Bear and Jackie’s Travel Diary

Some of last night’s behaviour will remain unpublished and forever engrained in the memories of those silly enough to stay up late.

Innocent start to the day with bagels and smoked salmon. Smashed out an hour or so of pickleball then a waft around Lisbon and a cheeky beer or two. Scarlet Night 2nite could be a late one so focusing on pace and distance. Oh dear! Karaoke started the proceedings after a few late afternoon bubbles then back to the cabin and get geared up.

It was always the idea to misbehave and get into the pool fully dressed, some poor bugger’s hairpiece got involved before we were invited to vacate the premises.

Downstairs for dry clothing and off to the night club!

Only 1 more week of this to endure

Eating and drinking is always fun. This mob, (Virgin Voyages!), have elevated the experience to ‘next level’. All day brekky, burgers and other tasty morsels are available. Lifts covering all 16 levels cater for vertical transport afterwards. Bento boxes, noodle and poke bowls, salad and leafy stuff for those who probably use the stairs rather than lifts. Somewhere in the middle are less common bits like brekky tacos with poached eggs or buffalo mozzarella and tomato toasties. Managed to smash both of those with a few bacon rashers, a sausage and a liberal dose of chilli sauce before rapidly tackling the stairs on-route to the dunny.

I have a somewhat perverse interest in reinventions of Sir Thomas Crapper’s Victorian invention. The dunny on a cruise liner is a bit different to the flush and brush variety at home. Also very different to the foot pump version on the average 30 footer! Pressing the innocent looking button on the wall activates a fairly violent vacuum, removing the aforementioned chilli sauce combo with a satisfying rush of air! A bit like an inverted shart! Holding onto loose clothing during this process is a good idea.

Time for a spot of relaxation in the balcony hammock before engaging in a few of this afternoon’s activities. The pickleball court was under about an inch of water yesterday and the court is allocated to noisy Americans with basketballs today. Other noisy Americans are also participating in something called dodge ball. Might give that a miss.

Salty Trivia, bevvies and bites sound more up our alley. Followed by a sail-in party to replace the washed out sail away version from Portsmouth. Booked into the rather swanky looking ‘Extra Virgin’ Italian for dinner. Might waft out into Lisbon for a nightcap or two afterwards. Gunna be a tough 12 days!

Richard Branson isn’t known for being quiet or shy. Recent images of him jumping, fully clothed into a pool on one of his boats looked like a good enough reason to hop onto one! Resilient Lady was waiting patiently in Portsmouth Dock as we clambered on board with about 2,500 of our new best friends. 20 eateries and about the same number of bars on board should keep essential fluids and sustenance requirements sorted. A heap of hot tubs and several pools cater for those who prefer the outdoor experience. There are also a few gyms, yoga and stretchy stuff for those who seem to forget that this is meant to be a holiday! The daily list of stuff on board requires more than one sitting to read through, let alone participate!

English weather delays departure on night one so we popped our PJs on and went to ……. A PJ party! Fortunately I was not the only person with most of his kit off, a lad donning his girlfriend’s see through undies took the biscuit there, enough said! Slow start and wobbly boat the next morning towards A Coruña. Couple of days sailing and here we are. Just need to get back on board before the boat buggers off!

Richard Branson sensibly decided that taking billion dollar vessels through a war zone to get to Oz might increase the insurance premiums a touch. Tassie cruise idea binned but the same boat now plies its trade around Europe. Sound like an awesome excuse to jump on a plane…

First stop, Essex. Home of Sam and Nicole. No excuse required to enjoy our time here, but the trip conveniently included Sam’s Birthday. Whacked a few chooks onto the BBQ, aided and abetted by the Essex Clan. Great opportunity to meet up with these wonderful characters before next year’s wedding in Bali. Can’t wait!

