diaryofapom.com
Memoires of a tour of Australia
Again we arrived at Hervey Bay full of excitement and anticipation, looking forward to going whale watching. All that was dashed when we found out the whales hadn’t arrived yet, but that’s just bad luck.
Hervey Bay isn’t what we imagined though; the main road in has just about every store you could imagine, from supermarkets to car dealers and bottle shops. We were imagining a small town with only basic shops etc, which was not at all the case. We had also booked a caravan park as close to what we imagined to be the centre of Hervey Bay as we could find, thinking that would be the best place to be. We were wrong; there was only one real run of bars and restaurants, and that was along Scarness and Torquay beaches, a good half hour walk from our caravan park. And as the tours all leave from the marina, which is a good distance from all of the caravan parks, you need a transfer to it anyway, rather than walking.
After the drive in, and seeing all of the large shops etc, we thought there would be plenty of bars and restaurants for us to utilise. Whilst there is a main run of them down the esplanade, they are more café’s than restaurants and not so many bars at all. Again a bit disappointing, and I doubt too many people would go there without the fact that the whale watching is there – in fact it was rather dead when we were there, probably because the whales weren’t there.
The caravan park we stayed on however was very good, probably the second best we have been on overall. It would be best overall if wasn’t for the fact that the ‘Tropic Breeze’ park in Port Douglas was so close to the action, and this one isn’t. In terms of facilities, cleanliness and how well kept the grounds were, the Hervey Bay Caravan Park was best, but the fact we really needed a car to fully appreciate it, and we haven’t got one, makes it second best.
Hervey Bay - 6/10.
Hervey Bay Caravan Park – 8/10.
I feel sure that once we come back and see the whales and visit Frazer Island, our opinion of the place will improve.