Vietnam Highlights!

We visited Vietnam and Cambodia in November 2014, originally we were going to visit South East Asia on the way back to the UK, but we decided to extend our time in Australia by applying for a working holiday visa! (You have to be out of the country when you apply.)

This meant we could be away for an extra 6 months and also get jobs in Australia, woo!

We left on the 2nd November and flew to Ho Chi Minh City, then took another flight to Hanoi in the north. We spent all day travelling and finally checked into the hotel at midnight!

I woke up at 6am and this is what it looked like outside, I was so excited to get out there and explore!!

We went for breakfast in the hotel and had sausage bacon and omelette which I didn’t expect to be eating in Vietnam! Then we set off! There were motorbikes everywhere and crossing the road was so scary! There were people all over the street, selling things, making food, and eating!

We headed for Hoan Kiem Lake, also known as the Lake of the restored sword and decided to walk around it. We got stopped by some students who were being filmed and wanted to ask us some questions to practice their English, they were so lovely and we chatted to them for ages! I think they only understood about 10% of what we said though!

We headed into a temple across the road and had a look around it, then carried on round the lake till we reached Ngoc Son Temple. this temple was on an island on the lake and cost 20,000 dong to go in. (Which is about 50p!)

We had to cross a red bridge to get there and it was really pretty.

We then went and sat at a street food place and I tried Pho for the first time! I had a beef version (Pho bo) which is the most popular and it was so yum! And only 30,000 dong! Damo had noodles and a beer, we then went and bought some pineapple from a lady selling them on the street for 10,000 dong and she cut it all up as well. So cheap!!!

After that we made our way down to the Hoa Lo prison, better known as the "Hanoi Hilton" which is what it was called by the American prisoners of war during the Vietnam war. A lot of the building has been knocked down but it was still really interesting.

We then headed back to the lake and saw the Thang Long Water Puppet theatre so we decided to go and watch the show. It was definitely different!! Lots of strange singing and a story being told which I didn't follow at all! It was fun though and I'm glad we saw it!

The next day we walked to the Military Museum, where we saw captured US planes, helicopters, tanks, guns and bombs from the war. We then carried on walking up the road and saw the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum, which was closed for some reason, and went to the One Pillar Pagoda. We were also going to go to the Presidential Palace but we couldn't find it! We then went into the botanic gardens, and went to look at another temple called Chua Tran Quoc. By then our feet were aching so we went back to the hotel!!!

That evening we went on a food tour which we booked through our hotel. We had a guide who met us at the hotel and it was just us and 1 other couple who were Irish and were really nice we had such a laugh with them! We went round loads of different places eating so much food! It started at 6pm and we didn't get back till after 11 even though it was meant to finish at 9! We drank bia hoi (beer!) and ate pho, vermicelli with eel, banana flower salad, rice paper rolls, sticky rice and loads more. 
We also had some dipping sauce which we then added a tiny drop of oil to, and it completely changed the flavour. We then got shown where it came from - a cockroach looking bug! Urgh! The essence is what the male bug produces to attract females! 

We finished by heading into a coffee shop which was down a small alleyway. It was packed full of people and everyone was eating sunflower seeds and throwing the shells on the floor, it seemed like it was the thing to do so we did it too! We then got given egg coffee, which sounds gross but it was my favourite thing we had on the tour!

The next day we got picked up from the hotel for our trip to Halong Bay. We did the trip with Golden Lotus who were great as well as a really good price compared to some of them! We did a 2 night trip, with 1 night being on the boat and 1 night on Cat Ba Island.

From Hanoi we had around 4 hours on a coach then we all got on a small boat which transferred us to our main boat where we would be sleeping that night. It was so nice, I kind of expected it to be like the boat we went on in the Whitsundays but it was 100 times nicer than that!

After checking into our rooms and having some lunch we sailed towards the "Surprising Cave" looking at loads of the rocks on the way including some that looked like 2 chickens kissing! It is such a beautiful place!

