Lea and Rick's Travels

Warrnambool, Vic to Daylesford, Vic

2011-12-10T08:00:00.000+11:00

Following along the Great Ocean Road through Port Campbell and the Twelve Apostles, we were amazed at how many overseas tourists were around the place. It is certainly popular.

We stopped at several locations leading up to the Twelve Apostles, taking lots of photos. The area certainly has changed since we first took the trip back in the 1980’s. Then, there was very little signage, no fencing, no safety regulations – and WOW – that visitor’s centre is certainly impressive.

We had initially contemplated staying at Apollo Bay, but found a free camp at Johanna Beach. It is a lovely spot, and very popular with surfers. It is the backup spot when Bell’s Beach is no good. Couple of days there was just perfect. The campground wasn’t too crowded and it is well taken care of by the ranger. Apparently the property was left to the NPWS in the original owners Will, on the grounds that it would remain free for camping. Must say, the NPWS have taken the intent seriously and do a good job of looking after the place.

From there we drove north to Colac. We had planned to spend a couple of days at Meredith Park (another free camp), on the northern side of Lake Colac, but the storm that hit – and continued next day – was so strong that the van was shaking. Bugger that for a game of soldiers!!!! On to Daylesford.

The Daylesford Victoria Caravan Park is actually located next to the showgrounds, where a Highland Festival was to be held on the coming weekend. Whooppee!!! Men in Kilts! My favourite watching pastime!

We went out to Glenlyon to check in with Gilly at Adsum Farmhouse, our next house-sit. Two dogs, five hens and a bantam rooster and three Suffolk sheep. Vegie garden and lots of fruit trees. Should be interesting.

We then went and spent a week at Mount Franklin, just north of Glenlyon. Lovely spot, it’s in the crater of an extinct (hopefully) volcano. During the week it was fantastic, very quiet – except for people driving in, driving up to the lookout, then driving out again. No biggie except when they did not slow down!!!

Weekend however was an entirely different story. Apparently, Saturday night was a full moon. Camped just behind us we had a group of about thirty greenies (ferals), celebrating a fortieth birthday. Just across the road was a slightly smaller group of Chilean “happy clappers”, and just opposite them a group of followers of the “Old Way”. God help me, they even had two goats! Don’t want to think about that! They were gone on Sunday morning though! The greenies party went until about 2am in the morning – when the drummer got told by his own people to “shut his head”. Oh well, weekends can be like that.

Sunday morning, back to Glenlyon to start the sit.

We were actually at London Bridge just days before the rock collapsed in 1990. We walked right out to the point and took photos. Used to have one of Rick standing at the edge in a diving position!

Adelaide, SA to Port Fairy, VIC

2011-11-24T07:58:00.000+11:00

Our visit to Adelaide was as fast as it was unexpected! Originally, we had planned to head down the Murray, through Murray Bridge, Tailem Bend, right down to Meningie on the eastern side of Lake Albert. This would have us avoiding Adelaide and all the busy, city areas. But – on the spur of the moment, being really irritated with Punyelroo, we headed west towards Nuriootpa and Adelaide. ‘Nuri’ has only the one caravan park – a Top Tourist. It is not a bad park, but the sites can be a little cramped because there are so many large pine trees. Also, management seemed to be packing people all into one area rather than spreading them out. We were only staying overnight and really wanted to stay hitched, but there was just not enough room on the site.

Next morning we headed across to Brown Hill Creek Caravan Park, via the new Northern Expressway. WOW! Heaps better than Main North Road and all the traffic lights. Sadly, it still all comes to a bottleneck at Gepps Cross. Then the slow trek down through the city to Brown Hill Creek. This a Top Tourist park (again), and is a lovely park. It is long and narrow, winding up along the creek, but the sites are a decent size and the environs are very quiet, because it is out of the city proper. But it is still within close reach of services and shopping.

The first day there, I made a hugely momentous decision (for me anyway). I got my hair all chopped off!!! It was such a relief. Long hair is really hard to look after when travelling, especially when it is hot. Now, I’m free!!!!

Our visit to Adelaide was very brief, and we headed out again quickly. Next stop Meningie on Lake Albert.

We stayed in Meningie for four days – and the wind blew hard for the whole time we were there. We spoke to another vanner who had arrived there from the east, and he’d had the wind right across from the east coast. The waves on the lake were so high on the worst day that we could have surfed! Having whinged about the weather, this park is in a beautiful location. Absolute lakefront, amazing birdlife and a full lake. Fantastic.

Our next stop was the Lakeside Caravan Park in Robe. This place has history for us from many, many years ago. We and some friends entertained the whole caravan park for several hours while trying to put up a large and complicated tent. Some alcohol was involved – and that’s all I’m going to say about that!!!!

After a couple of nights in Mount Gambier, we spent a few days seeing the sights of Warrnambool. The Art Gallery had an exhibit of works done by local school kids – both primary and secondary. There was some very good work – but some of it was rather disturbing and very confronting. It certainly made me think.

QUE???

Brown Hill Creek Caravan Park – lovely, peaceful park. The sight of the tepee was quite a shock, but it is apparently quite genuine. Who knows?????

Choppy my foot – this is surfing weather!

Lots and lots of birdlife.

Port Fairy – supposedly the best fish & chips in Oz. Pretty good actually!

Mildura, Vic to Swan Reach, SA

2011-11-07T07:46:00.000+11:00

From Mildura we decided to head downstream along the Murray River, stopping off here and there to camp. There are some really lovely spots at the moment with the river running so well. We fulfilled a long-term desire to go out to Ned’s Corner and camp. It was beautifully peaceful, even though other people were camped 500m further downstream. They just fished from bank nice and quiet!! About half way through the afternoon though, we heard a roaring noise coming from upstream. Eventually a pair of powered tinnies came hurtling through – followed by another two – and another two – and another two!!! Eventually about 12 boats came through – in pairs – all going flat out! And we still don’t know what it was all about???

After Ned’s Corner, we stopped at the Berri Riverside Tourist Park (Top Tourist). We caught up with fellow Kedron owners Derrick and Marilyn again (Derrick was also a Junior Recruit), so had been at the reunion in Mildura. They are heading across to WA, hoping to spend Christmas in Albany. We took a drive across to Barmera to attend the Sunday morning market. When we arrived and parked the car, a very large huntsman spider decided the time was ripe to wander down from the roof of the car and across the doors which were just in the process of being opened to let us out. You’ve never seen four people move so fast. It was like a scene from Keystone Cops –Marilyn and I levitated about 100 metres down the road, leaving Rick and Derrick (who had also levitated, just not as far) to deal with the monster. Our last sight of it was (we think) heading under one of the wheels to hide. Hmmmm!! There is only one thing wrong with finding a large spider – and that is losing it again!!! After extracting a promise from the guys that they would examine the car VERY closely before we got back in we headed on towards the market. Wasn’t too bad, but a lot of the goods were pretty expensive. Still, we wandered around for a little while and then headed back towards Berri.

On the way in to Berri, we stopped at the new Vietnam Veterans’ War Memorial. It’s situated at the end of the main street – overlooking the river. It is a very well thought out memorial and covers ALL post WWII “conflicts”, including Korea, the Indonesian Confrontation and all peace-keeping duties. It also covers all three arms of the Australian Defence Service.

After three pleasant, and rather warm days we headed off down-river again. The plan was to stop at Punyelroo Caravan Park, near to Swan Reach. We knew the place from many years ago when it was just a collection of fishing cabins on the river. Very old friends of ours – Fay and Brian – used to own one of the prperties, which they called Punyelrosa. We had a lot of fun up on the river, but sadly have not seen Fay or Brian for a long time. Fay is actually Rick’s ex-sister in law, but that is a story for another time, preferably around a camp-fire.

Unfortunately, Punyelroo Caravan Park now looks like a complete dump. We did a complete circuit of the place and nobody showed any sign of interest or enquiry. Long story short, we headed for Nuriootpa instead.

View upriver from Buronga Riverside Park

Nice camp-site at Buronga

The sunsets are just magic!

Who you calling a Tart!!

Buronga Caravan Park has lots of beautiful gardens, but the roses are just amazing!

Quaint little critter! He has lots of fellows around the park!

Camp area at Ned’s Corner. The area we where we are was two to three metres under water earlier in the year.

Our closest neighbour – isn’t he cute!

Peace!

Glorious sunset – the reflections are just magnificent!

Berri Vietnam Veterans’ Memorial – a very special place!

MV Proud Mary at Swan Reach – pulling out of the wharf to head downstream.

Friends – It’s been a Long Time!!

2011-10-31T17:02:00.000+11:00

Who woulda thunk it?? Since we last wrote, we’ve completed a six week house-sit in Kurmond, NSW (near Richmond and Penrith), visited an old mate in Moss Vale, NSW, travelled to Canberra for a few days and camped along both the Snowy Mountains Highway and the Murrumbidgee River.
Sadly, it hasn’t been lack of time that has caused our great slackness in writing, just – well – slackness!!
So, rather than blather on about what a great time we’ve had, I’ll just concentrate on the highlights and the photos, and hopefully keep you entertained.

Kurmond, NSW

Joan and Rob have a lovely property. They have 10 acres, and a beaut vegie patch. Poppy, their 13 year old cat has just the sweetest nature, and loves nothing more than to curl up on someone’s lap. As with most cats, she likes to sleep a lot, but is not shy about having a game of peek-a-boo around the house.

