the water containers, it had melted the plastic and set the ground alight, so i panicked being as there was loads of dry grass around woke Paul up but he was so confused with what was going on that i jumped out the tent in to all the mosquito's and put water on the ground to stop it, but some of the water went on to the wax and there was a big fire ball, i was lucky to have eyebrowes left. The flames finaly went out after my fire display and Paul and i spent the next 30mins killing all the mosquito that got in the tent. The following morning we just through everything back in to the car and drove to a car park where we had breakfast. We all were covered in bites, Stefan's feet were covered, Paul had them all around his ankles and I had them all across my back. We thankfully were leaving that morning. At least we had not been eaten by the monster sized crocodiles.

We arrived in Darwin on the 21st April. We stayed at the YHA which was ok. Darwin is a bit like a holiday resort. We spent a week relaxing after a hectic 2 weeks. Paul had his birthday while we were, there so it was a great excuse to eat and drink plenty. We went for a meal with 4 other people we had met. We went to the wharf and had a feast of - yes wait for it - Camel, crocodile, buffalo and burramundi fish and what a yummy meal it was, We then went and had a few drinks in Shinnanigans an Irish bar, well when i say a few maybe slightly more then that. We spent one night eating dinner on the beach watching the sunset (very romantic). Stefan got a lift to the east coast so we said goobye to him. Vara stayed with us. We travelled through Litchfield national park which was lovely, we went swimming in two lakes which were crocodile free.

We eventually travelled through the border to Western Australia on the 27th April.........................................................

We arrived in Christchurch at mid-night so the first thing we did was get a beer, well it was well needed after the flight and NZ is three hours ahead of OZ, enough of the excuses.

We spent six nights in Christchurch we met my mum there on the third night. She travelled with us for five weeks. We went to the antarctic centre and froze in the snow storm tank it went down to
-26, we had to wear these rubber shoes that made your feet look twice the size and a thick red coat, I of course had to try out the ice slide with all the children while Paul and mum took horrible photo's.

We met up with our friends Sharon and Luke, they were on holiday from Jersey. We all went to a Maui night. We watched them do the haka and we had dinner there, for starter we had seafood and i decided to try an oyster as i have always wanted to try them. I slid it in my mouth and i decided I really could not swollow it so i spat it back into the shell i was holding, well they all burst out laughing, I will never live it down. We saw a kiwi they breed them there then take them to an island, they are so sweet. The art centre in Christchurch is really good it was well worth a look and the botanic garden was really good to, and some aliens had even landed there in their spaceship.

we hired out a Nissan Sunny then moved up to Woodend and stayed in a cabin in a kiwi campsite, it could of done with a bit of updating, the beds were like hammoks but hey ho! The beach there was not that nice it was covered in drift wood someone had even tried to make a house out of it.

We then drove to Hamner Spring and bathed our bones in the 36 - 41 degree sulpher pools, It was like sitting in a bowl of boiled eggs well that is what it smelt like. We then drove to Kaikoura where we stayed for three nights in a top 10 campsite in a very nice cabin with a t.v and kitchen. We went on a boat to see the sperm whales, it was really good and got loads of great photo's, only of there tails though. We saw four whales, well mum and Paul did, i only saw three as the rest of the time i had my head in a sick bag. We also saw a big pod of dusky dolphins showing off their skills. The same day me and Paul went seal swimming it was really good they swam right underneath you or next to you, but the sea was bloody freezing. We went on cliff path walk and a big black cloud came in and it rained on us, not for too long though. We did a bit of sheep watching and saw all the seals lying on their beds made out of seaweed, you have to stay about ten metres away from them though other wise they will bite.

We travelled to Nelson the town with the most sun, well that is what the weather forecast always said. We drove to Abel Tasman national park and went down to the beach and saw the rock called the split apple. All the rock were covered in black muscles there were really tiny one's and others big enough to eat, so guess what we had for dinner? you guessed it a big bag of yummy muscles. The views in the national park where really nice and the sun was shining. We also saw some wild pigs running around together on the beach, that's a first.

We got to the west coast on the 16th February. We stopped in Greymouth for a night on the way there we stopped at Buller river and walked across the very high and narrow suspension bridge which Paul found amusing to jump on, boys will be boys!! We stopped at west port and saw all the fur seals, there were some really young one's and they were all playing together in the pools. We went to Punakaiki and saw the pancake rocks, which is layers of rock on top of each other.

Hokitika is where you can buy green stone jewellery cheap so Paul bought me a nice necklace, but we decided not to wear it until we get back to Jersey as the meaning of it was new life and that is definitly not in the plan. We went to Ross town, it used to be a mining town, but they ran out of land to mine and the big hole is now a big lake.

We stayed in Franze Joseph for a couple of nights, when we arrived and emptyed the boot mum's box of wine had leaked all into Paul's backpack so it smelt like a vine yard for about a week. Paul did a full day hike in Fox glacier and Mum and I did the heli-hike. The helicopter was a bit scarey at first but was something different and the four hour walk we did on the ice was amazing. I have never seen anything like it before. I got a bit carried away with taking photo's and had to go through a very large amount, thankgod for digital camera's!