The cave was awesome, there were 3 different sections and each one was bigger and more impressive than the one before, which is how the cave gets it's name. There was also an amazing viewpoint out over the islands.

We then went to a beach where there were a few wild monkeys and another viewpoint which we walked up to. We walked back down and just chilled on the beach and went in the sea.

That evening we made rice paper rolls then after dinner had a go at squid fishing. Damo was the only person that managed to catch one, he pulled it out the water and it inked all over my face and hair!!!!

The following morning we went kayaking around the islands which was amazing although we got rained on! We then transferred to a smaller boat with one other couple, as the rest of the people on our boat were just doing a 1 night trip but we were doing 2 nights.

We got taken to Cat Ba island, where we got on bikes and cycled to a village which was great! We stopped at a house on the way which was made of clay and straw and got given a shot of rice wine by the owner! Carried on a bit further then got off our bikes and went hiking through a forest and cave.

After heading back to the boat for lunch we went to Monkey Island. The monkeys here were a bit cheeky and funny to watch, but they also steal things so we had to be careful of our bags! I had a banana in my bag so Damo gave it to a monkey and we also gave him our bottle of water!

A lady was stood on the beach taking photos of them, when another monkey that she didn't see came walking up to her and bit her on the leg! She fell backwards with the shock of it and literally did a roly poly down the beach! We felt so bad for her but it was kind of funny, oops!

After that we got back on the boat and made our way to the main Cat Ba town, as we made our way through the harbour there was a huge floating village, one of the guys on our boat told us that some people spend their whole lives there and never live on land! Crazy! 

We had a short bus ride to our hotel, the Sea Pearl. The room was huge and had an awesome view of the beach! We had a bit of time before we had to meet back for dinner so we went for a walk down the road and got a 10 minute back massage for 20,000 dong! It was so good that we decided to get foot massages as well! We then went for dinner then had 2 for 1 cocktails in the bar downstairs with another couple from our boat!

The next day we went for breakfast at the hotel then spent the day travelling back to Hanoi which was 2 boats then 1 bus. We went for dinner at a place called New Day as we’d heard lots about it and it was so nice! 

After our final night in Hanoi we flew back down to Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) and got a taxi to our hotel, Duc Vuong! We chose the hotel because it’s where my niece stayed when she was there with her boyfriend. The hotel was amazing, the second our taxi pulled up the staff were there getting our bags for us and they were all so friendly! The hotel had amazing free breakfasts and an awesome rooftop bar with great city views!

We booked a load of day trips through the hotel as they were all only a few dollars each, and on our first full day we did a city tour in the morning. This took us to the War Remnants Museum, which had lots of things from the Vietnam War (a bit like the one we went to in Hanoi.) There was a big chinook, planes, tanks, guns! We had a group of about 30 teenagers ask for a photo with us and it felt like we were famous!!

There was also lots to see inside, including some awful stuff like how prisoners were tortured and photos of victims of Agent Orange - a chemical which was dropped on the jungle by the US soldiers during the war. It was used to clear the jungle, to expose the Viet Cong who were hiding in there, but exposure to the chemical caused people to have children and even grandchildren born with deformities. There were awful photos and even a fetus in a jar with 2 heads which was slightly disturbing!

We then went to a place where we tried some weasel coffee, which is a delicacy in Vietnam and is basically made from coffee beans which have been eaten and pooped back out by weasels! Apparently they choose the nicest beans to eat and something happens to them in their stomachs which makes it nicer than normal coffee!

After that we headed to a big Chinese temple, and the final place we visited was a huge wholesale market. We soon realised that the roads here were even busier and packed with motorbikes than the ones in Hanoi!!

This ice cream shop had an interesting name.. so we thought we'd go in to sample some Fanny and it was yum!!!

After that we headed to the Saigon Skydeck, which is at the top of the Bitexco Financial Tower - the tallest building in the city. The views were great and we stayed up there til it got dark so we could get photos of the sunset and the city all lit up.

We then went back and watched the Stoke football game in a place called the Spotted Cow, which was just like being in a bar back in Sydney or at home! We even had a burger and fajitas for dinner, which I think I was a bit excited about, judging by my face lol.

