We woke up early, earlier than planned – the excitement maybe – and walked to the wharves to get on a big catamaran. The sea was calm until we passed Fitzroy island, but became quite rough when we entered the open sea. Séverine had bought seasickness pills, it all went smoothly for us… but not for everyone on the boat. 45 min later we arrived at a big pontoon, in the middle of nowhere… or not so much maybe. It was anchored on one of the coral reefs of the Great Barrier Reef. We got into our wetsuits, were handed buoyancy jackets, snorkel sets and fins, and jumped in the water.

We didn’t even need to jump out of the jumping platform – we were already surrounded by « dory » and her family. Just next to the boat, the coral was quite dull, mostly brown or white. But just a few strokes away, we could see scores of small and big fish, yellow, black, striped, often with patches of iridescent colors. And the coral that looked static to start with, became an animated world always moving, as the waves pass by, and as I was more at ease with the snorkel.

Sun came after lunch, highlighting even more the diversity of colours. I saw completely black fish suddenly showing multitudes of small, bright spots. We also took a tour in a boat with a transparent base – although not as nice as when snorkelling, it was interesting to hear about this reef and where to find nemos (clown fish). Séverine got to see one, I didn’t. However, as I was back to the boat after my 4th and final round, I saw a beautiful turtle, majestically moving along the reef.

My phone is not waterproof so I don’t have any pictures of the corals, only memories.

We had diner at home, mac’n cheese!

Today, Cairns! We took the plane from Newcastle, landed mid-afternoon. Timo, Hugo and I enjoyed the swimming pool – even if a bit cold, while Sarah and Séverine went shopping. Timo even did 50 lengths, to swim 1000m for the first time.

After dinner, we took an evening walk in the city center and enjoyed the nice, festive atmosphere of this holiday city. Our plan here includes a trip to the tropical forest and to the coral reef.

We started the day with the Tour de France highlights – not as exciting as the day before but still a good mountain stage. We packed, checked out and went to the nearby Koala Hospital, where we saw lots of rescued koalas. We bought sausage rolls for lunch, another typical Australian thing, that we ate at the Tacking Point lighthouse.

After lunch, we drove along the pacific highway, back to Corlette. It’s good to be back to our base camp, after a week on the road. We watched the sunset on Bagnalls Beach, had diner at Mike’s and went back home to prepare our next trip: Cairns, in northern Queensland.

The day started with the highlights of a fantastic Tour de France stage and an egg-cellent breakfast prepared by the camping staff. It was too windy to go surfing, so we packed, checked out, and delivered the boards back to Chris and Dave. We had a late morning coffee there, talked about our program once in Sydney, Christmas in Bali, and how mentally difficult it is to change plans when we have our mind set on something.

We bought lunch at the Bruns Bakery, said goodbye to the Olsens, left Brunswick Heads, and drove to the Forest Sky Peer over Coffs Harbour for a quick stop.

We arrived at Port Macquarie late afternoon. The kids went to the swimming pool – a very cold one, so cold they had to wear their wetsuits.

We all woke up early to catch the high tide. We borrowed surf and bodyboards from Dave, walked across the bridge to the beach. Water temperature was about 20-21 deg, perfect with a wetsuit. Tim and Sarah tried surfing, with the help of Tom. They both succeeded to stand up and surf the waves a few times.

We had bbq for lunch, with Nel, Chris, Dave and James. A typical Australian bbq: sausage-sizzle. We celebrated Matilda’s 5th birthday with a delicious sponge cake covered by at least 10 cm of pink creamy topping.

We had a coffee and ice-cream downtown, then went back to the beach for an hour of bodyboarding, before the rain forced us back to the cabins.

We picked up Fish and chips takeaway for diner that we ate while watching rugby league on TV – the State of Origin decider’s game between Queensland and New South Wales.

Back to Chris and Nel… I have pretty much always known them, ever since I was born. My parents had bought an old house in the middle of a field in Normandie with them – a very 70s thing to do – where we would spend weekends and holidays when we lived in Paris. I remember playing with Nel and her brother Ollie when I was like 2 or 3, and being puzzled because I could not understand a word of what they were saying. Then we moved away from Paris. The house was sold, eventually, and I didn’t see the Olsen for like 2 decades, except Nel who had spent a few weeks with us later on. This takes me back to my very early childhood.

NB: Thomas took and shared some of the pictures below.