We have never been to Saaaarfend so Sam and Nic convinced us that a wander down the pier and some fish and chips would be fun. Southend Pier is a fucking monster, sticking out a mile or so into the Thames Estuary. It even has its own train line for people too lazy to walk. We took the 50:50 option, walked out:train back. Pretty cool actually, whilst working up a fish and chip appetite. Looking down the seafront offers a wide variety of hospitality venues, all of them with identical menus! Picked the least tacky version and contemplated our orders. Oh, 4 fish and chips please! This part of the world isn’t exactly known for its cuisine, so anything that can’t be deep fried is a bit of a special item. Tums rumbling louder now, that ‘special item’ request is causing the kitchen a few dramas. Having your fish ‘grilled’ rather than covered in batter and dunked in the boiling, artery clogging oil was clearly a complex task. Holy crap, we could have caught, cleaned, filleted, cooked and eaten this bloody thing in the time it took for them to work out how to work the grill! Maybe the left over batter on Jax’s plate had gone through some cleansing process before Sam smashed it out anyway! Fish and Chips by the sea is generally awesome, this was no exception. Off to to the amusement arcade for a few giggles. Plenty of old favourites in here, Outrun, Pacman and an unholy selection of throwy, shooty stuff. 20 quids worth of tokens used up, back to Leigh on Sea. Off to the Big Smoke to find Hazza and Jazza next

We had found ourselves a luxury apartment in Mile End that looked nice and close to the station and a piece of piss for getting in and out of town. Luxury for most of includes things like flying business class, fine dining and top notch accommodation. Luxury for the bellend that owns this place, maybe! Maybe he just missed out the word ‘student’ in the title, and clearly hasn’t updated the shiny photos from a few years ago. Shitty couch sitting on a rug that had consumed too much lager with a sticky up corner waving “Help me!”. Solitary fan in bits on the floor, air con fucked, (Yes, it was warm and opening windows on Mile End Road is not an option!). Naked lightbulbs producing a level of light that an iPhone would be ashamed of and ‘hot’ water that was either tepid or ball bag boiling depending on its mood. Fuck it, off to Wetherspoons in Canary Wharf for a couple of cheery uppers!

Met Hazza in her Brick Lane pad before a gentle amble down Brick Lane and the obligatory salt-beef bagel. “Mustard and pickles Sir?”, “Absolutely!”. More eating and general wafting around Spitalfield Markets. A few more feeds including the mother of all Turkish feasts in Mile End. Lunch with the Benjo’s. A cheeky school reunion in Covent Garden’s Lamb and Flag. Then bye bye to the ‘luxury’ student digs and off to Kent to see Mum and Roy.

Next stop, Jackie’s fabulous bestie from Jersey, Ima together with her new beau, Terry. Decided against the trek over the Channel to Jersey and jumped onto a train to Brockenhurst in the New Forest. Cue the predictable, reunion shenanigans in this awesome rural setting. Forest Park County Hotel is pretty fricken awesome too. Somehow managed to avoid any horse based activities and went for horsepower instead. Enough to hustle a few go karts around South Coast Karting’s cheeky outdoor track. Too much fun. Sadly our few days with Ima and Terry come to an end and it’s off to Portsmouth with Hells Bells who kindly offered to collect us! Don’t mind if we do!

Any visit to the House of Hells Bells starts with a Gin and Tonic. The rest is generally predictable and always a hoot. Managed to take over the kitchen for the evening and somehow ended up in our cruise party gear again! Early start in the morning for the shuffle to Portsmouth and our boat. Non starting cars are never funny. Non starting cars when you are aiming to jump on a big boat that will happily leave without you are especially not funny. Uber requested, bags unloaded and we are off….

Thousands of Australians in weather dependent businesses or people planning weather dependent activities carefully watch the weather forecast. Today, that includes us. 7am, it says, pissing with rain all day. Little peek out of the window looks like the bald weather forecaster is likely to be in need of sun screen or a hat rather than a brolly. How are these imbeciles allowed to remain in employment? Those of us in real businesses make decisions based on this rubbish. Hundreds of outdoor events have probably been cancelled today in the face of torrential rain that wankers like Professor Tim Flannery said we would never see again. You and the BOM should be publicly flogged for your scaremongering and incompetence.

So bugger it, popped the coffee on with a few slices of locally sourced bacon and sour dough for brekky. Also liberated the cork on some Rosé bubbles to begin our day. Nothing finer than watching the local Roos beginning their day by smashing out anything green next door.

