Day 7

Agnes Water to Rockhampton – 225km
Surf lesson – Reef 2 Beach – $17
Kabra Hotel Campsite – free if you buy something from the hotel (pub)

Agnes Water is the last place on the East Coast that you are able to surf, so it was a ‘must do’ on our very long ‘to do’ list. We arrived at the surf shop at 10am, but so did 19 other people. At $17 for a 3 hour lesson it is the cheapest in Australia so it was hardly surprising it was so popular.

The coach described himself as a dinkum Aussie (which basically means true Aussie). Despite being a little eccentric he great at getting everyone riled up and ready to surf. Surprisingly, Matt took to it really well. He was a little reluctant leading up to it but was constantly lining up to catch another wave with the instructors guidance.

We left a little more battered and a lot more salty than we arrived but we had the most amazing time and will 100% go for another lesson when we reach Western Australia.

Before we went on our way, we stopped at one of the local parks to make some lunch.We set up our little gas burners on a picnic table to cook some rice and heat up left over chilli (gourmet meals) and as we were waiting for the water to boil, a barbie pink campervan parked up. A blonde girl walks out and asks to join us. We were a little taken a back but said ‘of course’. We haven’t really encountered many people who were so willing to put themselves out there and socialise, so it was really refreshing. She was German, spoke great English and was in Australia mainly to surf. She had been north for the last few weeks and as you cant surf there (jellyfish etc!) she was itching to get back in the water.

We swapped some travel tips whilst eating our lunch and then parted ways. I didn’t catch her name, but she was lovely and I hope she has an amazing trip.

Day 8

Rockhampton to Mackay – 336km
Dreamtime Centre – $15.50pp
Big4 Mackay Marine Tourist Park – $41 powered

We spent last night in a ‘free’ camp just outside of Rockhampton. It is on the grounds of a hotel (basically a pub) and the idea is, if you choose to camp you should support the hotel by buying drinks and/or a meal. We bought two beers so we basically got two beers, a camp for the night and a hot shower for $11.90. You can’t really go wrong right? Well apparently you can. As soon as we pulled up, we regretted our decision but as stubborn as we are, set up anyway. There was a major highway less than 20m away and a railway the other side of that.

In Australia, they don’t do normal length trains (just like they don’t have normal sized spiders). For the whole night, we had a train coming past every few minutes and each train took over 3 minutes to come past! In the morning I counted 115 carriages. 115! I slept ok. I had earplugs in and a pillow over my head however the earplugs hurt his lordships ears so he was not the most pleasant person the morning after!

Running on a minuscule amount of sleep, we headed to the Dreamtime Cultural Centre. Dreamtime, from my understanding, is basically the Aboriginal understanding of the world and its creation. It is the beginning of knowledge and from which laws were made. We took a guided tour through the ‘village’ and first learnt about the Torres Strait Islanders. Before Europeans arrived on the Islands, some islanders were known as head hunters. There was a photo in the village of warriors holding human heads which was just insane.

We were then handed over to an Aboriginal guide, who taught us about the famed didgeridoo and let us throw a couple of boomerangs each. I could barely get it to move let alone come back to me but at least it didn’t end up in a tree like Matt’s first attempt!

The next thing on our to do list was to visit Mount Archer which overlooks Rockhampton.

Unfortunately the walking trail was closed so we decided to set off early to Mackay, book a more expensive site and pray for a reasonable nights sleep!

Day 9

Mackay to Eungella National Park – 86km
Broken River Bush Camping – $6.55 pp, unpowered.

I woke up early today and I am not quite sure what possessed me but I decided to leave my warm cosy bed and go for a run around the campsite, followed by a mini workout next to the tent. Who am I?!

Despite my jokes, I did feel much better for it. It is difficult to keep fit on the road, especially with little to no equipment. You can often find Matt in the campsite playground doing pull ups on the monkey bars.

After packing up, we headed to Lamberts lookout. We had heard that you could see whales migrating however I forgot to check the dates and we were a month or so early. It was still a pretty beautiful view, with lots of tiny islands scattered around in the distance so we weren’t too upset.

Mackay has a beautiful manmade lagoon and we were told it was a great place to swim. There is also something called the Bluewater trail, which is a 18km return cycle path. Unfortunately, it was so cloudy the lagoon looked less than inviting and we couldn’t find anywhere to rent a bike from so the day was a bit of a bust!

We had a quick walk around the shopping centre, made some lunch in the back of the car and decided to head to our next stop to Eungella National Park.

The drive up was beautiful though Hank wasn’t too impressed with the enormous climb to get us to the campsite. The views were incredible but as we were so high up, the clouds I mentioned earlier made it difficult to photograph. I am hoping I can snap some photos on the way back down because it honestly looked like something out of Jurassic park. Everything was so lush and green which due to the drought, isn’t something we have seen much of in Aus so far.

The camp site is basic at best, there is a drop toilet (no flushing here!), a fire pit and basically nothing else but the setting makes up for that. We are camped just next to a river filled with platypuses and surrounded by trees.

There is no phone signal and the only sound is the running water of the river. It is so peaceful.
We will be exploring the national park tomorrow and I am so excited to see more platypus!