Testing the Kia car range
Casamara
John & Susan Simpson
Sun 17 Mar 2024 07:22
Our trusty rental car in New Zealand had been a Kia Stonic - part mechanical mouse, part sewing machine!! It did us proud but wasn’t really built for the distances nor the steep mountain roads of NZ and our fairly minimal luggage filled the back seat as well as the boot. When booking our rental car for our next trip, which would be driving down the East coast of Australia, John had selected the option of a ‘mystery vehicle’. The only thing guaranteed was that it would have five doors and we were a little nervous as to what it might turn out to be. What if it was smaller than a Kia Stonic? After checking that all was well with Casamara in her cyclone season base of Scarborough Marina just north of Brisbane, we closed her up again and set off to collect the mystery vehicle. “You struck lucky”, said the guy in the rental car office. “We’ve got a Kia Carnival for you.” Another Kia, but what was it like? Our faces blank, he gestured out to the car park and we turned with much trepidation to see the largest car possible blocking out the sunlight! It was about twice the size of the Stonic, a seven seater people carrier with a rear boot space so large we were later able to fit in two full size electric mountain bikes without any disassembly. We nicknamed it ‘the hearse’, as that was what it looked like, but it carried us in comfort for the next 3,000 kilometres (1,800 miles). ’The Hearse’ parked in the pretty village of Bodalla, 200 miles south of Sydney Our route took us from Brisbane down to Melbourne and we traced the coast with stops in Byron Bay, Coffs Harbour, Port Macquarie, Newcastle, Sydney, Vincentia, Bermagui, and Eden. We also drove some inland routes to see a bit more than we might have seen if we were travelling by boat. What impressed us most though was the coastline. Miles of golden sand beaches with breaking surf stretching as far as you can see into the distance and, when you reach the headland that was that farthest point, all you can see beyond it is miles more of the same. Even where the coastline was interrupted by river inlets, the entrances were often difficult to spot due to the sand bars that form across them. Some fantastic natural harbours were missed by the early European explorers because they couldn’t see beyond the surf at the river entrance and entering them is still a tricky business even today. We watched nervously as a catamaran entered Port Macquarie over a turbulent sea. Their timing was exactly right as it was high tide so they had the maximum clearance possible over the sand bar but it still made us very nervous! Coastline and inlet entrance, Port Macquarie The coastal belt around the SE corner of Australia is where most of the population live. Many of the towns and villages have names that are very familiar to us and it seems that British settlers were keen to mark their new territories with names from home. Place names from regions of the UK were even grouped together as they are at home, so Gloucester was close to Stroud for example, and in the Newcastle area we also came across Jesmond, Stockton and Gateshead. Wherever we crossed a river, creek or stream there would be a road sign telling us the name of the watercourse we were crossing. We were amused by some of the names and felt that many of these painted a picture of what the settlers found as they explored their new surroundings: ‘Clay Bank Creek’, ‘Dead Horse Creek’, ‘Two Mile Stream’, ‘Stoney Creek’ and - probably our favourite - ‘Mad Cow Creek’. Learning from our previous road trips, we didn’t try to move on every couple of days as we’ve found that living out of a suitcase becomes tiring - first world problems, eh? We factored in a week in Byron Bay, five nights in Sydney and a week in Melbourne so that we were able to unpack and explore them in more depth. One of the highlights was a visit to the Sydney Opera House to see a superb performance of Idomeneo by Mozart and, it being our last evening in Sydney, a wonderful end to a pleasant stay. In Sydney and in Melbourne we were pleased to be able to get to some choral services at the Anglican cathedrals. It felt slightly surreal to attend services so similar to those we would attend at home, the only difference being the recognition of First Nation peoples at the start of each service and the local accent. Unusually, at the Cathedral in Sydney there were no clergy present for Evensong; the service was led by the Director of Music who also conducted the choir. He did everything very well but we hadn’t come across that before. Incidentally, neither Sydney nor Melbourne is Australia’s capital city. Canberra was chosen as a compromise after a long dispute as to whether Sydney or Melbourne was the best option. If we had to choose which we preferred it would be a difficult choice. Sydney has the beaches, the harbour views and the Opera House, but Melbourne has fantastic restaurants, lots of character and great public transport. Sydney Opera House - probably didn’t need to say that! We were surprised to find that the Australian day starts and finishes earlier than we would expect. A couple of times we missed out on our morning coffee because the coffee shop had closed by 11 am having opened at 5.30 am. We were nearly caught out at the other end of the day too by restaurants that closed by 8.30 pm. We wondered how our Spanish friends are finding that as they tour Australia; we once turned up at a restaurant in Spain at 8.30 pm to find that the chef didn’t start work until 10pm! We enjoyed sampling the beach life culture, particularly around the busier beaches where surfers hung about waiting for the perfect wave at Byron Bay, in Sydney at Manly and Bondi beaches, and in Newcastle. In Byron Bay it was the done thing to ride your bike to the beach with your surf board strapped alongside, and in Newcastle it was ok to step straight onto the tram barefoot, in your swimming togs(trunks), towel over your shoulder and with surf board in hand! It seems acceptable to be barefoot anywhere - the supermarket, filling your car at the fuel station, on the bus, hiking a coastal path - we saw all of those. Bondi Beach - note that a busy beach in Australia is not really that busy! We’ve been lucky enough to see some of Australia’s wildlife along the way. We saw a koala bear in the wild at Byron Bay and also visited the Koala Hospital in Port Macquarie to see some which are recovering from injury. They’re very cute creatures but unfortunately quite sleepy and prone to being hit by vehicles as they cross the road. They also get caught in bush fires, of which there seem to have been many judging by the blackened and rejuvenating bush areas we drove through. In Bermagui we were delighted to catch up with Martin, an old friend from university, and saw a large group of kangaroos and wallabies roaming free on his land. Along the coastal paths we’ve seen Goannas - large lizards with enormous flicking tongues. It was amazing to see how they camouflage themselves. Lying still, lowered to the ground with tongue and legs tucked in they look exactly like the dead Eucalyptus tree branches you see scattered about everywhere. We’ve also seen some very exotic looking birds, including a beautiful bird called the Blue-Faced Honey Eater and large numbers of the Masked Lapwing which look as though someone has moulded a large piece of yellow PlayDoh onto their faces. Luckily we haven’t (yet) seen any of the enormous spiders that we’re told live around these parts! Surprising the wildlife in Bermagui! The PlayDoh-faced Masked Lapwing So, exactly a month after we left Brisbane in our Kia Carnival we handed it back at Melbourne airport and flew on to our next adventure. There was just one moment during the trip when John might have preferred that we still had the Kia Stonic. Our hotel in Sydney offered parking at the hotel, which we gladly accepted only to find that the access to the car park meant reversing the car into a lift which transported us, car and all, to a different floor. It was a very very very tight squeeze for a Kia Carnival! The superb parking skills of Mr S! Next stop is Tasmania where we will see as much as we can of the island in 10 days. I wonder whether our rental car will be a Kia?? |