Moss Vale, NSW

We had decided quite a long time ago, that when we travelled south from Kurmond, we would call in to Moss Vale and catch up with Rick’s old mate Mick. They served together on board HMAS Curlew in 1966 during the Indonesian Confrontation. Unfortunately we lost contact with Mick and his wife Hagan in about 1976, when they started left South Australia and headed west looking for work. It was quite an emotional reunion, and we look forward to seeing Mick again as we head north sometime next year.

Canberra, ACT

The visit to Canberra was inspired primarily by the National Museum of Australia. We missed it on our last trip, and were looking forward to the visit. Very interesting architecture???
The artifacts inside the museum were purely Australian history based, and laid out really well – we kept getting lost.
We also made a visit to the War Museum to check out the new post-WWII displays (Korea, Confrontation, Vietnam and peace-keeping). They are very good as far as the Army and Air-force is concerned, but (IMHO) a little light on for the RAN.

Cooma, NSW

Whilst this is the long way around to get from Canberra to Mildura, we decided on this route for the sake of a bit of variety. We stayed at Snowtels Cooma Tourist Park. It’s not a bad spot, but suffers a little for level sites. At least the sun was shining and it was reasonably warm.

Snowy Mountains Highway – Yachting Point (#772 Camps Australia Wide V6)

We stopped here at about lunch-time and decided to stay overnight. It was pretty quiet, being mid-week, but I’d guess is could get pretty noisy and busy on weekends. The water levels at Lake Blowering are at 93% at the moment, and the sluice gates had been opened to let water out into the Tumut River. We stopped off at the Tumut Power Station, below the Blowering Dam wall and the river was flowing very fast indeed. Certainly not the type of water you’d want to be swimming in.

Wagga Wagga, NSW

We stayed overnight at the Wagga Wagga Beach Caravan Park. The last time we’d stayed there was during the height of the drought, and the state of the Murrumbidgee at that time was dreadful. You could have stepped across it.
Now, however, it’s a whole different story. The current is very fast and the river is back up to it’s normal levels. All the parks and gardens in Wagga are now looking green and lovely. The Tumut River runs into the Murrumbidgee, so all the snow melt is running west, as well as the results of the rains up north this year.

Pipers Reserve (#830 Camps Australia Wide V6)

Lovely area to camp on the river-side for a couple of days. It’s on the southern side of the Murrumbidgee, with room for big rigs. It also has a boat ramp (if it can be called such). We were entertained for a while by 3 young guys trying to get their little boat down the ramp (and then down the “drop”) into the river. Even more entertaining was watching them try to get it back out again later in the afternoon.

Hay, NSW

Although the Hay Caravan Park (Top Tourist) is on the Sturt Highway, we asked for, and were given, a site further back from the road than normal. We still got the traffic noise, but slightly diluted. The park is very well run, and the managers very friendly and helpful. We ran into Mal & Robyn, and Greg & Robyn (yes, both Robyns) who were also heading for the JR 1963 Reunion. Rick hasn’t seen either of them for many, many years!

Balranald, NSW

We had aimed to spend 2 nights here, as our booking for Mildura did not start until 27/10. Unfortunately, the road noise (TRUCKS mostly) was terrible, and neither of us got a good nights sleep, so – a quick phone call to Buronga Riverside Caravan Park, and we were on our way.

Mildura, VIC (and Buronga, NSW)

Although the JR 1963 Reunion is being held primarily at the RSL in Mildura, we decided (based on a kind recommendation from Paul & Judy) to book into the Buronga Riverside Caravan Park. The recommendation was spot on. This is a large park, but very well run. It’s dog friendly and does have some permanents, but is very clean and tidy, with lots of trees for shade and beauty. It is located on the river bank, directly across from the Mildura Wharf, so we have been able to watch the paddle steamers and house-boats come and go.
The Meet and Greet on Friday went off well. Lunch was supplied – mostly “smally eats”, but most people were busy talking and greeting old mates.
Saturday was a busy day, with a trip on the PS Rothbury up to Trentham Estates Winery for a very nice BBQ lunch, and then dinner at the Mildura RSL that night. Lovely evening, and the meal was very good. Trouble was, after a BBQ lunch, and then an over-large entree, the main course was a little neglected, and dessert hardly got a look-in! Nice desserts too!
Sunday was designated as a ‘sports’ day. Bowls, tennis and golf were on offer. We took the ‘day off’ option, but had a nice visit from Buck & Nelly. They needed company, because they were the only people left in their caravan park.
Today we have spent checking out the local Tourist Information Centre, and also the Ramon Deed Veterans’ Retreat (which will be our next stop). We still have 6 weeks to go before the start of our next sit, at Glenlyon in Victoria, so the plan is to spend that time wandering east along the Murray River to Echuca. Then we will head south to Bendigo, Daylesford and on to Glenlyon.

And VOILA! we are up to date!!

Congewai to Blackheath NSW

2011-09-30T14:25:00.000+10:00

We spent a great 4 days at Tony and Wendy`s place in Congewai. It is a lovely property with a great spot for the van down by the dam. Unfortunately you will all have to take my word about it. I took some great photos, but the camera had a 'spack attack' and I accidently erased them. (Alright it was operator error!!). So it gives us a good excuse to go back there at some time??

Tony cooked not one but two great roast dinners whilst we were there. Congewai is about 16 kms from Cessnock so it was a long drive LOL. Having enjoyed T & Ws wonderful hospitality it was time to move towards our next sit so we could meet with the clients, to make sure we would all be happy with the sitting arrangements.

We spent 4 days at MacNamara Park near the village of Broke. It is a long narrow free camp along the creek (Wollombi Brook). It was nice and quite when we were there, but we reckon it could get pretty busy during school holidays. There was a toilet and that`s about it. But plenty of room and level spots (more lost photos). On leaving Broke we we went to visit our next house sit clients Rob & Joan at Kurmond. We met them and their lovely cat (Poppy) and ended up staying for a couple of days on their property. Lovely couple and everything went well. Looking forward to the sit.

From there we drove to Lithgow to spend a week in the Lithgow Tourist Park about 2kms from town. There were a lot of railway workers staying at the time, so it was quite busy. The place is a little run down, but at least it was cheap ($150 plus power for a week). While we were there we visited the Small Arms Factory Museum.
Lithgow Small Arms Factory Museum

It was well worth the $6 each to get in. "The museum houses one of Australia's most comprehensive collections of machine guns, rifles, pistols and related items from around the world. Unique to this museum are Australian designed experimental, prototype and pre-production weapons.
On display are numerous non-military items manufactured at the well known Lithgow Small Arms Factory during its 80 years of precision engineering, including sewing machines, sheep shearing handsets, hand cuffs and many other commercial items."

A lot of the collection was donated by a Queenslander after the QLD government said they were not interested. (Typical, wankers!) Even if you are not interested in guns, it is a very interesting and informative visit to make when in Lithgow. I am not going to mention the lost piccies again!! except to say I am really p#ssed about it. I had not realised how many I have lost until now. Grrr!!
We moved from Lithgow to Newnes camp ground, about 48 kms down a very steep road, through the Newnes State Forest to the start of Wollemi National Park. It was a bit of a a hairy drive, but beautiful country from rain forest to rolling stock country.

Newnes Village, or what is left of it was a shale oil mining area in the earlier days (way back!). There is a tourist information centre which was the original Hotel. Thomas does a very nice coffee and biccies for $2 each. That`s right folks only $2. He is also building (by hand) some tourist cabins just behind the hotel. The camp ground is about 1km from the hotel. It is a magnificent and FREE camp ground in the middle of sandstone bluffs and peaks under-lined by bright yellow Wattle trees in full bloom. (and yes I have piccies YAY!). There are drop toilets/dump point, but facilities wise that is all. So you must be entirely self-sufficient with power and water as we are.

As you can see by the photos, there was plenty of native wildlife around. It was the first time we have seen Wombats in the wild. Mornings and nights were a little chilly so the diesel heater got a good work out. We stayed there for 4 days and except for the first night we were the only people their. Heaven!!

On the first day the rangers and staff pumped out the 2 drop dunnies, which was good because they were pretty full. On the 3rd day we drove across the creek to the other camp area, and then walked up to the remains of the old shale oil factory and railway station. The camp area on that side of the creek was only suitable for campers and tents. They were some great spots as well. The Mungrill got a good work out as well while we were camped, as we actually remembered to get some firewood before we arrived. So we cooked dinner on it then used it as a camp-fire at night.

Not long after we arrived, a chap arrived towing a camper trailer. He proceeded to erect the trailer taking lots of photos as he was going. We sat and watched him complete the exercise, taking about 45 minutes, and then after more piccies he took it all down again. This was way too much for my curiosity to bear (alright I am a nosy bastard) so I went across to ask him what on earth he was doing? Apparently he worked for one of the caravan and camping magazines,and he was testing a new camper. Mystery solvered!!

Eventually, we had to pack up and leave Newnes and head towards our next sit. It is definitely a place we would return to, but not during school holidays.

Our next stop was the town of Blackheath in the Blue Mountains. A pretty place, but it gets a bit crazy on the weekend when all the trendies come up from Sydney for their lattes etc. We stayed at the Blackheath Caravan Park, just out of the village near Govetts Leap. The town, park and surrounding area had a mini cyclone through about 6 weeks ago and they were still cleaning up all the fallen trees and mess when we were there. It did a lot of damage to the caravan park. They lost about 40 trees altogether, not counting any trees that fell throughout the town. It is owned by the council and under new management, so it is a work in progress. So far they are doing a great job.
Down the road is the tourist spot, Govetts Leap. It is a famous landmark in the Blue Mountains and a great lookout and is the start for walking trails of varying distances from 20 minutes to 10 hours. Needless to say we did the 20 minute one. It was well worth the walk, with fantastic views across the mountains.

