Tony and Liz's Travel Adventures (Part 3)

25 March  BNE to LAX

With all the best intentions we ran short of time to get to Part 3 of our next blog letting everyone know about the last legs of our travels taking us through more of Europe then over to Asia (Hong Kong, Vietnam, Laos, Thailand and on to China). But so much happened in the last few weeks before our journey that the blog just had to take a back seat.

At the time of writing this we were actually flying over the Pacific en route to LA.  For those who were waiting for the next instalment, we apologise, but what happened in the last week before we left was just as much an exciting story as our travel plans.  For example, Dean and Elouise drove from Brisbane arriving in Cairns on Monday afternoon, back to his birthplace and fishing, of course.  Travelling in another car were Elouise’s nan, her mum and auntie. They were all really lucky to get through due to the forming cyclone in the Gulf which turned into a tropical rain depression, causing wild weather and road closures on the Bruce Highway.  They arrived on Monday afternoon.  Now this is where the story takes a turn which could have resulted in us delaying our trip.   

On the very evening they arrived all the family went to the Esplanade for a bite to eat, the rain turned nasty and torrential.  Typical of Cairns you could say, but even we hadn’t seen anything like this.  After dropping off the ladies later that night and when Elouise and I drove into our street it was flooded across the road approx. 1 ft deep even in the centre of the road.  So of course, the natural thing to do is to take the back entrance into the property.  Yeah right !!! Big mistake.  We’d turned right off Mulgrance road into the next traffic lights.  What happened next took us both by surprise.  A wall of water  was coming straight towards us.  Within a couple of minutes it was almost halfway up the car doors.  The most logical thing to do at that time was to reverse back, but in trying to do so the car stalled. At that stage we were paddling with our feet in water IN THE CAR, and it was still rising.  Still the rain was bucketing down without any sign of it abating. Oh hell, the car was starting to float, then out of the thick rain and total darkness, 2 young guys whose car had stopped further up the road, had seen we were in trouble, and pushed the car up to a safer spot. We were still in water up to the top of the wheel rims.  Strangely the car was easy to push but it was the buoyancy and floating that got the car to the side of the road. These 2 good Samaritans had the water lapping high around their thighs.  That takes guts!!  We tried to stay fairly calm and Eloise called the Roadside Assist, they asked if we were OK and said a tow truck would be out in 1 and half hours.  The rain was still bucketing down when another good Samaritan in a 4 x 4 with a winch pulled us up completely out onto Mulgrave Road.  By that time the 6 lane road had been swallowed with flash flood water to become a 2 lane.  When we finally felt safe enough to get out of the car looking around there were at least 8 cars in the same predicament.

The tow truck driver said he had 12 calls – and that is just one company.  The outcome – our car, with only just over 1500 kms on the clock, was deemed a Write-off, perhaps repairable - as it happened the car was a write-off.  The Insurance company takes over now, deregisters the car, cancels the insurance and tenders for a new car for us with the same specs as our now written-off vehicle.  A consolation that we will return to a new car in November.   The Assessor told me that he had 20 Write-offs just from that one incident. 

There is more…. on Wednesday night Tony and I were staying with Holly and the kids on the Sunshine Coast.  Yep, you guessed it, flash flooding on Nicklin Way – we happened to be at that very spot at the very time that roads and houses flooded on Wednesday night.  The same crazy weather that affected Cairns, Townsville and the Sunshine Coast.  The panic started to set in and the last thing I wanted was for the same thing to happen so we turned around and headed back to Holly’s.

After those events, finally getting on Qantas QF15 from Brisbane to Los Angeles was a breeze.  We even did some ‘Celebrity Spotting” in the likes of Peter Andre (ie Get me out of here I’m a celebrity and former husband of Jordan, who is another one of those who is famous for doing nothing).  Poor Pete ended up with the kids who accompanied him on the flight.  We are also guilty of one of those new travel no-nos such as ‘gathering in groups’ on the plane.  Apparently with all the security regulations these days, no more than 2 people are allowed to gather in the aisles or around the toilets.  Well being our friendly selves we happened to have a gathering of 4 people, fellow Aussies, talking about our travel plans.  All good – the cabin crew were too tired to deal with us anyway.

Bellagio Water Show

We’ve now arrived in Las Vegas and we haven’t stopped.  Have taken lots of photos – AND – the Wedding vow renewal happened tonight at 8.00pm and have the piece of paper to prove it.  Tears shed by all including the marriage celebrant !!!  She explained that in "Sin City" the marriages are short-lived - ours is an exception. 

Cheers till next time (with more photos)

The Strip, Las Vegas

POSTSCRIPT:  From a reliable source we were informed that 178 cars were written-off by insurance companies on the fateful night of flash floods in Cairns on March 19, 2012