Australia - The Road Trip

After a 13 hour flight we got off the plane in Sydney it was Friday the 2nd of November. We stayed at a hostel called Wake Up which was more like a hotel it was really nice and in the centre of Sydney. As it was Friday night we had to keep up a long standing tradition and go out and have a drink (or 2!).

The next day we walked around Sydney exploring the city (a little hungover) we went to Darling harbour , the Opera House, botanic gardens, Sydney harbour bridge, the rocks and had a look round all the shops we really enjoyed our self's it was so different from being in South Africa and we felt so free.

In the hostel there was a notice board with lots of things for sale, jobs and people asking if anyone wants to share petrol costs and travel with them. We saw an advert from 2 English guys Ed and Will that said they had a car and wanted 1 or 2 people to share petrol costs and travel round Australia from the 5th of November and back to Sydney for Christmas. We called them and then met up it was perfect as we have 2 months to travel before Faye and Mark are due out to Sydney for New Year. We talked about what we wanted to do and agreed that we would try and make it round Australia and back to Sydney by Christmas.

We left Sydney on the 5th of November and headed for our first stop Coffs Harbour. We have 7 weeks which is 49 days to try and drive all the way round Australia. We are going to camp most of the time and stop at all the main places Byron Bay, Brisbane, Fraser Island, Whitsundays, Cairns, Darwin, Perth, Aires Rock, Adelaide and Melbourne. We are really excited about our road trip and plan to have as much fun as possible. We are also very glad we get to see so much of Australia and if the boys ever let us we may even drive the car which is a Holden Commodore named "the Polar Bear".

Saying goodbye to South Africa

It is the 1st of November 2007 and the end of our first Continent. We have spent the last 7 weeks in South Africa, Swaziland and Mozambique and it has been the best start to our trip we could have ever wished for. We have made good and bad decisions but it has always worked out OK, we have had few if not no real arguments or problems and are so glad about everything we have done. We have made friends we will hopefully always stay in touch with and see along the way in the year to come.

South Africa is a beautiful country and we have learnt a lot. Australia is the next chapter of trip and it is sad to say goodbye to South Africa and all the people we have met but this is only the beginning.

Watch out Australia!!!

Kruger

We left Swaziland for Nelspruit on which was to be our last baz bus journey. We went through the Swaziland/South Africa border and got even more stamps added top our passport. We went through customs and the guy was trying to get Zoe's number but luckily she managed to get through without giving him it. We got Nelspruit mid afternoon and ventured out for a tour. It was a lovely place, very pretty and clean. That night we talked to some South Africans we had met about our nearly ending trip to SA.

We got picked up around lunch time by our Kruger tour guide. Once we got there we were welcomed with a drink and set off for our night drive. It was hard to spot the animals in the dark but we had a strong spot light which Zoe was in charge of and managed to see a few animals including giraffes catching their eyes with the light.
We went to our tree house lodge where we were going to be staying whilst on the tour. We were shown to our tree house (which wasn't exactly in the trees but was amongst them on stilts) We had dinner altogether and were told what was happening the following day. We went back to inspect our room and Zoe lifted her pillow up to find a huge frog. We spent about an hour trying to chase it our the hut with Books and magazines but were failing miserably. We decided to go and find someone to help us but when we opened the door we were surrounded by buffalo!!!! There were about 12 of them all watching us. When they had finally gone we went up to the main house to find some help but everyone had gone to bed. By the time we had got back we had lost the frog so decided to top and tail in the same bed tucking our mosquito net into the mattress so nothing could get us. We got up the nest morning and told everyone of our traumatic evening over breakfast. We then set off for our game drive. We were in a huge safari truck which was amazing. We drove round for a bit and saw giraffes first then some elephants which were really close. The guide said that we had to stay clear of the younger one which was still huge and just as he had that it the elephant came towards us. (the driver still took his time to move though) We then saw a leopard resting in a tree but was quite a distance away. Next we saw a group of sleeping lions, the females were sleeping and the male had got up to do a number 2!!! and we managed to get some good pictures of that. We also saw buffalo, zebras, wildebeest, wild cats, crocodiles, hippos and lots of other weird animals. That night we went back to check out hut for animals that had gotten in during the day but it was OK. We were warned that monkeys would try to get in and steel anything laying around!!! We shared a bed again and hardly slept as all we could hear were animal noises then in the morning we went on a 6am bush walk.

