Kate and Josh left the NSW Central Coast in their 4WD Toyota Hiace, a boat in tow and a loose plan to spend at least a year making their way around Australia. They hightailed it straight to K’gari for their first adventure with friends, and continued north through Queensland toward Cape York - but somewhere between the beach camps, boat ramps and eskies full of fresh fish, they realised the best parts of the journey weren’t happening on the road at all. They were happening just offshore.
Their 4.6m fibreglass boat had joined the trip as Josh’s 30th birthday present, but it wasn’t built for the corrugations and outback tracks that lead to some of Australia’s best coastline. So in Cardwell, a sleepy highway town wedged between North Queensland's reef and rainforest, they made a straight swap for a tougher 4.3m centre console tinny - something better suited to the places they knew were waiting for them beyond the well-worn bitumen of the Captain Cook Highway.
Since then, the boat has become the heart of the trip, taking them from Fitzroy Island and the surrounding sand cays, to the northernmost tip of Australia and into the Gulf Country. After almost four months in Queensland, they’re now heading west toward the Northern Territory with no real end date in sight - just a van, a tinny and a growing belief that the best of Australia is found on the water.
Follow more of Kate & Josh's adventures here.
