Chronicle readers Gary and Mary Baker share their adventures in Australia and New Zealand.

Alocal travel guide said there were 28 sites to visit in the little town of Coromba.

The lady at the post office said there was not much there.

We took photos of St. Therese’s Catholic church which didn’t look like it was being used.

We drove back to Coff’s Harbor, then to the nearby Sealy Lookout with a fabulous view of Coff’s Harbor and the ocean.

Rain drove us back to our condo from the local beach.

After much discussion, we decided to drive further north along the coast to Brisbane.

Brisbane is about 600 miles from Sydney so it was a matter of deciding whether a quick overnight trip another 250 miles up the road was worth the 10 hour trip back. We ran into rain and lots of road work which slowed our travel.

In one small town, we saw a little antique shop which we had to stop and inspect. I was looking for some more Australian pennies and was sifting through a bowl at the checkout counter.

The owner asked me where we were from and I informed him South Carolina in the states. He said he wanted to visit Nashville, Memphis, and Tupelo.

I told him that sounded like Elvis.

He laughed and pulled up the right leg of his shorts and exposed a large tattoo of Elvis.

He turned a bit and on the outside of his right leg was a large tattoo of John Wayne.

Australians are intrigued by American culture.

A friendly cop

As we drove up the coast, it became necessary for me to seek a rest area. Following the sign, I pulled off but couldn’t find the service area and ended up near a shopping mall.

Apparently I ran a red light. You know, left turn on red and got pulled over by a police officer. He quickly figured out that we were not Australian and pointed out where to go.

He didn’t give me a ticket but since he was so nice, I shook his hand.

On Saturday morning, May 4, we walked to the nearby St. John’s Cathedral and toured the beautiful Anglican building. The lady in the gift shop gave me a nice booklet on the history of the church, primarily the military history of its congregation.

Brisbane was celebrating the annual Buddha Birthday along the waterfront with lots of Oriental food booths, crafts and activities.

After lunch we took a boat down the river and back to dodge the rain. Later that evening, we went upriver on the boat taking in the lights of the city.

Return to Hoey Moey

We got up early and on the road back toward Sydney.

On the first part of the journey we drove back to Coff’s Harbour and had steak at Hoey Moey.

It started raining about dark and I was having trouble watching the road and realized after a while that the parking lights were on instead of the headlights.

After about 12 hours, we made it to the hotel in Sydney and immediately turned in the car.

We had enough driving for this trip, probably 2,000 miles in less than 3 weeks.

On Monday, May 6, we took the train to downtown and walked to the old military barracks which are closed for renovation.

Next door, we toured the old mint, followed by the state library, and then into the parliament building.

Sydney is the capitol of New South Wales.

A further walk around Darling Harbour to the Hard Rock Cafe where we ate lunch before walking back downtown.

I had been intrigued by ANZACs so we found ourselves back at the ANZAC Memorial where we had been on our first day of the trip. We found we had not seen the whole building as there were lots of interesting relics and memorabilia.

Most of our trip was on our own, having taken only a couple of bus tours so we were up the next morning for a tour to the Blue Mountains.

The Blue Mountains are Australia’s Grand Canyon. The name derives from the beautiful blue of the mountains due to the eucalyptus trees covering the mountain sides.

The bus stopped at the welcome center overlooking the Three Sisters, a rock formation named for an Aboriginal legend of 3 sisters caught in a battle over marriage issues with a neighboring tribe’s young men and turned into stone by an elder to protect them.

The bus tour took us to Featherdale Animal Park where there were lots of animals. The kangaroos pretty much had the run of their area.

There were many colorful birds, small penguins and the other native creatures wombats, koalas, and dingos.

That evening we ate at the Rock Grill where we both ordered kangaroo burgers; different but tasty.

Our last day in Australia began with a walk St. James Church (Anglican) and St. Mary’s Cathedral (Catholic), 2 ornate, beautiful churches.

A visit to the Australian Museum included a talk from a curator about a whale skeleton. He advised us to see a display of the oldest found human skeleton.

St. Stephens Church was close by. One of the church ladies told us the church had been Presbyterian and is now a nondenominational, uniting church,

The General Post Office was next on our tour where I fed my philatelic hobby passion and bought two gold rush envelopes.

Outside the state library, we took photos of Capt. Flinders and his cat. Flinders was an explorer who circumnavigated Australia. His cat, Trim, accompanied him on the journey.

The long way home

Dinner was followed by a short cab ride to the airport. The almost 10-hour flight took us to Honolulu.

Somewhere over the Pacific, the date changed, picking up the day we lost when we began this adventure.

The Honolulu leg entailed a 3-hour layover followed by another almost 10-hour flight to New York followed by a short layover and a flight to Charlotte.

My son, the travel agent, picked us up and chauffeured us to home sweet home.

It was a grand 6 weeks, meeting some friendly people and seeing just a small bit of the beautiful countries of New Zealand and Australia.

We recommend the trip but advise taking several weeks.

Australia is a big country.

If you’re going to visit, stay awhile and enjoy the people and the country.