I made it up to Hervey Bay, where the whale festival itself was a bit of a non event, but went on a sailing trip and saw loads of giant humpbacks-it was an awesome sight!
Then my plans changed somewhat and i headed back down to Byron to meet a guy! He had travelled all the way over from Adelaide-2000km in his van!  We spent a few great days in Byron, the weather being much nicer than when i was there last and so i finally got to take my kayaking trip that i’d won.  Then we headed off into the bush in his van.  Stayed in National parks and by beaches and generally chilled out.  One morning we hiked up Mount Warning for sunrise, it’s the first place in Australia to see the sun!  Unfortunately I couldn’t find my torch and it was pitch black-had to rely on just Drew’s headlamp, and he set a pretty fast pace.  We were almost at the top when the sun started to appear, so we got a good view of the sunrise through the trees.  The last part we had to pull ourselves up on a chain, which was fun, and there was enough light to see my way by then.  The sun must have sensed that we were a bit late (despite having dragged ourselves out of bed at 4am!) because it waited behind a cloud until we got to the very top and then it came out!  The view was great, all the valley was covered in mists and rainforest everywhere.  It was well worth it.  The journey down was a bit hard on the knees and we ached for the whole day afterwards (any steps were avoided if possible).
Went from there to Nimbin, where our weary faces fitted in well with all the stoned hippies!  Camped in the Nightcap national park near Nimbin for another couple of days, doing some gentler walks to lovely waterfalls and seeing some cool lizards and wildlife.  Then we drove all the way back to Sydney, stopping at the Big Prawn and the Big Banana and a few other tourist spots.  Had a nice couple of days back in Manly before Drew had to head back to Adelaide.
So my journey up the coast has been slightly postponed, am now planning to fly straight up to Cairns and travel around a bit from there!