Uber booked for 11am, so we casually await its arrival on the porch. Our Uber driver for the day is Grayson in his Robinson 44 Helicopter. He swoops the beast in and gently parks it on the lawn right outside our accommodation. Don’t mind if we do.

After a quick safety briefing and a couple of swift ‘not our fault if you die’ signatures we climb into our transport for the day. Grayson ensures we are all buckled in, doors firmly closed and headsets on, he sticks his head out of the door and shouts “clear tail”. Maybe to warn the aforementioned marsupials that the spinny bits are about to rotate. Then he winds up the R44’s six cylinders and releases the clutch. Couple of minutes warming up and ATC checks complete, he gives the collective a yank and off we go. This little bugger is surprisingly nimble, gaining altitude and banking off with alarming speed. Maybe letting the pilot know that we had a couple of thousand skydives under our belts was a bit of an oversight! For anyone who hasn’t been in a non military chopper, it’s akin to being in your own personal camera drone, without the goggles or swiftly diminishing battery. Making the most of the BOM’s inaccuracy, we get treated to a 20 minute scenic tour of the Hunter on route to our first stop. Wine tasting at Ivanhoe Wines. A gentle low hover encourages a few very fat geese to vacate the landing area and we are back on terra firma.

Generally, when you arrive at the cellar door, there is a bit of a wait whilst a few dusty glasses get a wipe and one of the staff checks the latest list of wanky words to describe fermented grape juice. Approachable, is still one of my favourites. Make a rather noisier entrance by helicopter and all of a sudden, you are royalty. All other wine tastings are postponed as patrons record the landing and check out the passengers. Good morning, my name is Bond, Bear Bond! We get ushered to a pre-set table where a Geordie lad called Danny asks if we are on telly as he parks a nibbles platter and the tasting menu on the table. We can choose six but it’s ok if we go for seven! We naturally assumed that meant six each, so we selected everything with two ticks against the Tawny Port. Danny trimmed this selection back to a vineyard approved quota and spent the next hour or so pouring and describing our reduced selection. He also managed to whip out the stuff that isn’t meant to be open for tasting. Grayson by now has finished his first bottle of wine and is patiently waiting at the bar. Grabbed a bottle of the ‘not for tasting’ fortified stuff and a Rosé roadie and headed back to our Uber.

Next stop, Muse Kitchen for a spot of lunch. Sadly, with no thanks to Government incompetence and a Central Bank with only one lever to pull, this Hunter Valley icon is closing down. 2 covers, Monday to Thursday not going to cut the moutard. Epic crab and octopus starters followed by barramundi and venison mains, washed down with a couple of GnTs and more of the Hunter Valley’s finest. 2 hours goes way too fast before a quick dash to the cellar door for another roadie and a wander back to Grayson and our Uber.

Fingers crossed that Grayson has had a a few less beverages than we have as he launches the R44 skywards and back to our accommodation. Having gently parked it right in front of our porch, we say our cheerios as he roars off into the sky.

What an utterly epic day, wedding tomorrow arvo. Cheers!

Aus is home for us and I fucking love the place. Some of the local flora and fauna can be a tad feisty but that only adds to the fun. Don’t like it? Please feel free to politely go away!

Spiders are feisty creatures, the males get a rough wake up call after the wedding night shenanigans, brings a whole new level of demand to the ‘was that good for you’ question.

Spider in this case has 2 legs, a big, beefy torso and Merv Hughes style facial decoration. We arrived in Coowonga in the middle of nowhere. Just a big bloody field where you can park your horse overnight for a princely $10. They also chuck in a fire barrel and a heap of hardwood to keep the friendly midges away. Spider’s function here revolves mainly around building stuff, mending stuff and annoying climate change whingers by chopping down hardwood trees for firewood. Aeroguard and several hundred degrees of fire pit did little to prevent hordes of airborne terrorists from joining in the fun. There is also a pretty scary looking longhorn bull wandering around the paddock as a gentle reminder not to use the bush as your own personal dunny. There is a dunny here from a bygone era, views and airflow awesome, plumbing and privacy need some attention. Maybe something for the Spider to have a squizz at. Spent 3 nights in the company of the Spider before blood levels started getting a bit low, took a dignified retreat to the chemist for antihistamines and pastures new.

