Fortunately “Australia Day” was a Friday this year and we took our chance for a weekend in the Grampians to climb in the “Summerday Valley”. | See the pictures …

Was ist, neben Barbequeue, das wohl typischste in Australien? Der Strandurlaub. Und Strände gibts in Oz auch mehr als genug … einer der berühmtesten befindet sich in Queensland an der Gold Coast und heißt passenderweise Surfers Paradise. Wer hier schöne Natur erwartet, wird allerdings enttäuscht; der weiße Sandstrand grenzt direkt an die Hotelanlagen der Touristenstadt an und ist meist dicht bevölkert. Was ihn trotzdem so beliebt macht ist wahrscheinlich der Sicherheitsaspekt (seeeehr wichtig für einen Australier): fast keine Quallen, besonders keine tödlichen Box Jelly Fish und es sind Hai-Netze vor der Küste eingerichtet. Ausserdem gibt es viele markierte Strandbereiche mit Lifeguards, die für den Notfall bereit stehen. Und schließlich locken neben dem Wetter die Ansammlung von Vergnügungsparks die Australier jeden Alters an die Strände der Gold Coast. | Zu den Bildern (weiterlesen…)

At the weekend I went down to the Mornington Peninsular where Dave Martin had organised a BBQ at his beach house in McCrae. A good occasion to take some photos of the beautiful beaches. After a stop at Rye Ocean Beach we went on to London Bridge and Portsea Ocean Beach, before we finally met the others at the barbequeue. On Sunday we visited one of the numerous wineries around Red Hill and after that we went down to the beach again in Mornington where there was a nice sunset and an interesting view of Melbourne | See the pictures …

More than 30 degrees at 10am, the forcast predicts almost 40 degrees in the afternoon: only the beach can save us now! About an hour by car, at the start of the Great Ocean Road near Torquay the sandy coast of Jan Juc Beach awaits us.

Due to bush fires everything was coverd by smoke once again, even along the coast the thick haze lay over the water … in the afternoon the sky cleard though and out came the sun | See the pictures …

I wish you all a happy new year! Hope you had at least as much fun as I had at my NYE party …

After I finally had a good night’s rest to recover from NYE you can view some pictures in the Gallery | See the pictures …