The next day we visited the Cu Chi Tunnels, which are a huge network of underground tunnels that were used by the Viet Cong during the war. 

It took a few hours to get there and we stopped on the way at the beautiful and huge Cao Dai Temple! The Cao Dai is a fairly new religion which is made up of 4 different religions all praying together, and originated right at this temple. 

We were there in time to watch the 12pm service. You had to take off your shoes and leave them a few metres from the doors and walk over the ground which felt like red hot lava from the sun to get inside! We felt kind of like we were intruding but there were so many other tourists there and I guess they were used to it!

After the service we headed back to our tour bus and carried on the journey to the tunnels. Our tour guide, who was called Mr Bean, was hilarious and had so many stories although I’m not sure how many were actually true! He had moved to the US at a young age and ended up coming back to fight with the Americans against Vietnam, which was interesting to hear about and awesome that he had actually been there and knew what really happened.

After arriving at the tunnels the first thing was watching an awful quality 10 minute video, I have no idea what it was about! We then got to see some of the traps used, and got to climb into a small tunnel entrance. We then had the opportunity to shoot a gun for only a few dollars, most people did it but it kind of scared me so I just watched Damo do it. We then had the opportunity to go through the tunnels, which have actually been made bigger to allow for tourists to fit through them!! I was not going to do this as the thought of it made me feel totally claustrophobic but I went back and did the first part, and luckily there were chances to get out every few metres! We really enjoyed it here and I liked it a lot more than I thought I would!

The following day we visited the Ben Thanh market which was so funny, the shop assistants grab you and try to get you to buy stuff, I was just ignoring them but Damo was giving them all answers which made it even funnier, we didn’t even buy 1 thing as all the prices were doubled compared to other places!

That night we had a ‘city night life’ tour booked which included a water puppet show like the one in Hanoi, a cyclo through the city to the Saigon river where we got on a boat for a dinner cruise! There were lots of food courses and some traditional dancing as well so it was great!

The next tour we did was to Can Gio island, which is full of monkeys and crocodiles! After seeing the lady get bitten by the monkey in Halong Bay I was a bit nervous, but these monkeys were a lot more friendly and playful. The guide held up some peanuts and they climbed all up Damo’s back and onto his head!

Next we headed over a really rickety-looking bridge which had planks of wood missing from it - and below us were a load of huge crocodiles!! You could dangle a stick over the edge with an eel on the end and they jump out the water and grab the eel!
Every so often there would be a big commotion in the water where they were fighting with each other! Eeeek!

We then got a speedboat through the mangroves and learned a bit about how the Viet Cong had hidden there. We then arrived back to where the monkeys were and got to spend a bit more time with them. It was an awesome day trip, we loved it!

The final tour we did was a day trip to the Mekong Delta. We had read that to make the most of seeing it you really need to do an overnight trip but we only had time to fit in the 1-day, and it was the most disorganised tour ever!

Before we had even left, we had to change buses 3 times! Finally we were on our way and our tour guide started talking on a microphone which was really muffled, plus he was a lot harder to understand than the guides we’d had on the other trips, so I have no idea what he was talking about! I was desperate for a wee the whole journey and when we finally got off the coach and I found a toilet this is what it looked like!!

We then got onto a boat and went to the floating market. It’s packed early in the morning, but when we were there it was just a few boats selling stuff. We pulled up next to one selling fruit and we could climb onto the boat to have a look! We also got to try some jackfruit and some mango.

We got off the boat at a village where we watched people making things like rice paper, coconut candy, rice wine and things that tasted like sugar puffs! I guess it was all just to get us to buy stuff but it was nice to try it all! Damo even tried some of this snake wine!!

We then carried on to another place which had bees and we tried some honey tea. Then we had some lunch which was the tiniest portion ever and ‘soup’ which was basically hot water with 3 tiny pieces of carrot in it! Haha! In our itinerary it said we then go cycling, but half the bikes were broken so we walked instead and chatted to 2 guys from Sunderland who were really nice.

