- Nov 28, 2004
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A belated Happy New Year to all of you.
I really hope that you are all well, in good shape (have the hangovers passed?) and with a lot of good hopes and expactions for the year 2007.
Please forgive me all the spelling errors, I am writing this on a keyboard I am not used too at all.
I am just now in the township of Cobar, in New South Wales, Australia, The Outback. We (my kids and I) are enjoying our trip tremendously and are happy as one could be.
As you have not seen me for sime time, here is a short summary of my trip from December 10 until today:
Dec. 10: Flight from Stockholm to Vienna to Kuala Lumpur to Sydney
Dec. 11 - Dec. 14: Sydney: A great city - so much to see. Especially the Sydney Aquarium, some good pubs the Harbour Bridge, the Aussies (they are such great, polite, friendy people) - we enjoyed this very much.
Dec. 14: Flight from Sydney to Hervey Bay and from there to Lady Elliot Island (from now on LEI) - the most southern island of the Great Barrier Reef
Dec 14 - Dec. 26: Diving, snorkling, birdwatching, swimming in the ocean around LEI: this was just phantastic: I haver seen Manta Rays feeding, touched them, been diving with dolphins, sting rays, reef-sharks, all the small fishes you can imagine (I have noted some 55 different kinds) seen coralls of many colors, sea-cucumbers (beche-de-mer) and what-not. And I have pics too! LEI is reputed to be one of the absolutely best diving places - and it is! The food was great, the staff just super, the arrangements worked perfectly, "no probs, mate!", the kids were more in the water then outside and no accidents, no hurts, no stingers. We watched loggerhead-turtles dig the egg-holes, and we have seen the very first of the freshly hatched turles make the dash to the ocean (as you all understand we came late in the egg-laying-season and early in the hatching season). This was the best thing I have done.
Christmas: a great celebration in LEI: with some 29 degrees C, clear weather, a santa who came out in a boat and who dived with us. All were very happy.
Dec. 26: Flight to Hervey Bay, one day there
Dec. 27: Flight to Syeney, pick up of out 4WD for a dash to the outback, drive to the Blue Mountain National Park
Dec. 28: Blue Mountain National Park: small excursions (2 - 3 hours long) and then
to the Jenolan Caves, which are just marvelous! We went into four of the caves, one of them was 56 m high, and there we saw all the different formations: stalagmites, stalatites, columns, shoals, curtains and what-not. I had some trouble to persuade the kids to leave the place --- but we wanted to go to the outback to see some of the emus, kangeroos and much more.
Dec. 29: Driving day: from the Blue Mountains to ...
Dec. 30: Mungo National Park (which is part of a World Heritage Area): this is a really wonderful Place: the aboriginees have held religous ceremonies here for the passed 20 000 years (yepp, that is correct; the first recorded and dated cremations was found here), the traditions and archeologic finds seem to correspond to each other - so this place is somewhat older then the pyramids in Egypt (which are about 4 000 - 5 000 yeras old, but also very impressive). We saw kangeroos and many other animals all running free (my youngest was the best animal spotter in the car).
Dec. 31: Broken Hill - a very outback mining town where the streets are named after mineras, metalls, ores and such. Very friendly place, but very macho, Australian. We celebrated a great New Year's eve and moved on to Cobar on
January 1, 2007.
The plans are not firm. We are moving north to Queensland to se some national parks, then to Surfers Paradise (there are three amusement parkjs, with some of the best roller coasters there and we will be back in Sydney January 11, and back in Sweden January 13.
As you all can see, we are having the time of our lives.
The only problem: LEI does not have an internet connection, the internet cafés were all closed due to the Holyday Season and this is the first Motell which has a very decent internet connection. But - considering all - I can live without the 'net for a couple of weeks, the withdrawal was not too bad --- just a little bit painful.
I wish you all the best of the best and I'll be in touch around January 14 - 15 or so.
I really hope that you are all well, in good shape (have the hangovers passed?) and with a lot of good hopes and expactions for the year 2007.
Please forgive me all the spelling errors, I am writing this on a keyboard I am not used too at all.
I am just now in the township of Cobar, in New South Wales, Australia, The Outback. We (my kids and I) are enjoying our trip tremendously and are happy as one could be.
As you have not seen me for sime time, here is a short summary of my trip from December 10 until today:
Dec. 10: Flight from Stockholm to Vienna to Kuala Lumpur to Sydney
Dec. 11 - Dec. 14: Sydney: A great city - so much to see. Especially the Sydney Aquarium, some good pubs
the Harbour Bridge, the Aussies (they are such great, polite, friendy people) - we enjoyed this very much.Dec. 14: Flight from Sydney to Hervey Bay and from there to Lady Elliot Island (from now on LEI) - the most southern island of the Great Barrier Reef
Dec 14 - Dec. 26: Diving, snorkling, birdwatching, swimming in the ocean around LEI: this was just phantastic: I haver seen Manta Rays feeding, touched them, been diving with dolphins, sting rays, reef-sharks, all the small fishes you can imagine (I have noted some 55 different kinds) seen coralls of many colors, sea-cucumbers (beche-de-mer) and what-not. And I have pics too! LEI is reputed to be one of the absolutely best diving places - and it is! The food was great, the staff just super, the arrangements worked perfectly, "no probs, mate!", the kids were more in the water then outside and no accidents, no hurts, no stingers. We watched loggerhead-turtles dig the egg-holes, and we have seen the very first of the freshly hatched turles make the dash to the ocean (as you all understand we came late in the egg-laying-season and early in the hatching season). This was the best thing I have done.
Christmas: a great celebration in LEI: with some 29 degrees C, clear weather, a santa who came out in a boat and who dived with us. All were very happy.
Dec. 26: Flight to Hervey Bay, one day there
Dec. 27: Flight to Syeney, pick up of out 4WD for a dash to the outback, drive to the Blue Mountain National Park
Dec. 28: Blue Mountain National Park: small excursions (2 - 3 hours long) and then
to the Jenolan Caves, which are just marvelous! We went into four of the caves, one of them was 56 m high, and there we saw all the different formations: stalagmites, stalatites, columns, shoals, curtains and what-not. I had some trouble to persuade the kids to leave the place --- but we wanted to go to the outback to see some of the emus, kangeroos and much more.
Dec. 29: Driving day: from the Blue Mountains to ...
Dec. 30: Mungo National Park (which is part of a World Heritage Area): this is a really wonderful Place: the aboriginees have held religous ceremonies here for the passed 20 000 years (yepp, that is correct; the first recorded and dated cremations was found here), the traditions and archeologic finds seem to correspond to each other - so this place is somewhat older
then the pyramids in Egypt (which are about 4 000 - 5 000 yeras old, but also very impressive). We saw kangeroos and many other animals all running free (my youngest was the best animal spotter in the car).Dec. 31: Broken Hill - a very outback mining town where the streets are named after mineras, metalls, ores and such. Very friendly place, but very macho, Australian. We celebrated a great New Year's eve and moved on to Cobar on
January 1, 2007.
The plans are not firm. We are moving north to Queensland to se some national parks, then to Surfers Paradise (there are three amusement parkjs, with some of the best roller coasters there and we will be back in Sydney January 11, and back in Sweden January 13.
As you all can see, we are having the time of our lives.
The only problem: LEI does not have an internet connection, the internet cafés were all closed due to the Holyday Season and this is the first Motell which has a very decent internet connection. But - considering all - I can live without the 'net for a couple of weeks, the withdrawal was not too bad --- just a little bit painful.
I wish you all the best of the best and I'll be in touch around January 14 - 15 or so.
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