Noosa

We're in Noosa, after a brief interlude in the curiously named Murwillumbah where we ascended the Mt Warning. Mt Warning is the remains of a now extinct massive shield volcano, and the caldera is the biggest in the southern hemisphere. The walk was about 8k round trip through dense rain forest. On a good day you'd be hard pushed to beat the view from the summit in the whole of Australia. We saw the homogenous grey-white of the inside of a cloud. We did, however, see our first wild Wallaby and lots of bush turkeys. The hostel in Murwillumbah was a nice affair, with only a handful of beds and a quirky man that's been running it singlehandedly for the last 21 years. Right on the river, several half-tame water dragons could be found lazing in the sunshine on the patio waiting for the house guests to feed them food scraps. We took the bus to Noosa, which after the slight disappointment of Byron Bay immediately felt right. The hostel we're staying in, Halse Lodge, is probably the nicest we'd seen so far. We got chatting to a bunch of people on the first night and the evening degenerated into a bit of a wine tasting extravaganza, and we were all paying the price the morning after. We recouperated on the beach with the biggest surf board we could lay our hands on. Sadly, I won't be giving up my (future) day job to become a surfer. It looks so deceptively easy in the hands of the skilled. Even if there is the occasional success in the small waves near the shore, most of the time one is either knocked about or left flailing as the wave washes over you.

Today we're about to head out on another walk in the rain forest looking for Koalas, and tomorrow we're going to Fraser Island for three days. Sarah's just booked our last travel - the bus from here to Brisbane from where we're flying to Cairns on the 19th for the last stop before we're again walking on European soil. Or snow, rather.

Bring on Val Thorens!