Bretti Campground to Cessnock, NSW

2011-08-03T15:24:00.000+10:00

First up a few piccies of our travelling home

I will put one of the tug and van hitched up and ready to go later.
From Sherwood we drove to Bretti campground about 240 kms south and west. It was a great spot to camp. No facilities other than a long drop toilet. There was another group also camping and studying the stars at night with rather large portable telescopes.
There was a large Platypus pond next to our camp spot and it is the first time we have seen platiducks in the wild!! On the second of 3 days we had the whole place to ourselves. Peace and QUIET and great star views at night. I will have to learn how to take photos of them. People who live in cities (poor bastards) and don`t go camping have no idea what they are missing. The campground had copped a lot of damage during the floods 2 weeks before and as a consequence there was a lot of damage to what little infrastructure there was. A couple of solid metal picnic sets and a dunny were torn out and dumped at the end of the campground,and the track in was torn up a fair bit, but at least the ground was dry.

After spending the weekend at Bretti ,we decided to move on to East Gresford 124 kms down and up and round and round on Walcha Rd. and Bucketts Way via Barrington and Gloucester. Great scenery all around that way. We arrived at East Gresford and chose to stay at the Showgrounds for a couple of days to catch up on washing etc. There is a woodcarvers place in town which we had a look at. A couple of nice pieces, but the rest of the place looked like the city tip, and there was not a soul there. (Strange).

I gave Tony H. a ring as they had invited us to stay on there property for a couple of days in Congewai (no, really!).We spent a night in Cessnock caravan park on the way there after a 66kms drive (such a long day??). It was an over-priced, very ordinary place with daggy dunnies and facilities. But believe it or not they were installing a fancy brick and stainless steel pizza oven and a bloody bouncy castle!!?? As they say (Go figure!!). But Big 4 should check the place out!! $35 a night - ripoff!!

Sherwood housesit - last 8 weeks

2011-07-28T13:45:00.000+10:00

Hi gang I am back. I know, I have been a bit slack doing the blog but here goes. After the floods of the first couple of weeks we wondered what we were in for, but the rest of the stay was fairly good, weather wise. As soon as the flood bypass road (huh!?) into Kempsey opened, we shot into town to do some shopping for food and uver stuff!.
We had a bit of a drive around the area once the water had gone down, including the infamous Kempsey to Armidale Road. We went 20 kilometres past Bellbrook to a locality called Comara. The road follows the Macleay River for quite a ways, so we pulled up in a few spots to see how high the river had come up during the floods. A fair bit by the looks of it, including taking out a chunk of the road in a landslide. Luckily the council had cleaned up enough for one lane to get through (not that it was busy). On the way back we stopped at the Bellbrook Pub for lunch. Both had Fish & Chips. Although the Fish was frozen fillets it was nicely cooked and presented. The deal was - buy 1 drink each and get your meal for $10 ea. Good deal and a great stop. They were in the process of building a large deck out the back of the pub overlooking the river, so would love to go back and check it out when it is finished. When we arrived back at home base, I found an autobiography of Slim Dusty. It made interesting reading as he and his family were brought up all around that area of Bellbrook.

The last few weeks were fairly uneventful other than when Darren & Tracy (Joy & Bruce's daughter and son-in-law) came over to move the cattle to another paddock. In the process he got his vehicle bogged trying a short cut across the bottom creek. But with the tractor and a snatch he got it out fairly easily. I forgot to mention in the first week we were at Sherwood I managed to get the farm Suzy ute bogged in the creek (different spot to Darren!). It was a bit of an exercise to get it out, including a 1k walk for me to go back to the house to get the Cruiser and snatch strap. Keeping in mind that Lea does not drive, I just knew this was going to be fun??? accomplishing this exercise (gettin the job dun eh). Everything worked out fairly simply in the end. I hitched up the strap to the Suzy and Cruiser (yes,safely) and with Lea behind the wheel of the Suzy (sh#tten herself), snatched it out. Now all we had to do was get both trucks back to the house (how, I hear you ask?) Well, I drove the Suzy, and Lea crawled along behind me in first gear low (in the Cruiser off course you silly people!!) So all was good in the end. Sorry no piccies of that episode. (Thank God!! SWMBO)

We did a day drive down to Crescent Head and Point Plomer on the coast about 54 ks from Sherwood. The drive to Crescent Head was all sealed and a reasonable enough road. Stopped for coffee (as you do ), checked out the local caravan park, and then looked for the dunnys (as WE do!! ). Then it was on to Point Plomer. To say the road was absolute cr#p would be an understatement. 20 kms of huge pot holes and corros, we certainly had our teeth rattled. I think the photo of the road sign says it all.

It was a shame because Pt Plomer is a pretty place,and a nice camping area.

We returned via the same road (no choice) back to Sherwood.

I contacted Tom at Kedron to see how much another mud flap would cost for the van. He sent one to me for nix (very good of him). So I have attached it to the front of the door step, to stop the mud spraying all over it. Works well. It is nice to have some space and tools to do little jobs like that, thanks to Bruce and his huge shed. I also extended the mud flaps on the tug by about 6 inches. That also seems to be working as well.
On the last day of our sit when we were packing and washing etc. we were without power from 9am to 4pm.courtesy of the local power company (checking lines ??!! apparently). It would have been nice to be notified. (Wankers!!).
Bruce and Joy arrived home the next day, Thursday, from their trip. They drove directly from Brisbane on the last day, arriving late afternoon. Thank goodness we had time to wash and dry all the bedding we used, now that the power was back on. They had a great trip right up to the top of Cape York. Apparently the fishing wasn't real flash so they came home empty handed. But they had a great time and that is the main thing. And so did we looking after their lovely house and property.
Some piccies of the Sherwood birds (including that pesky power company bird!!)

Next stop Bretti Camp ground.

Sherwood House-sit Part 2

2011-06-18T12:47:00.003+10:00

Well, it has been an interesting 2 weeks. The first week we settled in to the house and got into a routine fairly quickly. The weather was good - fine warmish days and cool nights. We now have the fire going at night, so it is nice and warm inside. We were looking forward to having Steve and Kerry (fellow Koggers) staying here from the Saturday for a few days. The idea being they could camp up here in their van and use it as a base to tour the local area. Unfortunately Mother Nature stepped in and put the kybosh on that idea. It started to rain on Saturday morning and did not stop till the following Thursday. Steve and Kerry rocked up late on Saturday afternoon, having taken a bit of an un-intended detour of about 100 kms up the Kempsey / Armidale Rd (blame the GPS??? ) so by the time they arrived they were more than ready for a drink. By now the rain was really getting heavy. We had a BBQ tea and ate inside. The following photos will give you some idea of the weather conditions and road closures that soon followed. Needless to say both Steve, Kerry and our selves were not going anywhere now as all the roads out were underwater.

Luckily the house is situated on the top of a hill, so we were not concerned about the house going under. We were supposed to receive our Woolies order on the Wednesday though, but they rang and said they could not get through. Bugger! and we were running short of food and booze. But we stretched what we had with help from S&K and we managed. Kempsey copped some water through it, but luckily the levee held. It was a close run thing as it came up to about 10cms from the top. The Pacific Highway was closed for about 10kms north and south so even if you could make it to Kempsey there was know where to go from there. S&K reckon that it was their fault because every time they took the van out it rained. We had a similar problem with our first Kedron. That's why we ended up calling it Rainbird. So the current van is Bigbird, and our totem bird is the Wedge-tail Eagle. When ever we see one on our travels, we know we are doing the right thing and going in the right direction. We currently have a pair that often fly over the house so we know we are in the right place. (weird eh??)
The roads finally opened on Friday, so we took a quick trip into town and did a bit of shopping. S&K left that afternoon as Steve was starting a new job on Monday. They were a lovely couple and were great company for us during what could have been an otherwise boring week huddling from the rain. (Cabin fever!!)

Sherwood House-sit

2011-06-06T12:20:00.002+10:00

We arrived at our new house-sit on the Sunday, and set up the van near the shed whilst Bruce & Joy continued to pack and prepare their van for the big trip to the Cape. We arrived earlier than expected so they could show us the ropes and get away 2 days earlier. It is a beautiful house set on 116 acres of land about 16 kms west of Kempsey in NSW. They run about 40 head of cattle on the property as well as 2 Shetland Ponies, Princess and her daughter Merrylegs(who knows). They are all easy to look after, just checking their water and that they are still there is all that is required of us.We have been here 3 weeks and they are all present and correct.

When B & J left we moved the van up next to the house to unload and clean. We have finished cleaning the outside of the van including polishing the aluminium panels with Purple,it has come up a treat if I do say so myself . We have some fellow KOGGERS coming to stay for a few days next Saturday so we get to have happy hour with some new faces and hopefully do a bit of a tour around the local roads and sights.

South West Rocks

2011-05-14T11:29:00.002+10:00

On leaving Dorrigo ,we took a slow and windy trip down the mountains to the Coast and decided to spend the next 2 nights at South West Rocks. The South West Rocks Tourist Park was a great spot on the banks of a tidal waterway. According to the locals, an excellent spot for fishing. The hardest part of the fishing exercise is keeping the pelicans at bay whilst cleaning the fish. But a couple of handfuls of fish guts seem to do the trick. While we were there we spotted an immaculately restored HZ Holden. It was obvious that a lot of love and attention to detail had gone into it.
We bought some freshly caught Mullet fillets from the local Fish factory and they were lovely. The chap at the fishery said most of the locals thought it was a rubbish fish and only good for bait. We reckon that any fresh fish is good fish!! Lightly grilled on the Webber with a few Potato Wedges and it was yummy. On day 2 at S.W.Rocks we drove up to the shops to stock up on food ready for our house-sit at Sherwood.

