Sturt National Park

After three days exploring Outback NSW it feels like traveling as backpackers like we did about ten years ago. This time we have more advanced gear and we get paid for it. We could even put our gear to good use when we helped out a British couple who where stuck in the middle of nowhere with a flat tyre.
Meanwhile we passed Currawinya NP which was very nice. The National Park is located near the NSW/QLD border and we found great camp spots near the Paroo River which was of water and fish as well. Unfortunately I did not have my fishing gear with me... but I am here for work anyway.

Paroo-Darling National Park Camp-ground

Spoken to a few locals in Hungerford and Wanaaring we made sure the roads to Sturt NP are all in good conditions we headed to Tibooburra and spent the first night in NSW at a peaceful camping spot in the Sturt NP. The colours of the Outback are stunning and the wildlife is abundant. We have seen ferral pigs, goats, sheep, a fox, heaps of emus with little baby emus and lots of grey and brown kangaroos. It's just breathtaking to see the kangaroos jumping around everywhere in this beautiful scenery.
Yesterday we discovered a new part of road which turned out a short cut. We even stunned some Aussies as we suddenly appeared in front of them although they overtook us earlier on the usual linking road. We had good fun on that hidden track.
Tomorrow will be loaded with more adventures for sure. So long.

Pierre & Silke

First day of our Outback New South Wales field trip

Everything is packed

After three days of delay because we had some trouble with the car and also it needed a service to be done beforehand, we finally started our field work trip today. It felt great to be on the road again traveling around the country and camping. This time it is for a reason, tracking data for Hema Maps.
Everything went smooth today we had the plan to go as far as St George which should have been our first stop on our trip. Half way we discovered we did not have all the keys with us. The keys we need to refill our water container of the trailer and also another one to get the shower working. This would especially be great in remote areas where we are heading to. Luckily our field work chief and colleague Al is coming tomorrow morning catching up with us to hand over the precious keys. Although we had a thorough checklist and we could tick off all boxes, we're now delayed again because there wasn't a checkpoint  for keys. Ahh well, we had therefore a relaxing afternoon.
Anyway we will enjoy our first night here in Goondiwindi and looking forward for to the road trip ahead. Cross fingers it won't bucket down too much, because at the moment we are surrounded by thunder and lightning.

Fraser Island

On one of those 'get a bargain web pages' we found a special offer for the beautiful Resort on Fraser Island - Kingfisher Bay. Fraser Island is the biggest sand island in the world. about 100km long and 30km to 50km wide. The entire Island is National Park - Great Sandy National Park.

Kingfisher Bay - Fraser Island

Last week did take some days off and went for a short trip to Fraser.Usually we are not that kind of people spending time in a posh hotel or resort but this time we just wanted to indulge a bit. ... and we loved it.

Kingfisher Bay - Fraser Island

It was just great. When we arrived at River Heads south of Hervey Bay we could easily check in all our stuff and a coach picked us up and drove us down to the ferry ... and about 45 minutes later we were on that great sand island.
At the moment there is off peak season so it was not busy at all. That helped a lot ... we did not need to book any restaurants or even had any trouble to find a free spot at the pool area.
We also did a couple of walking tracks near the resort and just relaxed the rest of the time. Unfortunately the time went by too fast and all of the sudden the four days were over. I am sure it was not the last time we visited that beautiful piece of earth. I reckon next time we will hire a 4x4 and going camping or we might end up there  for a field trip again.