Queensland - Australia 1997

1997

In the end of February, when our calendar will show spring soon, my cousin Nick (you must have a look at his site with his travel reports!) and I are flying to the other end of the world, Australia. There we stay for five weeks, from the 24th of February until the 30th of March, to enjoy the summer in Queensland. At the stop-over on Bali, where I stay for one day, I meet Nick, who already has been there for fourteen days.

02/25 Flight to Brisbane, located at the East Coast of Australia. Kirsty and Axel, Nick's friends he met four years ago, pick us up at the airport and we are invited to spend some days with them. We walk thru the closer surroundings, a little bit of Rain Forest and stroll in the City. Impressing, the huge amount of highraisers surrounded by such nice parks as South Banks.
The next day we get our rental car and explore the Park, where we have our first contact with Australian animals: Kangaroos, Koalas, etc. Next day we're planning to go South.

02/26 Gold Coast is our target, we drive thru Mount Tambourine and Springbrook, where we do our first bush-walk in the Rain Forest. A little Kookaburra (only text) (left picture) hops around. He has a laughing sound (hoohoohoohaahaaaa). From the "Best of all Lookouts" you can see Surfer's Paradise. This Little California we visit next. Bizarre, the highraisers located directly at the beach. Not very typical for Australia.

02/27 We say good-bye to Kirsty and Axel. Seventy kilometers north of Brisbane we reach the Glass House Mountains. From the Mary Cairncross Park we look upon the strange mountains, which were vulcanos a long time ago. In Maroochydore we are back on the coast.

02/28 A little bit North we find Noosa, from the National Park we can see the nice beaches. Behind the little bay, the sun sets slowly - outstanding!

03/01 In the afternoon we are on a boat trip thru the Noosa Everglades. The wonderful reflexions in the water and the changing vegetation won't end. Also, interesting animals live in this region and we can watch many of them. In the upper left corner of the video a spectacle symbol appears for 3½ minutes, with the NUOPTIX-3D spectacles this part can be watched three-dimensional. A great effect I use sometimes in short scenes.

03/03-03/06 For Fraser Island we rent a Toyota 4WD. By ferry we get to the world's largest sand island. Alone with the nature, so quiet, it makes you feel good sitting on the shore of one of the rain water supplied lakes above sea level: Lake Mc.Kenzie with its white sands, Lake Boomanjin and green Lake Wabby, surrounded by yellow sand dunes. Of course, driving 4WD thru the rain forests and along the 120 k's of sand beaches, watching the creeks floating over them into the ocean, makes a lot of fun. The largest and most beautiful stream is Eli Creek.

Endless road near Emerald 03/07-03/10 We carry on to Rockhampton and get back our Falcon. A bit north, in Yeppoon, the sea floods the coastal area. Tropical Cyclone "Justin" is greeting for the first time. Because the road is blocked, we stroll thru the Rockhampton Botanic Garden. To escape the storm we are heading to Emerald in the Outback and then back to the coast to Mackay. We are lucky to get to Finch Hatton Gorge because two nice Aussies give us a lift with their 4WD thru all the brookes. A little walk along one of the brookes in the gorge confirms that it was worth while. With our rental car we drive to Eungella National Park, also a nice area to walk. North of Mackay we visit Cape Hillsborough National Park. Here we watch beautiful butterflies and interesting spiders.

03/13 For two days the Cyclone stops us from cruising to the Whitsunday-Islands, today we sit on the first catamaran leaving the harbor. First stop is Hamilton Island, very uninteresting. After some hours we reach the famous Whitehaven-Beach, a white beach consisting of finest quartz. Until now the cruise was tolerable, but our way back across the open Sea gives us four meter high waves - "a little bit of Rock'n'Roll", the Captain kids... red dragon-fly

03/14 On Highway Number 1 passing Ayre we go to Bowling Green Bay National Park. At the Cookatoo Creek a red dragon-fly is sitting. In the evening we are in Townsville. From Castle Hill we have a good view over the City and the coast.

03/15-03/16 With a passenger ferry we visit Magnetic Island, where Denis picks us up. Trudy provides coffee and biscuits. Trudy is my mother's old school friend, Denis is Trudy's life companion. He shows us the bays from different points and we all walk to "The Fort" From there we have a fantastic view over the island. The picture on the left shows Florence Bay. On our way we watch three dozing Koalas sitting in the tree tops. The next evening we have a glance into the north National Park of Townsville. A grining turtle (really looks like in the video) crosses slowly the driveway. Green Ants build their nest like a ball of glued leaves.