Dorrigo NSW

2011-05-12T14:27:00.002+10:00

Well, we set off from Armidale on Thursday morning with the idea of spending a night or two at Little Styx River Campground, which is along the Waterfall Way. Waterfall Way is a road running between Armidale and Coffs Harbour on the coast. It is approximately 200 kms long and takes in about a dozen different waterfalls, lookouts, picnic spots and campgrounds. It really is magnificent country. This road is not to be confused with the Armidale to Kempsey Rd. which is NOT suitable for trailers or caravans. (A trip we will do later in the car only.) We headed for the Little Styx River Campground via Point Lookout and when we reached the top of the road in the car park, we realized that you are supposed to leave your van at the bottom of the hill (I don't think so!!!). It was no problem getting up there, and there was plenty of room to turn around (THANK GOD - Lea). We went for a walk up to the lookout, about 400 metres away. The views were fantastic. You could see for miles, right across to the coast.
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We then headed back down to Styx river campground.
Talk about disappointed, the place was a mess, rubbish piled up everywhere and the ground was all chopped up and overgrown. I think whoever is supposed to be responsible for it should be shot. It is a beautiful area, but it was disgusting. After that disappointment we headed off to Dorrigo to find a place to camp.
Dorrigo is a quaint little town in the middle of The Waterfall Way, just before the road starts to fall towards the coast. We did some shopping and moved onto a beaut little campground called Dangar Falls Campground. We were the only people there so it was nice and quiet which is the way we like it. It was a case of find a spot and the caretaker would catch up with us later. The view across the valley was great. So we sat outside for a while and had a couple of Reds, despite the fact that it was bloody cold mate! The next morning we took a stroll down to checkout Dangar Falls about 1K out and back from the Campground.

The walk was lovely and the Falls as you can see by the piccies were great.
Next stop the Coast. Only 2 days to the next house sit.

Armidale NSW

2011-05-11T13:38:00.001+10:00

Well we have finally made it into NSW. We arrived in Armidale via Glen Innes in the afternoon. We booked into the Pembroke C/P just out of town. It is a lovely, well presented park especially with all the Autumn leaves around. I have forgotten what Autumn leaves were like, it`s been so long since we have seen them. Very pretty with all the different colours. We decided to spend a week in Armidale so we could have a look around and get some things done. Including new batteries for the immobiliser remotes on the tug and a new deep-cycle battery to run the Engel in the back of the tug. The previous one lasted about 5 years so that was not too bad. Armidale is a large town in the New England area, and it is growing very quickly. The weather can be very cold during winter and they often have snow.

When we first arrived at the C/P we spotted another Keddy, but when we asked about it they told us it was in storage along with the tug. It looked so lonely sitting there, especially next to a Bush-tracker. LOL.
It was a lazy week for us as in the end we did not do much. Trying to conserve costs. Especially Diesel which was around $1.60 per litre.
Whilst we were in Armidale the temperatures dropped quite substantially, so the diesel heater and Reverse Cycle got a bit of a work out. We use the R/C to bring up the temperature and then switch to the Diesel heater. I prefer the latter as the R/C dries the air out to much. But at least it works. Next stop Little Styx River camp ground.

Stanthorpe Qld.

2011-05-04T13:08:00.002+10:00

We arrived in Stanthorpe on Tues.morning and booked into Top of the Town C/P for a bit of a clean up and a decent shower. As you can imagine, by now the weather is starting to really cool down. We did a bit of shopping and that was about it for Stanthorpe. At the top of the C/P there was a lookout supposedly with a nice view over the town, but after I had climbed up there, all I could see was trees. I think a little bit of pruning is required. Lea would not let me take the chainsaw back up there. (I don`t know, some people have no sense of adventure) LOL. GEE I WONDER WHY!!!!! (She who must be obeyed!!)

Washpool Camping Reserve Qld. 29/4/11—2/5/11

2011-05-02T15:22:00.001+10:00

At last we are starting to head south towards our next housesit. It felt good to get out of the City and hit the road again. We are beginning to hate cities with all the constant noise and chaotic traffic. Give us small country towns any day. Our next stop was at Washpool Camping Reserve about 170kms southwest from Brisbane. It is situated on Lake Lesley, a great spot to camp, with fishing and boating activities going on for the weekend, but not intrusive enough to be annoying. Considering it was yet another long weekend (Labour Day) it was fairly quiet despite the large numbers of campers. We finally found a camp that supplies free (yes FREE) fire wood,so we were able to give the Mungrill ( Choofer) a good work out with several meals being cooked on it. And we only used the bark pieces from the wood pile to keep it going.

The weather for the weekend was great for a change, no rain, fine sunny days and cool nights. We only had to flash the genny up once for about an hour on the first day, because it was overcast and I needed to top up the batteries in case we needed the diesel heater(not that it uses much). So we spent 4 lovely days relaxing (good for my high stress levels). On the second morning the lake had taken on a Pea green colour around the edge because of a Blue/Green Algae attack. It is propagated by the sun apparently. But it looked and smelled very strange.

Next stop Stanthorpe.

Back to Brisbane (Lawnton Show grounds) 27/4—28/4/2011

2011-04-28T14:43:00.001+10:00

Well here we are back in Brisbane again, this time to pickup our Trailermate Jack which was promised to be ready by 27th. I even rang and checked. So we turned up for it, only to find it sitting against the wall in reception where I left it 3 weeks ago. We got a lame excuse about being busy and the receptionist just said “well I didn't say what time it would be ready”. So we had to come back in a couple of hours to pick it up. I really despair of crap customer service, especially in a lot of the caravan repairs and parts industry. Our next task was an appointment with Dr Paul Belt, my other skin and Plastic Surgeon on the Thursday morning. He just wanted to check out his last load of slice and dice from my face. He was happy with everything, so off we went back to Lawnton for the night. There was another couple at Lawnton who had stayed for some while waiting on delivery of their new van. So they unpacked all the goods from old van into a trailer so as to go and pick up the new van, only to discover that Franklin had put the tow hitch on the BOTTOM of the A frame instead off the top. (Who woulda thunk it??!!). So he had go back again the next day to get it fixed. Major welding job. For his sake, I hope they did it properly.

Yippee! Tomorrow we start heading South.

Standown Park Vets retreat (Caravan Park) 18/4/—26/4/2011

2011-04-26T16:57:00.000+10:00

Standown Park is on Tin Can Bay Road half way between Gympie and Tin Can Bay/Cooloola Cove Qld. It was primarily set up as a Veterans Retreat by Rod and his lovely wife Pam about 7 yrs. ago(?) It has gone from a house in the middle of a paddock, with a shed as gathering area, toilet and showers, to a well laid out and maintained Caravan & Camping ground for Vets and over 50s. They and their family and volunteers have done a fantastic job. The best part of staying at Standown is that it is nice and quiet. Especially as it was Easter W/E and all the usual idiots were out and about on the roads. They have a community campfire each night and everybody is welcome to join in from around 4pm onwards. As usual the rain tried to put a dampener on the weekend, but in between showers and sun it turned out OK. The grounds were a bit soggy because they have had a huge amount of rain in the last few months (as have most of QLD) so they had to close off the main unpowered camping area because it was very soft and boggy.

We had a lazy Easter weekend, so on Monday I decided to go into Gympie and march in the Anzac day parade. I ran into an old navy mate from my Minesweeper days, Rod Clarey, so we decided to march together. It was about 600 metres march followed by a ceremony near the War memorial in Gympie. There was the usual long winded speeches by local pollies and then the Last Post was played.

KOG.Kilkivan 15/4/2011-17/4/2011

2011-04-17T12:17:00.000+10:00

We arrived at Rob & Jewels (Kedron owners) property at Kilkivan on the Friday ,there was already about 12 Kedrons on site. A few people we had not seen for a while,and some new faces. After we set up we did the usual walk around and greet and catch up with the “gossip” Friday night we spent a quite night with Rosco & Chris, whilst the rest of the group went to the Kilkivan Bowls Club for tea. On Sat. morning there was a mystery drive which ended up at the old Copper mine chimney and remains of smelter.It was part of Kilkivans history dating back to the 1800s.We then found a great spot on the nearby creek and had a sausage sizzle BBQ for lunch,kindly supplied by Rob & Jewel via the Kilkivan butchers shop.

After a slow drive back to where we were camped, we started preparing for tea. The idea being every couple would prepare a meal for tea either using Camp oven and fire or anyway they wanted. Once the fire was going it was interesting to watch different methods of Camp Oven cooking, anything from roasts to stews to scones. When all was ready at about 6pm we all put our meals on the back or Robs trayback ute and then it was instant “Buffet”. The selection of food was wonderful and certainly showed some hidden talents. Our contributions was Hearty Beef & Beer casserole and Dry marinated spicy chicken wings. Off course all washed down with several fine wines and a superb Muscat (thanks for sharing Debbie) We finally retired to bed about 11pm. (late for us) whilst some hardy soles played on for a while. A thoroughly enjoyable night was had by all. Good company, good food and good wine .What more could you ask for?

Sunday morning saw a few sore heads,but the main thing everybody had a great time Sat. night.

