Kroombit

Part of our bus tour included a stop at a Cattle Station in Queensland.  It was interesting to see the differences between a farm in South Australia, Queensland and Canada.  The cattle in Queensland are Brahman so that is one big difference already.  Then all the cattle graze and look after themselves.  The properties are huge so that the cattle can find enough feed for themselves.  To round them up, they use helicopters or a one way gate to dugout.  While we were there, we took a quad tour of the property, learnt how to crack a whip, and we had ourselves a goat rodeo.  There were also opportunities to do the Limbo, ride a mechanical bull, skeet shoot, and be part of the goat round-up.  Below are some of the pictures from our time there.  

Airlie Beach

Another one of our stops was at Airlie Beach.  This is one of the more popular places to visit because you can tour the Whitsunday Islands from here.  The Whitsunday Islands is a group of 74 islands.  The most popular thing to do obviously is to tour via sailing.  We never got to see them from a boat, but we did take a helicopter up to get just a small taste of them.  There is a wide range of options of different activities that you can choose from.  We did get to go on a tube ride which was pretty fun.  We were pulled behind a speed boat which created huge wakes and therefore big jumps!  The only thing is, the salt water really burns the eyes and tastes disgusting.  We were scheduled to go parasailing but it was too windy to go up so we had to find other things to keep us occupied.  Here are a few pictures from our stay here.  

Sailing boats in the bay.

We were there over the weekend so the Markets

were open.  They gave camel rides up and down the beach. 

A few of the Islands

This is a boat with just a small corner 

of one of the islands

Magnetic Island

One of the popular places to visit along the Eastern Coast is a place called Magnetic Island.  An interesting fact about this, the Island is not actually magnetic in any way.  When they were exploring, the compass quit while they were on the island and they believed that it was due to some sort of Magnetic Force.  It was really just a faulty compass!  We only stayed there for one night because of  lack of time.  Our hostel was right along the beach, so we took a few moments to send a message home! 

'Missing You In Australia'

On The Way

One the way to our next destination, if there is something worth looking at, our bus driver will stop and take us on a short tour.  Here are a few pictures from two of our stops.  The first set is of Boulders Gorge.  There are huge rocks in the middle of this river.  It is actually a pretty amazing sight.  There is a story that the Aboriginals tell in regards to why there are huge boulders there but it is fairly long and I didn't catch it all because the river was so loud.  So anyways enjoy these few!!  

We also got to stop at a crocodile farm.  They raise the crocodiles from young to sell for their leather and meat.  No we have not tried any of the meat yet!!  They also get 'Problem Crocodiles' from the local rivers.  These ones are  not aloud to be sold for their meat or hide.  They are just used for breeding purposes.  They have around 80 large crocodiles and thousands of little ones.  They grow extremely slow!  The place that we stopped at is known to have the largest crocodile in captivity.  Five meters long.  He is huge!!  We also got to watch a feeding which was pretty cool.  We never got any pictures of that due to dead batteries in the camera and the rest of the batteries in stow-away under the bus!!  We did get video of it.  The videos are not uploaded onto the computer yet but I will try to post them at a later date!!  The crocodile in the pictures below is eight years old.  Believe it or not, one that size could take a finger or two and if he got you on the back of the leg, he would take a pretty good chunk.  Then there are a few of us with a Bearded Lizard.  These little guys are surprisingly pokey!  They are the ones that there neck flares out when intimidated.  Enjoy these!!   

Australian Celebrities

Ok...so maybe celebrities wasn't the right word to use.  A few weeks back, a radio news reporter from the ABC news came to the farm to do an interview with us.  He had found our blog on the internet and gotten in contact with Heather.  Below is a link to the website with our interview.  It is fairly lengthy about eight and a half minutes long, so have a seat and enjoy!!

http://www.abc.net.au/local/audio/2009/07/01/2613383.htm?site=riverland

Cape Tribulation

From Cairns we took a two day trip to a place called Cape Tribulation.  On our way there, we stopped at a park in Port Douglas to see some animals and to here a keeper talk.  There wasn't really any new animals to report on so I only included one picture which you will see later on.  I am not sure how many have seen the movie 'Fools Gold' but part of that was filmed here and also in a town called 'Bowen' where we also drove through.  Afterwards, we headed down to the rainforest. It was fairly interesting actually.  There was a river running through the forest but we never actually stopped for a swim.  It is considered to be safe swimming.  

Here are some from the rainforest.

After the rainforest, we headed out for a 'Daintree River Cruise'.  

We were crocodile spotting!  We saw four of them.  These guys are

all in their natural habitat.  There was a little one that I didn't include a 

picture of because I would actually have to point him out.  He was only 

2-3 weeks old so he was pretty tiny.  Here are a few from that. 

We found an interesting sign along the route.  It is pretty popular here

and is actually on tourist items such as t-shirts.  The picture of the thing

below is actually a Cassowary.  They are an endangered species and are actually a very 

dangerous and vicious animal.  They are about the size of an emu and for the most 

part look like one as well.  They roam the rainforest and eat the seeds of various plants.  

The seeds need to go through their digestive system in order to germinate.  So, it is essential

for these Cassowaries to survive otherwise the rainforest will deteriorate.  The roads

in the rainforest are lined with speed-bumps.  They are not your typical speed-bumps 

though, it is actually like rocks cemented in.  So on the sign below, someone drew on it to create the funny caption!!  

Here are a few pictures from the beach just outside our Hostel.

We actually got to go ocean Kayaking with the sea turtles.  This time of 

year they come to the reef to breed, so needless to say,  there 

are a few of them around!! I never got a picture of them because

they came up and down so fast and I didn't have time to put the 

paddle down and grab the camera!!

Cairns

The first stop on our vacation was Cairns in Queensland which is on the Northern end of the South Coastline. This picture is of the Lagoon looking out over the ocean.  At the tourist places they have lagoons for safe swimming.  This way there are no boats, and no other dangerous water animals such as Sharks, Crocodiles,  Jelly Fish and Sting Ray.  

While in Cairns we went snorkeling on the Great Barrier Reef.

It was so amazing.  It took quite a while to get used to the whole breathing 

underwater but once I could actually do it with panicking, it was beautiful!!

Here are just a few pictures that we took.  We have over 200 just from 

underwater so I had to choose just a few.  Enjoy!! 

This is in fact Dylan in case you were wondering!!