Friday 1st November 2002 We're in no hurry to get to Rockhampton. It's only a sleep-over town on our way to Airlie Beach and the Whitsunday Islands. Here we expect a simple motel sleeping accomodation, no suprises. On the road we listen to Triple J, the Australian counterpart of Studio Brussel, catering for the needs of students and rockheads, with a mixture of 80% rock,

Factssheet Arr 01-11-2002 Dep 02-11-2002 (1 night) Club Crocodile Motor Inn Corner of Albert & Alma Street Rockhampton - QLD 4700 Tel: ++61 (0)7 4927 7433 Fax: ++61 (0)7 4927 3815 rockymotorinn@clubcroc.com.au http://www.clubcroc.com.au/ccrocky

A word on driving in Australia. Of course, it's on the left side. But that actually makes sense, and after a day or 2, no problemo. Gas is pretty cheap: A$0.77 to A$0.89 for unleaded, half of what we pay in Belgium (they luckely use liters, and kilometers here too...). Diesel is more expensive than petrol. Then the 'highway'. Up north it's Bruce Highway, or Highway Nr1. Highways here are only single lanes, with every few km a stretch to take over any slow vehicles. There are also a lot of dead kangaroos on the road. I lost count between 40 - 50. And sometimes cowes running around on the side. That's asking for accidents.

The landscape we drive through is very dry, like some savannah grasses in between the gumtrees (eucalypt). Here and there, the soil is dark red, like the pictures we know of the Australian outback.

About 3:00 in the afternoon we arrive in Rockhampton, or 'Rocky' as they call it here. We check into the hotel, and head down towards the 'old' city center, along the muddy, evaporating Fitzroy river. It's blazing hot outside. That's probably why there aren't a lot of people on the streets. (Only freaking mad tourist ... like ourselves ;-) We went into a surfstore (but Rocky is no way near a beach!) to escape the heat, and I got myself a Mambo cap (in sale, only A$15). Mambo is an Australian surf and streetwear designer label. Reknowned for it's 'dog-fart' and other obscene T-shirt prints. Only for the coolest of the cool of course ;-) We then went to a one of the large indoor shopping centers, wandered into a music store and got our hands on a Triple J compilation cd and The Datsuns' cd. Sold! We then drove to an even larger shopping center, to find an ABC store where they normally sell Triple J t-shirts etc. But sadly the gear was all too big ... and too expensive.
Here and there are some typical Queenslander houses, but we can't imagine ourselves living here.
Rocky is the beefcapital of Australia. There are mock-ups and statues of bulls all over the place, including one 'big' Brahman to greet you when you drive in or out of town. So we are dead set to have ourselves a juicy steak, and keep our eyes open for a nice steakhous. But actually we could only find a few, and in the end we went to this (US) Texas Lone Star grill restaurant, where the waiters perform a line dance act every hour or so during the evening. Bwooaa!!! (this was probably the most exiting thing to do on a friday night in 'Rocky' ;-)