Australia – Page 2 – Jewells On Tour

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Thursday 24th,Friday 25th and Saturday 26th October

By admin on Tuesday, October 29, 2019

Enjoying a few days off. The ferry to Raymond Island is free the 1st one in the morning is at 6:30am and the last at night is 11pm it’s only a two minute crossing. We make the most of it and go back and forth enjoying walking around the island taking in the wild life. It has lots of wild life.

Echidnas, black swans,kangaroos and lots of brightly coloured birds to name a few. But of course it’s the koalas that we came to see and we weren’t disappointed.

The island has over 300 koalas, they can be seen sleeping in the trees. They sleep a lot anything up to 20 hours a day we were lucky enough to see some awake but they were very sleepy.

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Wednesday 23rd October

By admin on Sunday, October 27, 2019

We have decided to take a slight detour, our route will take us to Phillip island and the moto gp is on. This means that all the accommodation has either sold out or is a out of our price range. So the plan is to go 10 miles out of our way to paynesville where we have heard about a Island off of it where we are guaranteed to see koalas. The 10 miles was nice and easy.

We got to paynesville early. Time to relax in a coffee shop and watch the world go by. We also used the library, tourist information centre and supermarket. It’s a small town but has everything we need on hand. It was originally a fishing village that sent over 1500 baskets of fish weighing 40 tons each into Melbourne weekly. It also rapidly grew due to boat building. And the reason we are here is it’s ferry service across to Raymond island.

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Monday 21st October

By admin on Monday, October 21, 2019

We made the decision to take the day off. Yesterday’s wind was fierce and today my thighs were killing me, so much pushing against resistance I’ve got big pumped up muscles, at this moment in time I would probably make the worlds strongest man look like he skips legs day!

We also are headed into Phillip Island bad timing the moto g p is on this weekend putting the price of accommodation sky high and fat chance of seeing any wild life with all the bikers taking over. Best to sit it out.

So with a day to look around we headed into town. It’s actually bigger than most of the towns we pass through with lots of charity shops to have a rummage in, my favourite kind of shop you never know what you might find. Exciting news they have a brand new vinies opening this week and it’s huge.

Apart from the charity shops it’s also quite a nice town. A good selection of shops and restaurants all set in a nice harbour.

On the foreshore statues are carved into tree stumps of the Monterey trees that were planted in 1924. The stumps have been preserved by a local chainsaw artist John Brady as a memorial to world war 1 service men

The sun was out and it’s a beautiful day just to relax. Tomorrow we will ride on to the next town it’s only about 25 miles hopefully the weather will be kind.

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Sunday 20th October

By admin on Sunday, October 20, 2019

Finally some traffic free riding today. We join the gippsland rail trail which runs between Orbost and Bairnsdale.

It’s a bit tough with loose gravel and tree branches across the path from recent storms but it’s long and straight taking us through a tree lined route, we’re forever hopeful that we will spot a koala. Fat chance.

Lunch stop was in Nowa Nowa a small rural village home of several timber mills in its heyday.

Leaving Nowa Nowa behind we move on to Lakes Entrance home for the night. A holiday location that offers a wealth of activity’s. It’s also the base for Australia’s largest fishing fleet.

Just a brief stop to buy some hunny from a honesty shop, we ran out of hunny yesterday and missed it on our porridge this morning so was really pleased to see this pretty little hut on the road side.

It’s been hard going today we have been fighting a strong head wind so pleased with the 40 miles, I was brought to a standstill twice and mike pushed into a hedge but we didn’t give in and it will make us stronger.

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Saturday 19th October

By admin on Saturday, October 19, 2019

3rd night in a row staying in motels. We seem to be in the middle of nowhere. We have had no mobile service and no WiFi. There’s been hardly any house’s, no shops or petrol stations for miles. I really didn’t expect this for the south of Australia especially so close to the coast.

So today we are headed to a town called Orbost. I’m really not expecting much, but the map says it has all facilities and a campsite. It’s also the start of a rail trail that will get us off the highway for a bit.

9am on the road, the motel owner is keen to get rid of us early as it’s up for sale and we believe that someone is viewing it today. $400 k just less than £200k it has lots of land and owners home not bad. I’m sure I could run a little campsite here and 2 rooms easy!

We have to do 10 miles before we find some where for breakfast it’s funny you don’t get a breakfast in motels just room only and we have run out of porridge.

We find a cafe bosting home made pie. They must be good if we’re to believe the cat!

Tea and egg roll for me, we only have 15 more miles to go to Orbose the weather isn’t that great a bit cold and wet with a head wind against us. At least the hills are good nice long climbs and fast dissents a good day. We make town 12:30pm. Just as I feared not much here. A small store so we can buy tonight’s meal and tomorrow’s breakfast. A row of shops however all closed, we find that a lot in small towns over here they don’t open at weekends. And a tourist information centre which is in a old house built in 1872.

We pitch up the tent, shower and change and at last we can wash our smelly cycle clothes there’s a laundry room 😊 better still we have WiFi and phone service this town knows how to spoil us!

It’s a cold night so we have to rap up warm in our little tent, there is no camp kitchen to sit in but you can’t have everything.

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Friday 18th October

By admin on Saturday, October 19, 2019

Yesterday was a nice relaxing day eating junk food watching junk television and drinking junk fizzy drinks. Not much else to do, maybe a walk but the weather was so bad we didn’t venture out.