We then got onto smaller rowing boats and put on traditional Vietnamese hats to go down a smaller part of the river!

We arrived at what seemed like someone’s house and were given more fruit and tea, then watched some “traditional singing” which was really odd, we had no idea what was happening and at one point a man was pretending to go fishing and he got out a plastic wind up Nemo toy, it was super weird.

We left the house round the back and saw a monkey chained up in a tiny cage, he was trying to pull the chain off his neck and was totally distressed, it was horrible and I wanted to cry I felt so bad for him :-(

We got back onto the bigger boat which took us back to the bus. Some people were doing the 2-day trip so those of us doing the 1-day were changed to a different bus to get home. It was already full of people and the man who seemed to be a tour guide for the other group shouted and swore at our tour guide because they had apparently been waiting for us for 2 hours! 

Overall I’m glad we saw the Mekong Delta but it was our least favourite trip by far!

That night we went and got a Banh Mi, which is basically a Vietnamese pork roll, from where is meant to serve the best Banh Mi in Saigon! 

The place doesn't really have a queueing system and we just had to kind of wait till we were served, paid and got our sandwiches in bags. We took them back to the hotel to eat them and they were so good! Although maybe I shouldn’t of got chilli as it was the hottest thing I’ve ever eaten!!

The following day we caught the Giant Ibis bus to Cambodia!

At the end of our Cambodia trip we came back to the Duc Vuong Hotel for 1 night before flying back to Sydney. On our last day we went to a spa on our road called Beautiful Saigon Spa for full body massages, to use up the rest of our dong! 
Our flight wasn't till the evening so we had some drinks in the hotel's rooftop bar, then it started hammering down! When we went downstairs to get our taxi to the airport, the road had literally turned into a river!

We went to the airport and got our flight back to Sydney! We both loved Vietnam and Cambodia and can't wait to explore more of South East Asia!

Australia East Coast!

I didn’t think anything could beat New Zealand, but our East Coast trip was probably my favourite trip (so far!!!) We did so many amazing one-in-a-lifetime bucket list ticking-off things so this may be a long blog post - just warning you now!

After leaving New Zealand we arrived in Sydney on 11th July, where my brother, niece and her boyfriend met us at the airport! We got back to the house and were spending time with my brother’s kids (2 nephews and 1 niece) when my mum came walking down the stairs!!! My family are very good at surprise visits!!

So I got to spend 3 weeks with my mum and family in Sydney, which included my birthday and my youngest nephew’s 1st birthday (on the same day!)

Sydney is pretty cold in July! But we did loads, including taking the kids to Luna Park, the aquarium, Sky tower, and Taronga Zoo where we did ‘Roar and Snore’ which is where you get to camp at the zoo!

We also took my mum out on the whale watching boat! From the day we arrived we kept spotting whales splashing out at sea, so we decided it would be great to see them up close as well. The whales we saw were different to the ones we had seen in Kaikoura in New Zealand, these ones were Humpbacks and Southern Right whales.

My mum flew back to England on the 1st August, so we booked flights for the 5th up to Cairns, flying with Jetstar which isn’t as cheap as flights in Asia but was still not too bad! The thing I hate about budget airlines is when you book they then add on the price of taxes, baggage etc afterwards so it ends up costing way more than you originally thought!

For the whole of our trip we worked our way back down towards Sydney on the Greyhound buses, which are great! Loads of leg room, comfy leather reclining chairs, free wifi! We got hop on hop off passes which we booked online, then you can book your seats on the bus you want to catch the day before.

We had hop on hop off passes between Cairns and Sydney, but the first place we visited after landing in Cairns was Port Douglas, which is an hour north of Cairns. We decided to do our Great Barrier Reef trips from there, as a few people we had met had told us it was better! 

We did 2 reef trips - the first was with Quicksilver, which was an hour and a half trip out to Agincourt Reef (part of the outer reef) and to a floating platform. From the platform you could snorkel, go on a semi-submersible boat and have lunch! The boat out there was very busy but I think a lot of people didn’t actually go snorkelling, as it never seemed that busy in the water. I think this is a popular choice for non swimmers as there is the semi-submersible boat. We went on it but it was nothing like actually being in the water!