We left for jo'burg through a very scenic route which was beautiful. We stopped at Blayde River Canyon and the views breathtaking and we arrived at In Africa Lodge hostel early evening. We went for a look around jo'burg with a couple (Brain and Caroline) who we met on our safari. That evening Zoe and i went out for a meal to celebrate our last night in Africa. We wanted to go for a traditional African food but ended up in an Italian as there was our only choice. We tried snails which were lovely and ate far to much sea food that we could hardly move. We went back to the hostel and chatted to Caroline and Brian before going to bed excited about our journey the next day to Australia.

Swaziland and Mozambique

We arrived in Swaziland at about 6pm on Friday the 19th of October we had booked to stay at a backpackers called Always the Baz bus would only drop us at Legends so we stayed the night there this was the start of our run of bad luck!!

We got up the next day and had planned to travel over to Mozambique for a few days we had met Katie and Dave previously who had recommended hostels in Mozambique to stay. We travelled from Swaziland over to Maputo in Mozambique we got a "taxi" which is basically a mini bus rammed full of as many people possible we ended up sitting next to 3 kids who at the end of the trip were sick on Hayley's leg. We arrived at Mozambique at 5pm and got dropped of at a "bus station"we then had to pull our backpacks out of the trailer with loads of people surrounding us trying to get us to go with them in there taxi it was really horrible and me and Hayley just looked at each other not knowing what to do after being ripped off by a taxi we got to our first hostel in Mozambique called The Base. It was just a stop off as we wanted to go all the way to Tofu which is about a 7 and a half bus ride from Maputo. We had to get up at 5am to get our bus to Tofu, we got to the bus station and where ushered into a mini bus "taxi" we paid the small fee to take us to Tofu we then had to sit and wait until the mini bus was full which took 3 and a half hours!! So before we even left Maputo we sat in a mini bus with thousands of people around us in the market just waiting to leave. We finally left the bus station at 9.30am and left for Tofu we already had numb bums and we hadn't even left yet!

We got to Tofu at 5.30pm and hadn't stopped once we shared the mini bus with men, women, babies and a distressed chicken!! All we could do was laugh after all we had ended are nightmare bus ride in Tofu which was beautiful. We had to walk along the beach to our hostel the water was warm and very colourful it was stunning.

The hostel we stayed in was called Bamboozi and we booked to stay 3 nights the setting was so nice huts dotted around the beach the journey felt worth it now. Are first full day in Tofu we went to the beach and swam in the sea for hours which was warm, we said to ourselves we deserved to rest for the day. The next day we went snorkeling which was brilliant we swam with a whale shark and saw a dolphin close up playing in the sea. In the evenings we drank beer and watched the sun set, we decided after alot of talking that we would do anything not to have that taxi journey again and booked are selfs onto a flight from Inhabane to Maputo which is only a 45 min flight. The airport was tiny and so was the plain! We left Maputo in Mozambique and went to Swaziland which took another 3 hours

We arrived at the backpackers called Sonzela's in the evening which was situated in a nature reserve. We stayed 3 nights and on our first morning we opened the door to our hut and we saw Zebra an Ostrich and dear which were about 15 feet away! It was a really nice place very peaceful and obviously loads of wildlife. During the day we went on walks and saw a crocodile by a watering hole we also walked past Zebras and warthogs. In the evening we drank wine and had food by the fire we also started playing cheat (a card game) and soon got everyone addicted!!

Tomorrow is Saturday the 27th and we are heading to Nelspurit and then onto Kruger National Park to go on safari the park is said to be massive 2 million kilometers!! We have been told to wear neutral colours so pink and yellow it is!!