Quiet a few packed up and left Sunday as they had to go back to work on Monday.(Bugger!!).Sunday was a quite day for the few of us that were left.So we decided to go down to the Kilkivan Markets for Breakfast They are a very small local market held every Sunday consisting off about 5 stalls( I did say it was small)We ordered break fast from the only food stall and waited and waited and waited.along with everybody else. In the end after about an hour we gave up, got our money back and went to The Left Bank Cafe in town and had a lovely brekky in front of us about 10 mins. after arrival.

On Monday we headed of to Standown Park for the Easter/Anzac long weekend.

Lismore to Lawnton, Lowood to Lawnton

2011-04-14T17:40:00.001+10:00

Heading back to Brisbane (Lawnton S/G) via Lismore. We spent 2 days in Lismore where we had to get some repairs done on the Cruiser (split steering boot). It must have got hit by a rock somewhere along the road. Stayed in Lismore Tourist C/P. It had about 8 tourist sites and the rest of the park was permanents. At least it was cheap ($20 for powered site). Lismore is a large country town that looks like it is growing fairly quickly. We replaced our footstools there as well, so we are doing our small bit to help the country's economy.
We had an appointment with Dr. D my Dermo on Fri Pm at the other side of the city .They organised DVA transport for us and away we went. He discovered?? a small dark black mole at the top of my chest, even Lea missed it in her regular checks. He said it looked like a Melanoma so he chopped it out to send away for testing. Normally that takes about a week, so we set off for Lowood on the way to meet some Kedron friends at Boondooma Dam. On Monday morning we got a phone call from Dr.Ds. surgery telling me that the tests had come back as stage 2 Melanoma and we were to come back to Brisbane to have it further excised at 3pm.that afternoon. So we did a very quick pack up ready to head back to Brisbane.That is when the trailermate jack decided to sh#t itself. Luckily a bloke nearby had a hydraulic jack to help us hitch up and we hit the road back to Lawnton Show-grounds. With the operation he cut 2cm deep, 2cm across and about 8cm long. Luckily he did all internal stitches(it seemed like about a hundred of them) and no outside stitches, only temporary steristrips which come off after about a week.It was all pretty scary at the time ,but now I am clear for another 4 months.
We went to Kedron Caravans to see if they knew anyone who could fix the Trailermate jack, as without it we could not unhitch. Glen sent us to Aussie Escape caravan repairs just up the road. We already had the service kit, but they said it could not be done till after Easter (bugger!!) We left it there and went back to Kedron and Glen Gall, bless his soul, gave us a loaner till the other one was repaired. Thank goodness for that as we would have been really stuck. I was in enough pain as it was, without the extra stress of that.

Iluka Riverside Caravan Park 23–27 March 2011

2011-03-27T15:45:00.001+11:00

Our next stop on our slow lazy trip north was Iluka which is across the Clarence river from Yamba. We had a 16th Minesweeper Squad.reunion there in 2004. We took a ferry trip on that occasion and passed the Iluka Caravan Park. It looked very nice, so with an up to date recommendation from friends decided, to stay there for a few nights. We booked in for 5 nights expecting it to be very busy. About half an hour after we arrived vans started to pour in. We were thinking we were lucky to get a spot in a very popular park. The next morning most of them headed out again. After that it was pretty quiet for the rest of our stay.

Split Solitary Beach Caravan Park 19–22 March 2011

2011-03-22T14:38:00.001+11:00

Our next stop was Sapphire Beach, about 10ks north of Coffs Harbour. We had stayed there some years ago, on our way down the coast to Tasmania. It is now known as Split Solitary Beach ,Why you ask? Who knows!! We stayed here for 4 days. It is a small quiet C/P with quite a few permanents and only $25.20 for a powered site which is cheap for that area (Coffs Harbour). We picked up our mail and did some food shopping. Other than that we sat round on our clackers and relaxed. We drove past the Giant Banana a couple of times, I must say it is looking a bit tired. We visited BCF in Coffs. and bought 2 new chairs. The old ones were going mouldy and getting harder to pack, so we have bought lighter ones which are easier to pack away. When we are travelling we find that keeping the weight in the van down is an ongoing battle, so every 3 months or so, if it has not been used, OUT IT GOES! Since buying The Mungrill we do very little cooking inside the van. With the BabyQ (Weber) and the Mung, we rarely use the van oven which is as useless as tits on a bull anyway! If we could chuck it out we could save a bit of useless weight!!

Hat Head Caravan Park 15–18 March 2011

2011-03-18T14:32:00.001+11:00

Our first stop was Hat Head C/P about 47 kms from Sherwood. We booked in for 4 nights. It is a lovely little park right between the river and the Ocean beach. A very popular fishing spot for boaties. On Thursday 17th at about 3.30pm all hell broke loose. We had one of those mad storms that they can get in the area (found that out AFTER?!)We copped 4.5" of rain in about 20 mins. accompanied by crazy winds. That lot lasted about half an hour all up, but when it went on its way it left behind a fair bit of chaos. Anything that was made of canvas was flattened and filled with water. There was a group of year 12 girls from one of the local High schools camped there, and all their bedding and clothes were soaking wet, so we all jumped in and helped them take down what was left of their tents and packed them ready for the bus or parents to pick them up. It certainly left most of them wide eyed and slightly shocked as it apparently the first time the girls had been on the annual camp. The school usually takes the boys. It would be interesting to see how many girls volunteer next year .

Joy & Bruce, Sherwood, 14 March 2011

2011-03-14T14:27:00.001+11:00

Lovely couple in a large house on 116 acres, with about 40 head of cattle. They invited us to stay overnight and after a BBQ and a couple of convivial cool drinks (alright, wines then)we decided to accept the sit starting in May. It is in a nice quiet part of the country, so we are looking forward to it.
As I had more medical appointments to attend in Brisbane we decided not to travel down to Kurmond, west of Sydney in the foot of the Blue Mountains to check out our sit after Sherwood. The price of fuel was the main reason. It was a 1000 k round trip just to say good-day basically. So we spoke to the people on the phone and they were quite happy with that.
We decided to head back to Brisbane via the Coast for a change. We usually stay away from the coastal regions because they are busy,crowded and expensive, but it became quite a good trip.

Lake Keepit, Eastern Foreshore 11–13 March 2011

2011-03-13T14:21:00.001+11:00

This is a lake and dam between Gunnedah and Tamworth. It is used mainly by the locals for skiing and fishing and general recreation activities. The lake was full after the heavy rain events that everybody around the area seemed to get. We arrived on the Friday and expected it to be very busy, but to our surprise there was hardly anyone there in the bush camp area. Our nearest neighbour was about 400 metres away. Sheer bliss!! There was a lot of activity on the lake, mainly skiing and tube riding (that looked like a lot of fun), but that was primarily from the caravan park side. We moved out on Monday morning to go to an appointment with our next housesit clients in Sherwood about 16 klicks out of Kempsey.

John Oxley Caravan Park, Coonabarabran, 9 - 10 March 2011

2011-03-10T15:18:00.001+11:00

Well folks, it is my turn to write the Blog so here goes. We arrived in Coonabarabran NSW in the early PM, had 2 choices of C/P one at the south end of town or the John Oxley at the northern end. We chose the latter 'cos the other one looked a bit daggy. It is a nice open park at the south end of town on the Newell Hwy. Surprisingly, being right on the corner of the highway into town it was fairly quiet. Unfortunately, the reception area looked like a bomb had gone off in it, there was crap every where. But the owners were very helpful so all was well. Power, water and clean amenities, so every thing we needed for $26 a night. Across the road from the C/P was a Gem shop full of all sorts of crystals and fossils (not counting me of course!!). The lady who owned the shop was a wealth of info. The business is up for sale if anyone is interested. We stayed in Coona. for 2 nights to catch up with washing and top up the water tanks before heading out to Lake Keepit Bush camp about 150 kms away.

Mehi River Caravan Park, Moree, 8 March 2011

2011-03-08T15:17:00.001+11:00

Moving down the Newell, we stopped at Goondiwindi on the banks of the McIntyre River for a brew-up. The river is looking really good, but you can see the marks of the flooding in the debris high in the trees. Too early to stop for the night, so it was on the road again.
We eventually landed in Moree and decided to call it a day. Now, we’ve heard lots of stories about people having troubles with thefts and damage when camping in the area. Fortunately, the Mehi River Caravan Park area gave no indications of anything to worry about. It’s well organised, and well looked after. Having said that, we didn’t push our luck, and only stayed one night. The following picture is a collage of photos Rick took from around the park. There are many amusing murals painted around the place.

Yarramalonga Weir 7 March 2011

2011-03-07T15:13:00.000+11:00

(Camps Australia Wide V6.0 Ref: #726 11km from Millmerran, QLD)
This was a great first night spot. There’s still a bit of damage around the area due to the floods (the Condamine came up quite high), but the river has gone down now and the place is quite “campable”. Apparently there are spots all along the river which is used extensively for fishing and small boating. Tomorrow we’re heading towards Goondiwindi and the Newell Highway.

Lawnton Showgrounds 4–6 March 2011

2011-03-06T10:55:00.000+11:00

The reason for this visit to Lawnton Showgrounds was a General Meeting of the Kedron Owners Group Inc. The Committee members for this year had conducted a review of the Constitution which came into play when the group was originally incorporated in late 2009, and made recommendations for some changes. The aim of the changes was to simplify the wording of some of the clauses.

With 20 or so people in attendance, the debate was vocal and “interesting”!! And that’s all I’m going to say about that!

To compensate, both Happy Hour and dinner later at the Pine Rivers Bowls Club were excellent.

Kalbar Showgrounds 21 February to 3 March 2011

2011-03-03T12:27:00.000+11:00

Plugging into the power here at Kalbar was a bit of a relief. Monday was still very hot so the air-conditioning came in very welcome. We had a big thunder storm on Monday night which cooled the place down nicely.