The water was really rough on the way out, as the weather had turned a bit stormy and there were literally people spewing everywhere! I get seasick and had taken tablets and luckily I was ok! They also gave us ginger tablets so I took one of those too.

The following day we had booked a trip with a company called Wavelength, which was a smaller boat with a maximum of 30 people. Due to the sea being rough though it was cancelled, and we were transferred onto another boat called Calypso. It seemed the same as what we would have done with Wavelength - snorkelling at 3 different outer reef sites, I think mainly at Opal reef. This was even better than the day before! The reef is so beautiful and we saw so many colourful fish!

From Port Douglas we also did a tour with Daintree Discovery Tours, which took us to the Daintree Rainforest, Mossman Gorge, Cape Tribulation, Cassowary Falls, and a crocodile spotting river cruise! It was just us and 6 Kiwi ladies who were lovely! Our guide was a guy called Kim, who was so knowledgable but didn’t stop talking!!

When we left Port Douglas we got transfers back to Cairns. The man in our hostel, Port O’Call lodge, was so friendly and funny and when our bus arrived he came running out with a red carpet and laid it down for us to walk on!

In Cairns we stayed at the Jack Backpackers, right above the Union Jack hotel. We got free dinners at this hostel and they were really nice!

While we were in Cairns we went to the Esplanade and sunbathed at the lagoon, and went on a day trip on the Skyrail, which took us over the rainforest and to a village called Kuranda.

In Kuranda we visited the Australian Butterfly Sanctuary, where the butterflies come and land on you! We then went to the Kuranda Koala Gardens which was a wildlife park full of Australian animals. The best part about this place was that we got to cuddle a koala! I had been wanting to do it since well forever so I was so excited, we cuddled one called Tilly and she was so cute!!

We also got to feed kangaroos, saw wombats, crocs, lizards, snakes and spiders.

After leaving Cairns we got our first Greyhound bus to Mission Beach. The reason for visiting here was to do a skydive, but for the whole 2 days we were there it rained! So we decided we will have to do it somewhere else (or Damo can, I don’t know if I’m too chicken to do it or not!!) 

The next destination was Townsville, while we were here we visited Reef HQ, an aquarium with a really cute turtle hospital! We climbed Castle Hill for an amazing view of the city and watched the sunset from up there too. We went to the seafront area called the Strand, swam in the sea and had lunch at a place called Longboard, where we spotted turtles in the sea!

From Townsville we also visited Billabong Sanctuary, which is an amazing sanctuary full of Australian animals, where you have loads of chances to get up close and interact with them. It’s much smaller than a zoo and you get to feed kangaroos, turtles, cassowaries, birds and if you pay extra can get photos holding a koala, wombat, snake or baby croc! There were also lots of talks and shows including dingoes, jumping crocs, and a bird show!

The following day we got the ferry over to Magnetic Island, where we stayed for 2 nights at Bungalow Bay - a hostel with its own koala sanctuary! We got a deal which included 2 nights accommodation, entry to the sanctuary, a koala photo, snorkel gear, plus return ferry!

The hostel was walking distance to a beach called Horseshoe Bay, we walked down to it and decided to hire a jet ski! I had a go at driving which was a bit scary but I loved it! That afternoon we also saw a man feeding loads of lorikeets some bread, he gave us some to hold and they surrounded us too! I love lorikeets, they are so pretty, but they totally scratched my arms up!!

The koala park was really good, we got to hold a koala, a snake, a turtle, lizards and a parrot ate a seed from your mouth - if you timed it right you had a photo of the parrot kissing you!

We met two girls at breakfast called Becka and Kate and 2 guys at the park, Kish and Ash, and that afternoon we all went and did the forts walk, which was a good few hours but beautiful, amazing views and beaches, we even saw a wild koala in a tree which was amazing!