Rosedale Pub is also in the middle of nowhere, owned and run by a couple of Kiwis, Dee and Mike. At 2pm on a Sunday arvo, the place was noisy and full to the brim with people getting on with some fairly professional levels of beverage consumption! The young lass in the kitchen got a tad lippy with the owner at lunch so we decided to have some fun. Slid the chef’s outfit on and popped the knife roll under my arm before marching into the kitchen as the new head chef. 10 minutes of Gordon Ramsay style abuse later we let the cat out of the bag and returned to the bar. Just in time to avoid the flying tongs and jug of icy water that landed square in the boss’s grinning face. Job done! Turns out we had also agreed to attend a BBQ the next day with a couple of other local identities, Butch and Sausage.

Butch and Sausage also live in a field in the middle of nowhere. Butch in a bloody big hanger with all of his boaty/farm toys. Sausage in a hut on stilts that slides on and off $130 grands worth of souped up truck. We have a dear friend called Sausage from school. Communal showers are part of the whole boarding school experience where dropped soap generally stays on the floor! This Sausage earned his name from the barbecued variety. After a particularly intense drinking session he had a bit of a tactical chunder, regurgitating an entire, unchewed pork sword for people’s enjoyment. Sausage is also well off the ADHD scale, taking great pleasure in racing the girls around the paddock and in the air with 4WD trucks without spilling a drop! A compound bow got an airing along with an FPV drone and firearms. Firearms, compound bow and 4WD vehicles somehow survived along with all participants, the drone has seen better days. Much fun had, back to the pub for a nightcap and Nurofen!

Around 1913, an ambitious Spaniard, José Paronella, sailed to Far North Queensland searching for a better life. Well over 100 years before an arrogant army of geriatric POMs decided that Earl Grey Tea, Big Ears & Co were more relevant than relationships with Europe. Maybe he was psychic and hopped onto a boat to the other side of the world.
He left his future wife at home, planning to accrue a large enough pile of cash to set themselves up. 13 years later, mission accomplished, he popped back to Spain to fetch the Mrs. Sadly for José, the future Mrs Paronella had got the shits. Apparently, she waited 10 years without a word so decided to make paella with some other chap. All was not lost, José hooks up with her younger sister and heads back to Oz to build his dream.

Although José’s letter writing skills were somewhat lacking, his vision and imagination were off the scale. Building his own castle next to a waterfall, planting about 7000 trees including avenues of Kauris, secret gardens through underground tunnels, entertainment areas, a cinema, ballroom and tennis court. The bloke also worked out in the 1930’s that hydroelectric power might be a good idea. Building his own system to power the property and feed electricity back to the local town. Maybe some of the imbeciles that we have in various levels of government could take a page out of his book rather than focus purely on subsidies for wind and solar, just a thought.

Sadly, the place was delivered a bit of a monstering from Mother Nature. Cyclones and floods took their toll. A large kitchen fire probably didn’t help and José met his maker in 1948. Fast forward 75 years and Paronella Park is heritage listed under new custodians reviving Paronella’s dream. Lots of work to be done here but difficult not to get swept up in the passion of owners past and present. Wished Mark all the best and continued on with our own dream.

Mud crabs are always a good idea, catching the bastards however whilst maintaining a full quota of fingers and thumbs is another matter entirely. Also given the creeks here are infested with prehistoric eating machines, the risk of losing a finger or two pales into insignificance. The unwelcome appearance of another variety of mud is not recommended! Took the somewhat less risky, (And cleaner!), option of a trip to the fishmonger. Picked out the biggest bugger in the tank and returned 2 hours later when he was cleaned and cooked for our enjoyment. Delicious!

Smelling strongly of crab the next morning we went in search of larger beasts. Generally, I am not a fan of beasts in captivity, even less of a fan of the watching selfie stick waving muppets knock on the cages! Hartley’s Crocodile adventures was a bit different. Many of the animals in captivity had been relocated here for doing what thousands of years of instinct has taught them. Rex, had a bit of a taste for dog meat. The locals couldn’t work out why the bait in the croc trap disappeared every night. Turns out Rex patiently waited for fluffy and co to come for dinner and helped himself. Doug decided to make golf far more exciting by giving a few chaps on the 16th an underpant filling welcome. Up close and personal, these beasts are truly terrifying and majestic. Bumping into one in the wild without the benefit of a big fence is not going to end well. The place is also a home to 5000 or so smaller versions destined for the handbag and belt shop. $250 for a belt or another zero for a handbag, maybe not. 2 croc burgers please.