It’s a quite pretty spot, just on the northern outskirt of Kalbar. They had some flooding in early January, with the showgrounds going under water, but Harry has got the grounds looking nice now, even though he is a little obsessive about mowing the grass. At $80 / week, it is pretty cheap living, with power and water and two toilet and shower blocks. One is quite old and a little dilapidated, while the other is quite new. Rick spent about 4 hours all up cleaning and scrubbing the old toilet block. It was completely disgusting, and covered in bugs and webs, but is now clean and sweet.

We took a drive out to Lake Moogerah and Maroon Dam, to assess their suitability for camping. Lake Moogerah Caravan Park is quite good for powered and unpowered camping, NOT ON A WEEKEND, but Maroon Dam was pretty decrepit. That’s now crossed off the list.

Flanagan Reserve Bush Camping 14 February to 20 February 2011

2011-02-20T08:31:00.000+11:00

This is the first time we’ve been to Flanagan Reserve. It’s a really lovely spot on the Logan River, near Rathdowney, at the foot of Mount Maroon. From Monday through to Thursday, it was quiet and peaceful and the weather was good, except for the usual late afternoon showers. It’s certainly a place I would go back to.

We enjoyed the river and the local critters, birds, Lace Monitors (some of whom were quite large) and POSSUMS, who made themselves quite at home on the awning, top of the van and window sills! We sat outside after nightfall, watching them while they scuffled around and looked for food. Unfortunately, one of the little buggers decided that my toes looked edible, and took a bite. CHEEKY!!!! I woke up at some stage on the first night, to find a possum sitting on my window sill, staring inside at me. I don’t know who was more startled – me or the possum??

Although the place has no power, the generator was more than capable of firing up the washing machine to clear out the back log. We were able to refill the water tanks using the taps attached to the toilet block. Bit messy – tap > 20lt water bottle > pump > tank, but it works and we were refilled.

On the Tuesday, we had a drive along the Lions Road towards Kyogle. We didn’t go the full way there, but stopped about two thirds of the way, and then came back the same way. It is lovely country, especially once into the Border Ranges National Park in NSW.

While we were out, Rick got a text message from OPSM at Beenleigh saying that his new glasses were ready for pick-up. It’s all in the timing!!! We tried to get them sent to Beaudesert, but after much fluffing about, decided it was simpler to drive back to Beenleigh and pick them up. At least it gave the truck a run and charged up the batteries.

Then came the weekend. We’d been warned that it could be quite busy so were expecting it??? Boy did the peace get broken! Every body had lots of fun – especially the children in the river. I didn’t envy the parents, especially those in large groups. They had to count noses every 5 minutes just to make sure nobody was missing or underwater. They were all very friendly, and we found quite a few people to talk to. It got quite hot over the weekend too, and with no power to run the air-con, the poor little box fan took quite a beating (we can run that from the inverter).

On Monday after breakfast, we slowly packed up and headed for Kalbar Showgrounds.

19 January to 13 February 2011 Buccan

2011-02-13T08:17:00.000+11:00

This sit has been lovely. The area is generally very quiet, the property is just lovely and the 2 cats – Chinta and Binnie are very interesting little characters. The owners – Sue & Chris have headed north to Burrum Heads for a little fishing and R & R.

The weather has been very hot, which has inhibited a lot of outdoor activity, but we kept ourselves busy by getting some jobs done on the car, van and himself. Especially the much delayed hearing test. Fortunately, there is only a small change in Rick’s hearing, but a new hearing aid has been ordered for his worst ear because the other one died. We got both the car & van serviced – both with mobile services who were very good and did not charge like wounded bulls!

The most entertaining job of the sit has been looking after the cats. Chinta is Siamese – when she wants something, she’s a real sweetie and very affectionate. When that need has been served (FOOD) it’s a whole different story. She is mistress of all she surveys and as the princess, what she says goes! Binnie is a big ginger cat. He was given his name when he was found as a two day old kitten, in a rubbish bin. He is very affectionate, and just loves attention. He likes to follow you around the garden, wanting to know what is going on. Unfortunately, the two cats do not get on at all. Chinta is scared of Binnie, and Binnie hates the fact that she can go in the house and he can’t. Even though he has been neutered, he still sprays everywhere and leaves a real mess.

Watching and interacting with these two has been a delight.

A little later

Sue & Chris had invited us to return at the end of March for a 10 week sit while they went to South Australia for the King George Whiting. Unfortunately, they have decided to cancel their trip and sell the house and probably also the caravan. Disappointing, because we had been looking forward to going back and had also arranged several appointments during that period. Oh well – these things happen. We will find something else to do and somewhere else to go. Possibly NSW?

What a start to a New Year???

2011-01-18T11:40:00.001+11:00

It’s hard to believe that this year has started so wildly. First the flooding hit Emerald and surrounding areas then moved downstream to Rockhampton and Bundaberg. Then the rain and flooded rivers moved south and started hitting places like Gympie and Maryborough, and then all Hell broke loose in Toowoomba and the Lockyer Valley. I’ve never seen anything like the vision that was shown on the TV – all channels, 24 hours a day for the first 2 days. It was just terrifying. And we were safe – not like the residents of these areas who lost not only property, but family members as well.

All in all, last week was an awful, tragic one. However, Queenslanders being who they are, work is pretty much underway all over to clean-up and rebuild.

We suffered only minor inconvenience in having to move out of the caravan park for three days. The park owners and police were concerned that Breakfast Creek would back-up and flood because of the king-tides which were due. In the end, the park did not flood, but there was a small amount of sewage back-up which needed to be cleaned up before anybody could re-enter the park.

We moved a few streets up the hill, and – together with 3 other vans, parked on the side of the street for those days. The people in the houses where we parked were amazing. Power, water, use of toilets and showers were all offered almost as soon as we got there. One person offered the use of her clothes dryer so that we could dry off all the gear that had gotten sodden as we did our emergency pack-up and pull-out. That one kind act made life on the street so much simpler for us.

Life is now moving on, and tomorrow we head to Buccan, a small community near Beenleigh, south of Brisbane, to take up a 1 month house-sit. The home and property are just lovely – 3 acres with a huge, comfortable home and two cats to look after. The owners, Sue and Chris, are wonderful people, and for a while, they really thought they would not be able to go away on holiday. Not just because of the floods, but also they had a load of earth filling dumped on the rear driveway a couple of weeks ago so they could fill in the old pool area. Since then it had rained and rained and rained, and the guy with the bob-cat couldn’t shift it. This meant that the van couldn’t be moved!!! Disaster! But, as of today, the bob-cat man is working hard, and all is starting to look good for them to travel. We’re all keeping our fingers crossed!

More Photos

2011-01-17T11:33:00.000+11:00

Samford Valley & Brisbane

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Samford Valley

2010-12-21T08:10:00.001+11:00

Samford Valley

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COMING UP NEXT

2010-12-20T08:34:00.000+11:00

Our next major post will be from Samford Valley, where we are house-sitting. We're here until about 3 January, so we'll do an interim post of some of the photos.
It's all good stuff!!!

18–20 November 2010 Kalbar Showgrounds KOG Christmas

2010-11-20T11:12:00.000+11:00

It’s time for the annual Kedron Owners Group Christmas Gathering. This is the first one Rick & I have been too, and it was really well organised by Margaret & Lionel. Even the weather co-operated, raining heavily before most people got there, but then settling to fine during the weekend.

The gathering was well attended and everyone had a ball. The games that were played during Happy Hour were very entertaining, and lots of fun.

Dinner was cooked and presented beautifully by the ladies and gentlemen of the Kalbar Show Society.

15–17 November 2010 Goomburra Valley Camp Ground

2010-11-17T14:54:00.000+11:00

Once again Debbie and Andy have made us very welcome, and we thoroughly enjoyed stay here. It is a lovely environment, and was very quiet for the three days we were there. No TV, no phones, no Internet, no motor-bikes, very few cars – all adds up to peace and quiet!! Very little to disturb the birds.

The creek is looking really healthy, there are even fish breeding in it (not that we actually saw any!). We had some heavy rain on the last night – it made a BIG difference to the creek – all of a sudden it was running fast and silty!

12–14 November 2010 Samford Valley Showgrounds

2010-11-14T13:32:00.000+11:00

The 3 days spent here was really nice. We were able to catch up with Deborah and Peter, our next house-sit. They invited us over for a lovely BBQ which enabled us to meet their 3 daughters, as well as the neighbours who will be able to provide assistance if needed.

We also had the opportunity to watch Jaime, the youngest daughter, perform in her dressage testing with her horse Rocky. She did very well and was extremely happy with her results.

5–11 November 2010 Standown Park

2010-11-11T14:03:00.000+11:00

The last time we were at Standown was in August 2010. We were there for Long Tan Day (otherwise known as Vietnam Veterans Day).

The main reason we went this time was to look at the ‘Mungrill’ – Rod’s version of the 9kg gas-bottle camp cooker. The construction of this little beauty is very good and it’s both strong and compact. It has a real advantage in being able to be used with a gas ring as well as lighting a fire in it.

When dismantled, all the pieces fit together nicely, and it easily packs into a milk-crate.

While we were there, we also celebrated our 35th wedding anniversary, and the 37th anniversary of the date we met.