Becka, Kish and Ash were all heading to the Whitsundays next, which is what we were planning to do, and they were going on a boat called the Clipper, so we decided to get booked on it too as we all got on really well! So we travelled down to Airlie Beach where we spent 2 nights, then 2 nights on board the boat!

We had heard that the Clipper had a reputation of being the party boat but it was pretty tame really, even though there were 54 of us on board! It had 2 slides that went from the boat into the sea and you could also jump from the deck which was loads of fun!

We also did an introductory scuba dive, which at $60 was the cheapest we had seen it. I'm so glad we did this, it was so relaxed as we went in from the beach, there were heaps of fish, and we even heard a whale singing which was incredible!! The second day we booked to do it again but this time it was going in backwards straight off the boat and for some reason I freaked out a bit and couldn't get my breathing right! I think because I couldn't touch the bottom which always makes me panic as I'm not a strong swimmer! So Damo did the second dive and I went for a snorkel instead!

We also did a trip to Whitehaven beach which has pure white sand and again is beautiful!!

We arrived back to Airlie beach, and had booked the Greyhound with Becka for 11.55pm that night. So we hung around Airlie Beach for the day, with another girl we had met on the boat called Katie. We then got ready and went out for a couple of drinks, got a dominos and got on the coach! 

The coach arrived into Agnes Water / 1770 at around 10am the next morning. It was quite hard to sleep on the coach but we managed it somehow!! We checked into Backpackers @ 1770, the private rooms here weren't private at all which was weird! The walls separating them had big gaps at the top so they weren't really walls! It was just like one big room sectioned into 3. There were also no plugs! Annoying!!

In 1770 we did a tour called Scooteroo and also a 3-hour surf lesson! We did the surf lesson first, it was great but such hard work, I'm so unfit!! I managed to stand up a few times though!

Scooteroo is a tour of 1770 on motorbikes, where you get to ride your own Harley style bike, spot kangaroos and watch an awesome sunset! I was terrible at trying to ride a motorbike so I got to go on the back of the guide’s bike, which meant I got to go really fast! It was still so much fun, we even saw a kangaroo with a joey in his pouch just stood at the side of the road looking at us!

We did one more thing in 1770 which was a sunset dolphin kayak, and it was only the 2 of us that day so we had a private tour! We kayaked around, stopped at a beach which was full of millions of butterflies, saw turtles, dolphins, and a beautiful sunset!

We left 1770 at 6.30am the next morning and got the Greyhound with Becka down to Rainbow Beach, ready for our Fraser Island trip!

We were put into 4 groups and we all had our own 4x4 which everyone took in turns to drive! Fraser Island was amazing, it was so beautiful! We visited a couple of lakes (Lake Mackenzie and Lake Wabby) a lookout called Indian Head which had incredible views and we could see 2 small sharks swimming in the sea! Champagne pools, Eli Creek, also known as Hangover creek, where the water floats you along, there were even people halfway down giving out beers! We spotted a couple of whales too, we saw one breaching from our 4x4 on the beach and it was so close! On the last day we also saw 2 dingoes!

We had to camp in really small tents which wasn’t too bad, until the last morning when I saw the shadow of a big spider crawl up the outside of the tent while I was in it!! We also saw a huge lace monitor lizard on camp one morning. The showers, toilets and cooking stuff they gave us were so gross, but we got given plenty of food!!

After staying one more night at Rainbow Beach we said goodbye to Becka and travelled down to Noosa. In Noosa we did the coastal walk, which people in the hostel had told us was a must-do - and it definitely was! On the first part of the walk we spotted a big water dragon on the rocks! We followed the coastal path, it was all so pretty, then we got to a part of the headland called ‘Hell’s gates’ where we spotted some dolphins! We carried on up the path to get a little closer, and we stood watching them for ages until they went further out to sea. I loved it I could have watched them all day!!