Cassowaries here too, kind of like emus on acid. Also relocated from the rainforest after interactions with motor vehicles. A variety of feisty looking snakes here as well as lizards and a fucking big Komodo Dragon. The day ends with watching Hagrid, a 400 kilo bundle of anger and attitude chasing one of the zookeepers around inside the cage. Happy this time to remain on the selfie stick side of the experience!
Off to the pub to watch the girls send the frogs packing. Slow start the next day croissants and a whine anyone?

Our original plan was to get as far as Cape Tribulation before a gentle amble back South. My trusty co-pilot poo-pooed that idea and pointed us back North. A gentle 4 hours later we find ourselves in Cooktown. Seems like little has changed here since Captain Cook tried parking his boat on the Barrier Reef 250 odd years ago. The local fellas get on the piss nice and early, before falling over for a morning siesta waiting for the bottle shops to open. No cask wine available before 4pm, so bottles of vodka get tipped into one of the morning’s beer bottles with a dash of orange cordial. Ice and a slice with that Sir?

Away from the pavement style sleeping facilities, we found a campsite and plugged the horse in for a couple of nights. We spotted a walking loop around the town on the local map. Not much of a scale to go by, so whacked on the sandals and headed off. First obstacle was a cheeky creek by the botanical gardens. Given the quantity of crocodile warning signs in this part of the world, we took the slightly underpant filling crossing on a dodgy plank and scampered into the relative safety of the park. An hour or so later around the walk, sandals were proving a less than ideal choice where the nice gentle looking dotted line failed to indicate an iron man style challenge around most of its twisty inclines and descents! Fortunately, a full camelbak was a more sensible choice and we duly arrived at ‘grassy hill lookout’ where Captain Cook had a long think about his driving skills and pondered his awkward situation in 1770. Gentle hike back down to town and the campsite for a well earned dinner.

Took a waft around the museum the next day, pretty awesome reading some of Captain Cook’s log. Bumped into a couple of other grey nomads in the pub before grabbing some steak from the local IGA and heading back. ‘Steak’ was about 1.5 kilos of FNQ’s finest which was introduced to Mr Weber for our enjoyment. The grey nomads from the pub wafted in a couple of spots away from us and invited us over for pre dinner drinks. Drinks turned into dinner, chef’s jacket and hat came out, much cow consumed! Dinner morphed into drinks again. #vanlife

Took a gentle detour to the iconic Lions Den Hotel about half an hour out of Cooktown. Didn’t fancy the mud bath in the powered sites, so snuck into a dryish looking patch under the trees further away, perfect. Lions Den Hotel is well known to most who have ventured up here. The place looks like an old mining town bar with the walls plastered by stuff left by far more modern travellers. No WiFi, no phone reception. All day bar, all day pizzas, don’t mind if we do. Surprised but happy to find my local ginger beer from Brookie on tap, perfect for washing down seriously cheesy pizza! Bed beckoned before safely steering Fergie past the mud traps and back to the safety of the road.

Off to Mossman to do the water in/out thing then Palm Cove about 300km South. Off we go again!

Got a message from a yoga chum of ours wondering if we were anywhere near Cairns. An hour or so’s drive in the wrong direction didn’t seem too arduous, so off we headed to Palm Cove. 

Bels and Amber had popped up here for a relaxing weekend of yoga, meditation and a cocktail or two. Yoga and meditation were popped on hold for day one which ended up in the rooftop spa. Enough said. There was a look of concern as a letter from building management came under the door the next morning. Turns out it was just a heads up for a wedding that evening. Security would be on site and festivities would cease by 10.30. Excellent, we can whack the tunes up a level or two! Negronis for brekky?

Nipped into the local Coles for dinner. A serving of duck with a few yummies was the order of the evening. Wobbled back to to our bus for a detox!