At lest today we can get back onto our bikes, we still are in the middle of nowhere. We have 70 miles to do before the next town but can split that up and stay in a motel 35 miles away. Or head south to the coast where there’s a campsite just over 26 miles.

To help us with our decisions we call into the tourist information centre. The nice lady informed us that the road south was gravel and didn’t advise us to take it after yesterday’s storm so that was out. Back on the princess highway it is. When we get to the motel we will make the decision whether to stay or push on.

More hills but getting easier. They are now long and not so steep. Just keep on rolling. I have the tune to rawhide stuck in my head driving me mad.

We reached the bellbirds motel just after 2pm a small motel just with two rooms set at the side of a pub/cafe. Google maps said that if we carried on we still had over 2000ft of climbing to do. We decided to stay.

Another big room and 3rd night in a row in side better watch out mike will get used to this.

Showered and changed we head to the bar for food, there is nothing else around so we have no choice but to eat here tonight. The food isn’t great but it will do. There is another couple staying originally from the Uk but now live in Barbados. We are very down south and they are driving to cairns which is very up north they have hired a camper van and think that they will get there in two weeks. Good luck to them. It’s a long way!

Time for bed.

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Wednesday 16th October and Thursday 17th October

By admin on Saturday, October 19, 2019

After a night of wild camping we said our fair wells to Burt and Kerry, they did offer us breakfast but we declined we already had eaten porridge with banana and hunny. And boy we need the energy.

Burt was lovely and out of mikes earshot he asked if we were ok financially did we have money put to one side for our flights bless him, not sure what he would have done if I said no!

So on we go up more hills, will we ever get to the top if we carry on we will be on the moon.

Tonight’s destination is Cann River there’s FA here I looked in my trusty guide book for inspiration on what to write about it. Cann River centrally located for traveling to the coastal region around point hicks. So yeah it’s just a passing through town basically. We have a motel, bakery, petrol station and small store. It did have a pub once but that was closed. So into the motel it was,we didn’t have to pay for last nights. one night in a motel will do us good.

Motel was nice and clean with a big room. Big enough to fit both our bikes in the room with us. We also have a tv but no internet and no laundry facilities a bit of a bummer my cycle clothes stink what with all the sweating up these hills.

Next morning the weather was shocking, we checked the forecast with reception and it was thunderstorms all day until 10pm. We booked in for another night. So the day was spent reading and watching crap tv. The rest will do us good.

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Tuesday 15th October

By admin on Saturday, October 19, 2019

Next Morning we said our goodbyes leaving as friends, so many great people out there.

We took there photo in there lovely garden in-front of a pretty red flower they told us it was a waratah the emblem of New South Wales . We are leaving New South Wales tomorrow and into Victoria.

Still following the princess highway it heads inland. Traffic is lighter now and we are on a strip that is hilly with over 70 miles between towns. We opt to break it up with a overnight stop wild camping ; we have a app that gives us approved sights there’s one mid point.

The long road out off Eden is straight up, thankfully after over a week of hill training we managed it relatively easily no longer getting out of breath.

30 miles in we find the campsite we mistakenly thought we would be alone but it was busy full of what the Ozzies refer to as gray nomads. We were instantly greeted with great hospitality. Offers of food and drink. We excepted some soup and wine and then later spent the evening in Burt and Kerry’s 5th wheeler drinking tea and eating biscuits what a great night.

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Monday 14th October

By admin on Monday, October 14, 2019

After a comfortable night spent at Shayne and kates and full up on hunny and toast, we said our good byes.

Just around the corner from there house we had to go passed a kangaroo blocking our way. We did so carefully as to not upset it as it was carrying a young joey. So nice to see up close.

A few hills again today as we carried along the coast. We had a tea stop in Pambula. It claims to be franchise free and traffic light free, well we didn’t see any traffic lights but I’m sure that the tea shop is part of a franchise but what do I know.

A short ride later and we arrive at Eden, we have another warm showers host for tonight.

Eden is yet another whaling post and has a killer whale museum that has a skeleton of old Tom a famous killer whale that used to work with humans hunting humpback whales.

Eden harbour is one of the deepest natural harbours in the Southern Hemisphere making it a ideal deep fishing destination.

Our hosts tonight are Peter and Pam. We are staying in there self built environmental friendly home. Complete with solar energy, reclaimed building materials and a compost toilet. It’s very homily and comfortable set on a peaceful location with woodland views.

We are treated to a vegan meal washed down with home brew. After dinner we settled down to watch a documentary filmed in Eden about Tom the killer whale before we went to bed.

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Sunday 13th October

By admin on Sunday, October 13, 2019

Today we pick up the sapphire coast highway a pretty route, we are surrounded by wild life as we weave our way through national parks. It’s still hilly and today was a day for walking one or two of them.

We are on are way to Merimbula to stay with are warm showers host Shayne and Kate.

There home is on top of a hill but offers fantastic views across the ocean and onto distant mountains. We arrived early afternoon so they took us for a car tour around the town. It’s a holiday destination town with safe swimming beaches, cinema,restaurants,museum and aquarium to list a few. It used to be a whaling town but now is a good place to watch as they migrate passed

The evening meal was delicious and beer and wine was also on offer. Another great experience using warm showers. So far we have had really positive experience using it. We have met so many interesting people that we wouldn’t normally meet and it’s a good insight into people’s lives.

Tag Archives: Australia