After watching the dolphins the path lead us down to a nudist beach, which is part of the walk, I didn’t expect to actually see any nudists but as we got down onto the sand a man came walking past swinging his swim shorts around in his hand!! Damo then decided it would be funny to strip off and get a photo of him facing the sea while there was no one around, but we spotted a man watching from the bushes haha! As we got to the end of the beach there were nudists everywhere! We then walked round a bit more headland before arriving at Sunshine Beach, which is where our hostel was. We decided to go to the bottle shop and have a couple of drinks and doritos on the beach, we sat and watched the surf life savers and a man trying to have a surf, but he was just getting swept along the beach!

The following day we did a boat trip on the Noosa Everglades. We just did an afternoon trip, which was around 4 hours, we went up the river, stopped for some food and drinks and travelled back down. We saw lots of wildlife, mainly birds and lizards. We also saw a huge lizard at the place where we stopped!

That night we went to watch the Inbetweeners 2 at the cinema, which we loved because it was about them backpacking in Australia so we could relate to it all!!

The day we left Noosa we went to Australia Zoo for the day, as the Greyhound stopped there on the way to Brisbane. The bus was even Australia Zoo themed!!

They do loads of different animal experiences which you can book online before you arrive, you can even have your photo taken with a tiger if you don’t mind paying $400!! As we’d already had a couple of koala photos we decided to do the Cheetah photo, a lot cheaper at $60 for the both of us! It was an awesome experience!

After our photos we caught the end of the main croc show, it wasn’t as good as the one we had seen at Billabong Sanctuary though! We also watched the tiger show which was great! All in all we had a good day but I wouldn’t say Australia Zoo is as amazing as I thought it would be!

After leaving the zoo we got to Brisbane and checked into Chill Backpackers which was a really nice hostel with a rooftop bar! There was a hostel just up the road which did $7 burgers so we went there for food. We hadn’t planned much to do in Brisbane other than a visit to my favourite clothing brand, Black Milk! That was arranged for the Wednesday so on the Tuesday we just walked into the city. We walked along the river and over the bridge and back, and went in the Queensland museum as it was free!

The next day we walked to Black Milk HQ in Newstead, we had a 1.30pm tour and a girl called Shanna took us around. It was cool to see where all the clothes are made and we also saw loads of new stuff coming out in the future including loads of Disney stuff! I also got to go in the ‘sample room’ and buy anything for $40 each so I got some stuff for me and my niece Daisy (who got me into Black Milk in the first place!), Shanna then filled up my bag with a load of goodies like badges, stickers and water bottles! I also got to take part in a ‘Fit night’ where they invite a load of Queensland girls to try on clothes for the latest release before it comes out, and because I was there I got to do it too! We had half an hour to try on as much as we could, take loads of selfies and eat the food!! We then walked back to the hostel a different way and saw the Story bridge by the river.

After Brisbane we caught the Greyhound to Surfers Paradise on the Gold Coast. We bumped into a lovely lady called Jane again, who we keep seeing at loads of different places! She was also staying at the same hostel as us this time. After checking in, we went to have a look around and went up the Q1 building, which Becka had told us to do. The view was amazing and we stayed up there for the sunset and took pictures in the dark too.

We bought theme park tickets online with a deal that meant we got to go to Seaworld, Movie World and Wet n Wild for the price of one park! So for the next 3 days we got the bus to each park, it was like being back in Florida again! All the parks were great!

After Surfers Paradise we got the Greyhound to Byron Bay, our final stop on the East Coast before heading back to Sydney. We stayed at Arts Factory Lodge - as seen in the Inbetweeners 2!! Byron Bay was so beautiful, I loved the coastal walk around the headland and to the lighthouse! We saw so many whales and a big pod of dolphins that hung around for ages!

After 2 nights in Byron Bay we got the overnight Greyhound bus back to Sydney, leaving at 8pm and arriving at 9.30am the following morning! We spend just over 6 weeks on the trip in total. A lot of people we met had booked the whole trip through places like Peter Pans travel, but we found it was so easy to do it ourselves, and it meant we could be a lot more flexible and stay longer in a place if we wanted to! I made a video montage of our East Coast adventure and you can watch it below! :-)