Australia Part One... On the Road

I first met Dean after my wife and I split up... wait a minute... that is not what happened... What really happened on the road is that we arrived in Brisbane at around 7AM and rented this car... from EuropCar... do not get me started...

  You can see that I am ready to go, all strapped in.  But what you can't tell is that in Australia they drive on the wrong side of the road, the driver sits on the wrong side of the car, and not only that, but instead of just sliding the steering wheel across the dashboard and mounting it on the wrong side, they FLIP it over, so that all of the knobbies and buttons are backward.  What that means is that each time you want to change lanes, you accidentally set off the windshield wipers instead.  I think that is how they tell the out of towners!   

Doesn't it look weird?  The best part is that we were planning to go to Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary which is on route M3.  Well, we leave the airport and hit our first roundabout (traffic circle- there are no red lights in Australia, only circles).  So we carefully merge onto the circle and see M2, M5, M7... no M3... 15 seconds of driving and we are officially lost.

Kind of reminded me of this... and I used this line quite a bit, especially after turning on the windshield wipers to go left!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iAgX6qlJEMc

We do make it there, after stopping at 3 different gas stations- it should have been only 2, but one attendant lady didn't have her glasses...

These cuties were not part of the exhibits, just tourists like us.

We get up close and personal with the kangaroos.

You can see there are quite a few of them!

We had snacks, so they loved the kids.

Next stop was the koala cuddling part...

Yes, it is a real koala, and it is alive.

The kids sat down and the placed the koala in their arms.

Next stop.. the mall.  Where you can shop at the Golden Casket.

This is downtown Brisbane.  While we did love Australia so far, we were in for some serious sticker shock.  Prices here are outrageous!

After a long day we need some liquid refreshment.

Outside out hotel you can see parts of the city.  I love these cities that still have the old style buildings and modern ones.

Note to self... vegemite does NOT taste like Nutella. 

Always good advice.

The next day we get back on the road for what we think is the first quarter of our drive south to Sydney. 

Some shots from the road.

R-Man's feet... taken by the driver... me.

We stop in Byron Bay for a dip in the South Pacific. 

The water is perfect!

Back on the road we stop to see the Cape Byron Lighthouse.  The lighthouse is only about 2 miles from Byron  Beach, but it is winding and narrow... not a good combination when you are driving on the wrong side of the car and road.

You can park below this sign and save the 7$, which of course, we did. 

Hoofin' it to the top.

What can you even say about this except that it is georgeous?!?

Most Easterly point of the Australian mainland.

OK, the liquid refreshment seems to be the central theme to the trip so far... but really it isn't...

Well, maybe it is!  OK, the story here is... we went to Dan Murphy's to pick up some domestic beer.  You could by 10 bottles for $35, OR you could get a box of 36 XXXXGold domestics for $32... well, that is quite a conundrum, considering that we were getting on the boat in 5 days.  Hmmmmm... what would you do?    Yup, us too...

The kids relaxing by the pool... none of us knew that our first leg of driving (about 2 hours) was not the first quarter of our trip, and that tomorrow we would face a 12 hour drive south... instead we are blisfully unaware... chipping away at those 36 XXXXGolds!