Wanaka was a nice little town the lake was lovely and the views all around of the mountains was breath taking. The cabin we stayed in was a bit grim, the carpet smelt really bad and there were quite a few spiders, but i checked them out and none of them were dodgy white tails. We went to puzzle world which was ok, you went into this room that was on a slant and if you took a photo it looked like you were leaning over really far and it tricked the eye. There was also a maze there which was quite hard, yes we did get lost and it took a while to find our way out.

Queenstown was not far away just had to drive over a few mountains and there were some really nice lookouts on the way. We also stopped off at Arrow town which is a gold mining town, so we hired out the gold panning equipment and went in search. Paul found a tiny bit of gold and i had it on my knuckle while i found somewhere to put it and it blew off my hand so the only piece of gold and i managed to loose it in the space of about 30 seconds. We went on the cable car in Queenstown, at the top was the most amazing view. The mountains called the remarkables you could see really well and they filmed part of the Lord of the Rings there. Me and Paul went on the Luge, we are such big kids. We went on the scenic route first then on the fast route twice which was a little scarey.

We drove to Te Anua next, which is close to Milford sounds. We went on a boat trip on milford sounds, we were surrounded by big mountains that have just grown out the ground. We saw some fur seals and penguins swimming along. The cabin we stayed in was ok but bloody cold, i think we almost froze that night the temp went down loads, thats what happens when you get that close to Antarctica.

Dunedin was quite a nice place we went down to the beach and saw the sea lions just lying there covering them-selves with sand. We went to Nugget point and walked to the light house, it was very windy and certainly cleared the cobs webs out, we saw more fur seals all young playing in the pools. We went to the Cadbury's world and went on the tour, we got some yummy free chocolate. The same evening we went on a tour to see seals, sea lions, yellow eyed penguins and Albatrose. The penguins are so cool they just washed up on the beach and waddled up the beach really slow, there were also sea lions on the same part and if the penguins realised they were there they would legg it to safety. There were some young penguins just waiting for their parents to appear. We saw two Albatrose which was great, they are sooooooooo big, it's amazing they can actually fly.

We had a very long drive to Timaru so on the way we stopped to have a look at some more fur seals and yellow eyed penguins. You just can't get bored of the seals they are very entertaining. We also stopped at the Moeraki boulders, they are big round boulders in the sand, it's just really quite strange. Timaru was a nice little town and we had a visit from a tiny kitten in our cabin he was lovely i wanted to steal him.

We spent another night in Kaikoura before we headed up to Picton to get the ferry over to the North Island. The weather had changed and it rained all the time we were there. Mum's wine had another leak in the car this time in my bag so i have a top now all different shades of red wine.

We got a hire car and I braved the drive through Melbourne city, while Paul did the map reading. We did not have too many problems apart from I almost run over a load of people, well we never got told that when a tram is in the lane next to you and it stops you have to stop to, as a load of people jump out infront of you. We stayed at Luke and Karen's for a few nights, they really looked after us. They have two greyhounds Beau the quiet dog and Blitz the mad licky licky dog, a cockatiel that stuck it's tongue out at you and a rat that loved it's food.

We left for the Great Ocean Road on the 29th January. We made a slight wrong turn and drove in the wrong direction for a short time. It was hard to find your way out of Melbourne but we managed it in the end. We met up with Mark for the last time before he headed back to London, we camped at a free site in Lorne and had a few beers and played cards. We stopped off in Torquay as all the cheap surf shops are there and then Bells bay where Point Break was filmed. We camped for the night at Port Campbell in the rain but nothing changes. The twelve apostles were really good, but there is only eleven now the twelth one is a heap of rocks on the sand. We were really lucky for a change with the weather it was really hot. We saw the Loch and Gorge and the arch they where amazing. The sea was really ruff, the waves looked massive. We saw London bridge, it's called that because of the shape, It used to have a connection but it collasped one night while two people were on it and they got stranded one side. They were having an affair so that is one way of being court on the news. Serves them right. We camped at Portland and had a lovely view of a lake and saw the sunset. We went to the petrified forest in Cape Bridge water and saw a big pod of dolphins swim past.

We camped at the grampians national park for the night. We were kind of in the middle of knowhere so who knows what could of been in the tree's. We saw McKenzie falls it was really pretty and the balconies was some rocks that stuck out over a cliff. We went and saw an original aboriginal drawing in a cave, There are not many left as people destroy them.

We stayed in Ballarat for a couple of nights, it's an old mining town. They have a place called Soverign Hill you go there and it's like going back to the mining days, everyone is dressed up in the old clothes and all the shops sell hand made candles, brass candle stick holders and we watched a guy make aniseed sweets and we tried one, its the first time we have ever had a warm boild sweet. We went on the gold mine tour, we went in to a real mine and they showed us the equipment they used and the biggest gold nugget that was ever found. Of course not the real thing though. The night tour in Soverign Hill was really good, It told the story of the miners and how the police were charging tax even if they had found no gold so there was a big fight and loads of miners died, But they won and the police stopped charging tax. It was all done with lights and sound there were no actors.

We then travelled to Phillip Island. We went to seal rock and nobbies rock, but saw no seals as they were too far out and nobbies rock was just an island stuck out the sea, It was a nice view though. Some of the beaches were really nice and the surf was really good.

We stayed with Luke and Karen for one more night before getting a flight to New Zealand................................................