Where We Are & Where We Go From Here

Click for larger view.There are so many considerations when traveling that the best we can do is to give an overview of what's happening next to just keep you as up-to-date as we can. Everyday we discuss where to go, how far to go, and which direction to take. We have just arrived in Hervey Bay, Queensland, a little coastal town on the east coast of Australia, about three hours drive north of Brisbane. We arrived in time for the blessing of the whales (that made them happy for a while) followed by a short but fun round of fireworks that scared the daylights out of them (hence their short-lived joy). We're here until Monday because tomorrow we plan to see Fraser Island, largest sand island in the Milky Way Galaxy, or so we've been told. We are sort of going in fits and starts as we discover that distances between towns and (therefore) stopping points, are great and wide. We plan to be in Cairns, the most northern point for us, by August 19th, and to stay for a week, before we head to Darwin.

Now, if you're an astute reader, you may wonder, What happened to Alice Springs, Uluru, and the entire West Coast, not to mention Melbourne and Tasmania? Ha ha, funny story. OK, umm, turns out there are a gazillion kilometers/miles between where we are and all those other places! Since we can only drive about 350 km/210 miles on any given day in our four-cylinder gas guzzler…if you divide that into a gazillion then add in no services for fuel on poorly maintained secondary roads, then you have a good insight into what we're not going to see and do: A whole lot of Australia!

Yes, it was wildly unrealistic for us to expect we'd be able to bop over to Ayr's Rock in the middle of nowhere, then with a tip of the hat and a howdy-do, take a jaunt to Perth and Melbourne, in anything less than another few months and a whole lotta money! Gasoline is about US$6.00/gallon so that translates into hundreds of dollars just to see The Almighty Rock from where we are, then we have to get up to Darwin for a firm departure date of September 13th to fly to Bali before our visa expires. It ain't happening (the other parts, that is)

So, when we think about, what do we really want to do, there's no conclusion to come to but to say, "On Another Trip" for the wild, wild west of this big country with the highway infrastructure similar to when it was first discovered. (The roads along the coast and even in the outback have been great but as you may remember, we've already had one scare with just barely making it to a gas station before the van careened to a halt.)

Basically, we're here to have fun, take it easy, and discover things as they come along. We're not doing a tourist jaunt to see every known site but are finding some fun places and plenty of great people along the way. That's the journey as we know it for now.