3–4 November 2010 Lawnton Showgrounds

2010-11-04T13:56:00.000+11:00

Back to the city yet again! While we were staying at Maleny Showgrounds (during the first big wet) the 240v power decided to give up the ghost. We managed to find a local electrician who could actually come out and look at the system that day (how extra-ordinary!) who told us that we had one “dud” internal circuit which kept blowing the safety switch. Because we were looking after the property at Booroobin for two weeks that was not really a problem, but it’s now time to get it fixed.

Took the van into Kedron so that Tom’s contract electrician could check it out and fix it. Surprise, surprise, he could find nothing wrong with it at all. The whole system worked fine!!!

After a lot of fiddling and farting around, they discovered that there was loose wire at the bottom end of the transformer which was causing all the drama. We were not charged for the time taken for trouble-shooting nor for fixing the errant wire properly. Our thanks go once again to David and Tom at Kedron for looking after us so well.

Wheee! Tomorrow we can head north to Standown Park.

12 October–2 November 2010–Booroobin

2010-11-02T12:47:00.001+11:00

This is a really lovely spot to stay for a couple of weeks. The house is solar powered and self-sufficient of the power grid. There is a combustion stove for water heating and cooking, but there is the back up of gas for both. All water is caught and stored on the property. We are looking after three dogs (Jazz, Xylon & Philo), four horses (Sarah, Red, Razz and Thistle) and two goldfish who I don’t believe have names.

There is also heaps of birdlife, snakes, lizards, little mammals and large huntsman spiders. I CAN DO WITHOUT THE SPIDERS. Rick had an incident in the shower with two of the huntsmans - at the same time (thong to the rescue!) and I’ve been forced to levitate backwards after confronting another two. The dogs all love chasing little skinks, and have also been responsible for the death of what we thought initially was a possum. After another sighting of the same type of critter further along the road, we are now not sure quite what it was.
28 Oct …..Three of the horses are really good-natured and well-behaved. Unfortunately, Sarah has a severe case of ATTITUDE. All 4 broke into the home paddock early yesterday, and Sarah then decided to take it one step further and head into the orchard. In my attempt to move her out, and back into her own paddock, the bitch whipped around and BIT ME!!! All I saw was a bloody big set of teeth and then a searing pain in my chest. I now have a huge bruise and very stiff pectoral muscles. I’ve come to the conclusion that she’s a bit head-shy and also considers herself leader of the pack. She didn’t lose it until I got near her head and was about to step in front of her. Finally however, we got them all back into the right place and then I went and did serious work with an ice pack.
Rick has been doing sterling duty on the property, pruning and burning off (as he just loves to do). He’s also managed to move the van rear bumper out further, so we can accommodate a poly pipe carrier for annex poles.
We took a drive out to Lake Baroon. It’s not a large dam, but very pretty. It supplies Maroochydore with water, as well as the Maleny – Montville area.
29 Oct ….. I paid a visit to the local hospital this morning (Maleny Soldiers Memorial) because the bruising on my chest is still growing and looks dreadful. I have to keep on icing it and keep resting, as there can be a significant risk of infection. I’ll take a pass on that!
31 Oct …. Last night was the Chicago concert at the Brisbane River Stage. It was fantastic – but way too short. Peter Frampton came on first and did an entertaining 45 minutes, then America (Horse with No Name, Ventura Highway) for an hour. And then, the highlight of the night, Chicago came on. I have been a hot fan of Chicago since mid 1970 (about a year after the release of their first album Chicago Transit Authority. When I met Rick in late 1973, I converted him as well. Neither of us have ever lost the feelings that Chicago’s music inspires and have been to all the live concerts in Australia (not enough – only three). This one here in Brisbane, even though it was way too short, was by far the best. On stage for just over an hour is not enough, and the bulk of the crowd felt the same way. Brian Wilson (Beach-Boys) was due on after Chicago and many people, including ourselves, left before he came on stage. Would much rather have Chicago on stage than Brian Wilson any day.
1 Nov …..Today, the fertiliser hit the fan in a big way. The farrier came to do the horses’ feet, along with Rod, the neighbour. NOTE: Rod & Liz live down the road and are fantastic neighbours and friends. Even though we’ve known them for only two weeks, they have provided un-ending help and support when having problems with Sarah. Rod decided to work on Sarah first and got her out of the paddock while the farrier set up. He held her by the head-rope while the farrier got to work. She was nicely relaxed and co-operative while her forefoot was done, and then the farrier moved to the rear. For the space of maybe a minute, she was fine – and then all hell broke loose. The change was instantaneous, from a nicely settled horse to a devil bitch. She lunged at the farrier with her teeth, and when she couldn’t reach him, she whipped around and kicked him. He took both hooves in the belly, and fell back, hitting the rim of his ute. Unfortunately, his kidneys took the brunt of the fall. When he could breathe again, we convinced him that he should go to the hospital and get checked out. The poor man was in agony and Rod loaded him gently into the ute and took him off. We heard later that the hospital suspected a cracked or broken rib. And after her little ‘spack’ attack, Sarah was fine and relaxed again??? Can’t work it out.
Vivienne and Peter got home a couple of hours later. They had a great time while in Japan, but ran into family problems when they got to the airport. Then they had to face the issue of Sarah when they arrived home. Very distressing day for them. They are a lovely couple, and we hope to stay in touch with them.

11–12 October 2010–Maleny Showgrounds

2010-10-12T12:42:00.001+11:00

After the drive from Kenilworth and taking photos of the Mary River in flood near Conondale, we camped at the Maleny Showgrounds in what we hoped was a spot sheltered a little bit from the wind and the rain. Unfortunately, no such luck. By next morning parts of the area where six inches under water just due to the rain. After splashing about for a while we decided to move to another area of the showgrounds – closer to the creek, but ironically drier than the first spot. then we discovered that we had 240v power problem. Every time we plugged the 240v lead into the input port, the safety breaker blew. Oh great!! After a couple of phone calls to Tom at Kedron we contacted a local electrician who, quite amazingly was able to come that afternoon. Some $95 later, he advised that there was a short in one of the van circuits. – on the load side of the circuit breaker. I could have told him that!! The upshot is that we’ve got to take the van into Kedron on 4/11 to get an electrician (presumably one who knows the interior layout of the vans) to fix it.

After all that fluffing about, we contacted Peter at Booroobin (our next house-sit) and he invited us to come up there early. Beauty – now we can get a feel for the place over a couple of days, before they head off to Japan on Saturday.

8–10 October 2010–Kenilworth Showgrounds

2010-10-10T14:46:00.000+11:00

THE BIG STORM

“The rain storm started with a deluge at 3.00am on Friday 8th October and ended at 10.30pm on Monday 11th – just over three and a half days of continuous precipitation amounting to 454.6mm.

Total rainfall to date for October is 471.6mm. This is the highest maximum rainfall ever recorded at Maleny over the past 117 years. The average for the month is 102 mm.”

Extract taken from www.malenyweather.com 12/10/2010

I have never seen this amount of rain – anywhere!! It started overnight the first night we spent in Kenilworth. The creek through the showgrounds came up – and went down again – and then came up again!! As we were the site closest to the creek I kept a really close eye on it, but it would have taken a huge amount to overflow the banks. All in all it was a somewhat soggy weekend – but it was Bathurst weekend, so it didn’t really matter.

7 October 2010–Brisbane River

2010-10-07T14:31:00.000+11:00

As we arrived at the entrance to the free camp spot on the Brisbane River, we could see another van in the distance coming out of the gate. As we got closer, we realised it was a Kedron, and then it turned out to be Rod & Mavis – fellow members of the Kedron Owners Group. They had gone in at the lower level, close to the river, and very nearly bogged themselves. They were on the way out with a view to turning around and trying the top level.

We all ended up going back to the spot where we camped last time. It was a nice little spot overlooking the river. Unfortunately, the village idiots have been at work, and the location is now a dreadful mess. There is rubbish and glass scattered all over the place. The idiots must have sat drinking at the top of the ledge and thrown their bottles down onto the track, with a view to hitting rocks and breaking the glass. Rick and Rod got out the rubbish bags, gloves and pick-up sticks and cleaned up as well as they could. It’s absolutely disgraceful the rubbish that was left, and has now spoiled this lovely place for us. Rick was absolutely livid and we ended up leaving the next morning and going to Kenilworth Showgrounds.

6 October 2010–Kaimkillenbun Caravan Park

2010-10-06T14:01:00.000+11:00

We stopped here on the way to the Brisbane River. It is a tiny little caravan park in a tiny little town. The place is reasonably well looked after, and contains mainly permanents. They have only two or three overnight camp spots, so for $15 per night, it suited us fine.

4-5 October 2010–Lake Broadwater Conservation Park

2010-10-05T13:32:00.000+11:00

Lake Broadwater is a beautiful little conservation park just south of Dalby, on the Cecil Plains – Dalby Road. It is very quiet and well off the road, which is just what the doctor ordered after the crush of people at the camp oven festival.

The weather was warm, but we had a light breeze blowing off the lake. Perfect. The Lake itself hasn’t had any water for quite a number of years, but the recent rains have filled it with water. This ensures a plentiful supply of bird life, as well as the requisite fish, turtles and bugs to support them.

1–3 October 2010–Millmerran Camp Oven Festival

2010-10-03T13:36:00.000+11:00

Commemorating traditional Australian Camp Oven cooking and the lifestyle activities associated with it, this festival sees professional and amateur cooks use cast iron camp ovens, cooking over open fires at the local showgrounds. Camp Oven cooking competitions, billy boiling speed tests, a damper throwing competition and live country music make this festival a great weekend for the whole family to fill up on!

We arrived on Friday 1 October to find that the showgrounds had dried out substantially from the rain. there were still a few boggy patches, but the festival organisers were working hard at laying sawdust and wood-chips – anything that would absorb the moisture.

