Last Day in Bundaberg

Another two and a half day stopover and each day has been frantic. We are still in that frame of mind where we acknowledge, that relatively speaking, our visit to Australia is only for a short time and we feel we must see everything in that time.  I feel a ‘strategy meeting’ coming on so as a realistic slant can be put on our journey.

Rod at the Rum Distillery and still upright

We did the visit to the Bundaberg Rum Distillery yesterday.  It was a very interesting morning that ended at the Distillery’s bar.  As you know I am not a huge fan of Bundy rum however I did take a fancy to their new Dark Oak rum. It tasted very much like Navy rum but at A$90 per bottle it remained on the shelf. We came away with a delicious bottle of Bundy Rum Liqueur.

A couple of interesting facts for you

1.  The Distillery has been producing rum products since 1888.

2. Australia consumes 96 percent of the Distillery’s production. 3 percent is consumed by New Zealand and the other 1 percent by the rest of the world.

3. The Distillery produces 22 million litres of rum annually. It is matured at 78% ALC/VOL in 75,000 litre Oak vats.

Rod with the ‘birds’

We decided to do a ‘roady’ today and visit some of the areas ‘top spots’. We ended up this morning just north of Childers at the Flying High Bird Sanctuary. The Sanctuary is Australia’s largest walk through aviary covering nearly two acres and with a height of over seven metres. There is approximately half a kilometre of walking track and the aviary houses over 3000 birds.  While a majority of the birds fly free, there are some species that are incompatible with other birds (and tourists) and they are housed separately.  Many of the birds land on you at will. More photos of our visit can be seen HERE .

From the Sanctuary we head back north and visited Burnett Heads and the port area. Rod said he had visited Bundaberg on one of the ships he was on many years ago but he did not remember ‘any’ of the scenery around the port. His explanation was that fog must have set in that day. We were going to head over the Mon Repos Beach to have a look at the turtle rookery but unfortunately it’s the wrong time of year so we gave that a miss. We visited are few other local attractions such as the Bundaberg Ginger Beer Distillery and the sugar cane farms.

For the cooks amongst you, we did our fruit and vege shopping today for next week at one of the roadside stalls. Our purchases cost us the princely sum of $6.50. Eating healthily over here is very easy and cheap.

Dearne on her new electric bike

Many of the motorhomers and caravaners over here either carry the standard bicycle or a battery-powered bicycle to get around local shops etc.  You guessed it – Dearne is now in possession of a battery-powered bicycle. Top speed of 26kph with a maximum range of approximately 40km. What could possibly go wrong!!

We are heading further north tomorrow but again we have no firm plan of where we will stop for the night.  Our current thinking is that we may have to start getting as far north as we can over the next month so that when we do the turn around to head back south into NSW and Victoria for the summer, we will have more time to take in the country.  Our return trip is going to be inland rather than coastal.

We have been in Australia one month yesterday and all is going well.