We are well and truly back in Australia now, and couldn’t be further from the remote islands and villages of the Pacific islands. I must say it hasn’t taken long to get back into the groove of the Australian way of life, but I do miss the serenity and simplicity of the beautiful anchorages we enjoyed in the South Pacific. It is just so easy to pop down to the local café and pick up a cappuccino, and have multiple return visits to the supermarkets to get loads and loads of fresh fruit, veggies and bread. Gone are the days of Nescafe instant coffee, powdered milk, canned vegetables and making bread stretch over 5 days. We are spoil here with the variety and ease of access to everything.
The Rosie / Daddy morning adventures of collecting coconuts and building huts has been replaced by surfing and sandcastle ventures to the beach and includes the whole family (at 5am mind you – no sleeping in for this family!)
We spent an enjoyable week in Mooloolaba on the Sunshine Coast where we caught up with the Pitara family who were here on vacation. It was great for the kids to have ‘kid company’ on the beach while the adults got to enjoy catching up and a wine or two. Christmas arrived early for our girls in Mooloolaba where we got to see beautiful Christmas lights over the water, and bought Grace and Olivia their own surfboard (pink of course!). Olivia’s grungy determination light weight and positive attitude means she has mastered the surfing instantly, much to Graces annoyance.
We met a family from Apollo Bay when we first arrived in Bundaberg (Ash, Sue, Angus, Isabel and Tilly) who have sailed south and left their catamaran in Mooloolaba. Their family live here in Mooloolabah and were kind enough to loan us a car to use for a day. We thought about visiting Australia Zoo, but with the theme parks of the Gold Coast awaiting us, we chose instead to drive to Noosa, do the National Park hike and swim on the beach instead.
We took an overnight sail from Mooloolabah to Surfers Paradise. I must say, this is a very busy stretch of water with shipping markers, fishing boats, cargo ships and other yachts all out and about. This passage definitely kept us alert while on watch and meant, while the girls all had full night sleep, we were very tired and frazzled when we arrived in Surfers Paradise at 6am.
We are here on the Gold Coast for our version of ‘Schoolies Week’!
Very early in the year, we promised the girls if they worked hard on their school modules and got everything completed by the time we arrived to the Gold Coast, we would take them to the theme parks. They have come through (well almost – we are down to the final module!), and we have purchased a 7day unlimited entry pass to SeaWorld, Wet’n’Wild and Movie World. The girls are very excited. As we are on anchor right outside of SeaWorld, we couldn’t help ourselves. Tiredness aside, we made our way across and hit the rides, water slide and shows for the day. It has been priceless seeing the joy and excitement on the kid’s faces, especially Rose who is seeing it for the first time (she was too young to remember the last time we came to SeaWorld). I forgot how amazing the dolphin show, and the seal show is. We have all enjoyed the ‘big kid’ rides as the girls are now old enough to come on them too. So much fun!. Having a 7 day pass means we can return day after day to catch the shows we missed the day before. It has been easy to pop across to SeaWorld as we are within walking distance, but I can safely say we have seen everything here. We hired a car for two days in order to take the trip out to Movie World and Wet n Wild.
Movie World was a revisit of all of the Warner Bros characters I remember when I was a child, Batman, Superman, Road Runner, Tweety and Sylvester, and the girls experiencing these up close. As the girls have discovered and become obsessed with Harry Potter this year, we hoped there would be some attraction including this, but it was closed down in 2013. It seems we missed the Harry Potter craze by a couple of years! Nevertheless, we had a full day of rides, and shows to enjoy.
Wet n Wild was all about the thrilling rides and getting wet. We had a beautiful sunny 29deg day for this and ran from one ride to the next, ending with the wave pool. Some favorites were the aqua race, kamikaze, the black hole, and the tornado, and for Rose it was the junior wet n wild.
Surfers Paradise is full of high-rise time share apartments, and never a shortage of people trying to sell them. With the promise of a grand prize, we headed on over for a 90 minute tour and sales pitch with this girls being looked after in a kids-club. We had no intention of purchasing time-share, but Craig loves to question the numbers behind their logic, and watch them try to convince us – quite fun! We come along just for the prize at the end. In this case we walked away with 5 night accommodation back on the Gold Coast which we may or may not use. We were hoping for the $2000 Flight Center gift card!
While in Surfers Paradise and in a marina, we are taking the opportunity to do a bit of boat maintenance. Our boat stove / oven is presently in bits, so we are using a portable gas stove. Not ideal as we need to use it outside in the cockpit, and things take much longer to cook because it is so drafty. Our hot water service is also leaking so we have had to pull this apart to find the source and stainless steel welder to get this repaired. Fortunately we have access to multiple chandleries and trades people to get things fixed. A pleasant change from the challenges we had in the islands in finding parts.
We have also listed Nika with a couple of boat brokers in order to sell her. This was always the plan, as Melbourne just does not have the cruising locations that you get in NZ, or in Sydney or Queensland, and Nika is too big to just have sitting around. We spent a good four hours cleaning her up and I must say she looks AMAZING. We needed to have a photo shoot, and have her ready to show to prospective buyers while we are still here in Surfers. We have already had one couple through and while Craig went through the mechanics of sails and navigation, I excitedly shared our experiences of the past 11 months.
While we are still in cruising mode, the reality of life back at home is slowly creeping into the back of our minds and the forefront of our credit card with 2016 school fees due, enrollment and paperwork to be submitted. Craig has already begun putting the feelers out for work when we return and has sent of this resume to a few recruiters. We are gradually being reminded of our pending return home, however still have lots of fun in store. We have a few more days here in Surfers before we start to head further south.
Bye for now! Xx