stand by on plans to cairns

So i've made it as far as townsville now... looking back on the last week since i left brisbane on saturday was one of ups and downs. this time not the roads but in myself. it can be a lonesome journey sometimes. and alas, manny has abandoned me; he only got as far as brisbane and felt at home and is planting roots. i'll see him when i go back that way though. and benni is planted too for a while , i met up with him again in bunderburg... nice town, i may go back to check it out for a while.

i spent a couple days in a hotel in prosperpine just to get my back feeling better. i can only do a couple days in the tent now in a row, i guess i'm not as young as i used to be. that being said this journey has been good but i've decided not to circumfrence the country, instead i need a home base. after travelling up to cairns next i'll probably head back down south via a different route and find that launching point. travelling allday everyday is in every way tiresome and not enjoyable, but if i break it up it's awesome. from the home base (in which ill find some work before i go broke) i can do separate trips to all the different states. i still have melbourne in mind for that it's pretty central to everywhere else i want to go but who knows.
so there's frogs and lizards and sugar refinaries everywhere(this one was my fav. maybe jzeros next psychic pollution cover?)

what a nice frog...

...to eat!
lots of the landscape is pretty barren wasteland. dryed up creek beds pass by mile after mile and i wonder what they are like during the rain season. oh that's also influencing my decision not to go around north ... monsoons + tropical storms is no place for a motorbike and tent. also abandon cars littered every so often makes me realize the auto theft here is real.
also i saw my first kangaroos!
i was wondering if they were only mythical creatures. 3 weeks in and i hadn't seen any. still no koalas though....or crocs. apparenty over on magnetic island, just a 20 min ferry from townsville, are lots of wild animals. it's also really interesting to listen to the chorus of birds in the morning. different mix every day i wake. some sound like monkeys, others finish each others beautiful songs.


bamboo! ahh made me think of the old watering hole.

big guy, little guy and other guy.
i also crossed the tropic of capricorn for the first time in rockhampton.(well i guess i did in the plane) but it was still pretty neat since i'm a capricorn.i can see the constellation here too i don't think you can in canada. i never even knew it is a SEA goat not just goat. huh. well now we know.
did you know? australia doesn't use the penny. everything is rounded to the nickel. genius!