AUSTRALIA

Time was running short, we still wanted to see the whole eastcoast (Photo OZ 13: We show the Kookaburra, who he is!). Sometimes inland, other times next to the coast up to sydney. There the breakdrums broke, so Kolja had to repair lots and Tokyo went to Kindergarten. The eastcoast (Photo OZ 14: Surfers) is more crowded, so it was more difficult to find good spots, still we parked often directly infront of no-camping-signs and kept away from campgrounds. Very often we got invited and a got a good view inside a normal Ozzifamilylife.

The Great-Barrier-Reef was disappointing, far away with expensive trips and so we got up to Mossman, turned around (Photo OZ 15: World-Cup 2002) and were looking forward to the outback, the Golf of Carpentaria and the
landscape around the Lawn Hill Nationalpark.

Budgerians

Since we bought a birdbook in Alice Springs we turned into passionate birdwatchers. Tokyo had a few phases were she woke up early and in the morning it was helpfull to hold on to the coffeemug and the binoculars (while
there was no newspaper around). We know budgies from germany, living in pairs in the cage. It was a shocker to see them how they really live. The landscape in the northeast is pretty much the opposite off a cage. Hundreds of kilometers we were bumping over corrigated tracks. It is so bloody wide and dry that we are asking ourselves why the birds even bother to wear this flashy green color. In hundreds they fly around in flocks, from one tree to
another, with no obvious sense, maybe just for fun.

In Gregory Downs (Photo OZ 16: Mail from John Bratt(yeah yogi, thats our title)) we had some lovely days with our friends from Grey Power/Army, pensioneers with their 4wds and campervans. At Highway-Inn we again reached the Stuart Highway, celebrated our drive-around-Australia and took care of an exhausted pelican which unfortunatly soon died. The last bit up to Darwin we knew already, visited the lovely hot springs and met people from Humpty Doo, where we could dismantle the truck and prepare it for the container. Jeremy arrived, helped us and we had wonderful 2-3 weeks weeks together. The 26.8. we went with Jabbawouk to the shipping company and packed the container, the 28.8. we had our flight from Darwin to Borneo.