The Schuberts are coming!!😱🥳

We had said you can come visit us in Australia. Then you can rent a camper and we can drive around together. To be honest, we were pleasantly surprised when Philip's parents actually agreed to a road trip from Sydney to Melbourne. Not bad for two grandparents (even though they're not really old).

Together we covered over 1100 km along the east coast. We saw and experienced a lot. Summer, sun, beach.

The Blue Mountains

We went hiking in the mountains west of Sydney. We saw the Three Sisters and rode on the steepest passenger train in the world. After spending a night at a small campground on site, we actually wanted to visit the Wentworth Falls together. Unfortunately, due to the fog, we couldn't see anything, but they sounded amazing😁

Summer, sun, beach

Australia has plenty of beaches and we visited many of them: Wattamolla Beach in the Royal National Park with its own waterfall; Hyams Beach - the supposedly whitest beach in the world; Whiskey Bay and Squeaky Beach - in Wilsons Promontory National Park with the squeaking sand that gives it its name. We also liked the beach at the campground in Batemans Bay.

Wedding Cake Rock

In Royal National Park, we went on a short hike to Wedding Cake Rock. Doesn't it look delicious? 😋

Unfortunately, it is in danger of collapsing.

Pebbly Beach - Breakfast with Kangaroos

Okay, technically just another beach. But it's located in the middle of the forest in a national park with an adjacent campground. The real highlight here is a group of kangaroos that live here and spend most of their time grazing on the beach. The kangaroos have become accustomed to the presence of curious people, allowing themselves to be photographed and even petted without any fuss.

At night, possums roam the campground in search of leftovers from campers (not to be confused with opossums, as we have learned they are not related to each other).

We were lucky with the timing because 4 days later, a nasty fire broke out here. The forest suffered significant damage, and we don't know what happened to the kangaroos.

Mogo

A small, adorable old gold mining town. Today, it has many cute little cafes and shops. You can still visit the old mine and even pan for gold.

Snorkeling with Seals at Montague Island

As the heading suggests, we were able to snorkel with seals here. Despite the 17°C water, it wasn't too cold thanks to our wetsuits and the endorphins. The seals are used to snorkelers and didn't pay much attention to us. Sometimes we were surprised how close they came to us.

A seal fight?:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kj-_fdT1a9M

Seal and us:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXT1LpeWGDI

Wombats in Wilsons Promontory National Park

Located southeast of Melbourne, you can find not only the southernmost point of mainland Australia (if we don't count Tasmania as mainland), but also mountains, beaches, kangaroos, emus, and above all wombats 😁.

Even food has to be hidden because the wombats will rummage through everything and can even open coolers.

=)

Wombat eating:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CAMfU35zfI0

Koalas on Phillip Island

In the Koala Reserve, we were able to see koalas up close on a treetop walkway. We found over 10 of them.

Penguins in Melbourne

There were supposed to be penguins on Philip Island as well. However, the arrival of the little waddling birds on the beach at sunset has unfortunately turned into a quite commercial tourist event. You have to pay €15 to watch from an assigned seat. We decided to skip that and instead watched the penguins in Melbourne. We saw them up close, although not for free 😋😋

We also visited the graffiti street in Melbourne again. The water actually flows there =)

The Queen Victoria Market is definitely worth a visit: you can find everything from meat to vegan food, fish, clothes, and junk.