With the Ford through the river 03/17-03/18 With the Falcon up to the Mount Spec! This time the Ford must bring us to all the beautiful places, even thru floodways. Near Mission Beach, while walking through the Lacey Creek forest, we see a wild Cassowary! The range of food provides ideal conditions for this animal.
This road does not lead to Townsville or Cairns On our search for the proper way to the Murray Falls, a roadsign tells us that "This street does not lead to Cairns and not to Townsville" - Thanks to the Australian Road Authorities we find the right way! These falls are some of the most astonishing we ever saw.

03/19 For the next two days Susanne and Guido are our companions, we met them at the "Treehouse" in Mission Beach. In Paronella Park next to a suspension bridge above a waterfall we can watch the blue Ulysses butterfly for the first time. Near Babinda we find the Boulders, a lot of stones with some brookes within. In the West we're coming up the Atherton Tablelands, where we visit three waterfalls in a row along a graveled Scenic Drive: the Millaa-Millaa Falls, the Zillie Falls and the Ellinjaa Falls. Passing Lake Eacham we arrive at the Curtain Fig Tree. Seeds are deposited in a tree's crown and after a while first roots descend the tree, encircle and strangle the host tree which fell into a neighbouring one. The vertical fig roots form the curtain. For many hours we do Platypus spotting, finally, in twilight, we are lucky to watch one of them swimming in the river.

Granite Gorge near Mareeba 03/20 At Lake Barrine a little duck likes it to be stroked. More distant, near Lake Tinaroo, we find the Cathedral Fig Tree, resulting like the Curtain Fig. South of Mareeba we come to the Granite Gorge: fantastic stones everywhere, adventurous bridges cross little brookes and we walk thru the whole gorge. A family of Rock-Wallabys hide in the Granite, that's where they live.

Meteosat-Picture of the Cyclone from 03/21 Cape Tribulation, tropical Rainforest. Captain Cook christened this Cape as he ran ashore with his Endeavour on a Reef. But there is no tribulation, except 400 mm rain in 24 hours (Tropical Cyclone Justin followed us, have a look at the Meteosat Satellite Picture). It's very hot and humid. Endless, deserted beaches and rivers where you are warned against crocodiles. The total loneliness. With a ferry we cross the Daintree River and drive along the coast passing Port Douglas to the Mossman Gorge. After ten minutes it rains cats and dogs. Some kilometers outside the gorge the sun is shining, but you see the heavy rainfalls in the gorge...

Barron Falls near Cairns Green Island - 33km from Cairns The huge Barron Falls are near Cairns. We fly from Cairns to Green Island, a little island in the middle of the Great Barrier Reef. With the "Yellow Submarine" you can watch all the beauties of the Sea. From the air we enjoy the Reef lighting in all the beautiful colors. A unique impression from above here! The 03/31 has come and we start from Cairns Airport home with a four day stop-over in Singapore.
This was definitly not the last travel to Australia. See ya, Nick!

The pictures on this Site are digitized from my video. It is filmed with the SONY CCD-TR2200E, an excellent Hi8-Camera.
Marginal interesting: the raw material of this film is six hours long, therefore the video-drum ran nearly fifty hours! (Hey, what you can read via LANC...)

By the way, the animation of the film intro was already designed 1992 with an AMIGA-500 computer (later on an AMIGA-1200 HD), by great support of my friend Joerg. Without him I would have never done some superimposings in a film! Inspite of that I never understood this machine...
Today everything goes digital and linear editing seems to be lightyears ago.

A Production

I discovered a nice German text: Tagebuch eines Australienurlaubs. Very good writing and I guarantee long reading!

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Work and Travel: this is a large guidebook about financing and organisation of Work and Travel recidences and visa questions. Visitors are getting answers to typical temporary employment abroad questions.

A helpful source of information about Work and Travel is Heike' Blog, you must have a look at it!

Searching for a language study travel through Australia? Here is the language holiday comparison at a glance!

Or rather a practical training in Australia? Have a look at this guidebook for further assistance. A site with many useful tips and helpful articles!

Or at auslandspraktikum.info with great information about language study travels.
Plus, an ebook about practical training (written in german language).

A checklist makes arrangements for the next stay abroad more easy!
Here you find another checklist...

Are you interested in koalas? Then you must have a look at Lutz Michel's Koala Homepage. Besides, you find infos about Australia and the Australian animals.