By Saturday, we had the full complement of Kedron owners. For us, the weekend was more about socialising with friends. Some of whom we haven’t seen for quite some time.

25–30 September 2010–Crows Nest Caravan Park, Crows Nest, QLD

2010-09-30T12:36:00.000+10:00

Finally, we were able to get away from Brisbane. We headed out along the Brisbane Valley Highway towards Crows Nest. Just had to stop at the Bakery in Esk for a taste. There was a group of old Ford cars doing a run through the area. Even though it was cloudy, it was still a pleasant day for an outing. So, after some photos and a coffee, Crows Nest here we come. The plan was to spend the night there, and then head south towards Millmerran, perhaps spending a couple of nights somewhere in-between. It was a good plan, but then that night it rained. Not only in Crows Nest, but Millmerran received 30mm which brought the creeks up and flooded the showgrounds. We received word of this via the owner of Crows Nest, and decided that, caution being the name of the game, we would stay there until the weather cleared a bit, and Millmerran showgrounds dried out. We had a good, if quiet week. Wandered around the area and went out to Lake Cressbrook and Lake Perseverance, as well as the Crows Nest National Park.

13–24 September 2010–Newmarket Gardens Caravan Park, Ashgrove, Brisbane

2010-09-24T11:06:00.000+10:00

At the start of September, when Rick visited Dr D (his Dermatologist), two moles were scraped for biopsy, several sun spots were frozen, and Dr D decided that two more suspect moles needed to be completely excised. Unfortunately, Rick couldn’t get an appointment until 14 October. This would have been a really bad day, because the following day is when we move to Booroobin to begin the house-sit. At that stage, Rick already had an appointment with Dr Paul for 14 September. Dr Paul is the plastic surgeon responsible for removing the last melanoma from Rick’s right cheek. The aim when we made the appointment (from Perth) was to see if the scar on Rick’s face could be minimised somewhat.

With the additional problems arising, we decided to ask Dr D to refer Rick to Dr Paul, firstly to remove the two suspects, and secondly to follow up on the pathology results from the two that had already been biopsied. After a little bit of confusion, Dr Paul booked Rick into Greenslopes Private Hospital (day surgery only) for the coming Friday – 17 September. Dr Paul doesn’t mess about!! Unfortunately, the results of the two previous biopsies weren’t particularly good, so they had to be fully excised. That meant, all up that Rick had four moles fully removed, and additional surgery to take some of the slight lumpiness out of his existing scar. So that’s two on his right cheek, one on the upper left arm and two on his left foot.

Rick heals very quickly (fortunately), and only needed pain-killers for the first couple of days. Dr Paul rang on the Monday to advise the all clear with the pathology results. This was a huge relief after the number of surgeries it took to fully remove the melanoma on his face in 2008. The stitches on his face were due to come out on Friday 24th after seven days and the results of the surgery were fantastic. Dr Paul is not only a very good surgeon, but it’s very obvious that he really cares about his patients. Even after only a week of healing, the scars from the surgery were minimal, and hardly visible.

The stitches on Rick’s shoulder and feet were due to come out on 1 October, but we told them we had to be elsewhere then (Millmerran of course), and planned on leaving Brisbane on 25 September. Eventually between the nurse, and Dr Paul’s attending surgeon, Matthew, they decided that the nurse could remove the shoulder sutures, and I could remove the ones on his feet on the 1st. I’ve done it before, so I’m not too fussed about it, and the nurse supplied a full suture removal kit, so I’ve now got better tools than my own tweezers and scissors.

We were then able to leave Newmarket Gardens on schedule on Saturday 24th.

Forgot to mention earlier, that we were able to catch up with Stephanie when we arrived at Newmarket. She’s a long time resident of the park and a qualified electrician. We met her a couple of years ago as she’s a good friend of Kedron owners Bob & Di. She’s just gone all extravagant and bought herself a new Jeep. Charcoal grey, leather upholstery, and all the bells and whistles! Her site (which was just behind ours) is temporarily rather crowded, with her van, boat & trailer, and two jeeps! Unfortunately, she was working night shift that fortnight, but we still managed to have some good chats. The woman is as mad as a cut snake! She fits in really well with most of the Kedron owners as well!

8–12 September 2010–Brisbane River

2010-09-12T10:50:00.000+10:00

After the hustle and bustle of the city, this a such a beautiful, quiet place to camp. It is on the banks of the Brisbane River, just outside of Kilcoy. We were given the directions by Laurie, who is also a Kedron owner. There are two areas where it is possible to camp – one is right down on the banks of the river, and the other is at a higher level and not quite so close to the banks. Because of recent rains, the river level is quite high, and the lower sites are unusable. Not a problem though because the higher level gave us a better view.

We had five days of bliss! Over the entire period, we saw only three other vehicles. They came in, checked the lower camp sites, and went out again. How sad! The birds were plentiful, and some quite cheeky! Bugs were not a problem, and we were able to sit outside by the campfire both before and after dinner. We had no problems recharging power even though it got a bit cloudy at times. There was no TV or NextG signal, but we set up the Sat – just to test it out, you understand! The main aim here was relaxation and we certainly achieved that. Just what was needed after the previous couple of weeks and to strengthen us up for the next run at the city.

6–7 September 2010–Lawnton Showgrounds

2010-09-07T10:25:00.000+10:00

When we first arrived back in Brisbane we had made a booking with Kedron to get a couple of minor things fixed in the van, and also get get our existing 3.5 tonne Hyland Hitch (on the van) replaced with a 6.0 tonne McHitch. This change also required a new, heavier set of Hayman Reece Weight Distribution Bars. This was all due to happen on 7 Sept, so we arrived at Lawnton Showgrounds the day before on 6 Sept. We knew that Brian & Lis (fellow Kedron owners from SA) were also going to be there so we were looking forward to a good catch up. We first met them in 2009 in SA while we were in the McLaren Valley (lovely wine area).

When we arrived, we were really pleased to see that Kim & Ned (which is short for Nerida) were also there. We first met them at the Millmerran Camp Oven Festival in 2006, and have only seen them a couple of times since. We had our own little Kedron gathering, and also celebrated both Kim’s birthday and Ned & Kim’s wedding anniversary. What perfect timing!.

The following morning we were due at Kedron at 07:30, so gave breakfast a miss until we dropped the van off. The Coffee Club in Strathpine does a great breakfast, so that set us up for the day. We spent the morning fiddle-arsing about, before getting back to Kedron at about 1:30pm to get the vehicle end of the hitch set up.

The McHitch and Weight Distribution set-up took a big chunk out of our savings, but was well worth it. It is easy to hitch and un-hitch, and the WD bars actually work now, and transfer some of the ball weight to the front wheels. The whole rig now travels much better.

That night, dinner had been arranged at the Aspley Hornets Leagues Club, where we caught up with yet another Kedron Owner couple – David & Jane. Haven’t seen them for yonks and a good time was had by all. We organised a maxi taxi to go and come back, so nobody had to worry about driving.

4–5 September 2010–Acacia Ridge Caravan Park

2010-09-05T10:01:00.000+10:00

Dad’s 80th birthday was on 2 September, so the whole weekend was set aside for revelry. Saturday was set aside for a family BBQ. Denise makes a mean salad and we had lamb and beef burgers with potato salad to match. We worked out that it has been 35 years since Dad, my brother Brett and myself have been in the same place together. Even with phone calls and emails, it’s still a long time apart. Unfortunately my sister-in-law Chris was unable to come with Brett as it was her Dad’s birthday on the weekend also.

On Sunday, which was also Fathers’ Day, we went to lunch at the Runcorn Tavern. Some very good friends of Dad & Denise’s also came along. The Tavern was very busy because of Fathers’ Day, but the service was pretty good, and the meal was great. Then we all piled into the cars, headed back home for birthday cake and champagne and a much quieter place to be able to talk.

Brett had arranged a taxi to take him to the railway station. From there he was heading to the airport to catch Jetstar back home to Newcastle. Rick and I decided to go with him to the station, and then keep the taxi to go back to Acacia Ridge.

It was a lovely weekend, but it was now time to head north of the city to get the new tow hitch installed on the Kedron.

27 August–3 September 2010–Nestle Inn, Tingalpa, Brisbane

2010-09-03T09:32:00.000+10:00

This was eight days of running around like complete maniacs. In between visits to the doctor to get a referral to a Sleep Clinic, doing an overnight stint at the Sleep Clinic, Rick attending the dermatologist (and leaving with little holes and freeze scabs AGAIN – not to mention the fact that Dr D wanted another two moles fully excised next month), getting the car serviced and checked over, shopping – both general and for Dad’s birthday, we actually tried to relax a little. Because we were staying in Tingalpa, we were able to revisit old haunts and check out the changes. Not many really except for more housing developments and ongoing road building and maintenance.

The Nestle Inn itself is much improved. Last time we stayed there, we swore we wouldn’t stay there again. It was very run down, and the owner at the time didn’t give a rat’s. The park has recently changed hands and has new managers who are working their butts off to bring it up to scratch. They have lots of plans for the place and the owner is giving them full support and encouragement. It will be interesting to go back in 12 months and see what has changed. Unfortunately, some of the upgrades are going to rely on Brisbane Council coming to the party and upgrading the drainage of the creek that flows into and through the property. The creek runs under Manly road and into the park, and generally during summer, half the area is soggy or under water.

25 - 26 August 2010–Samford Valley Showgrounds

2010-08-26T13:38:00.000+10:00

Samford Valley Showgrounds is actually the local equestrian centre as well as showgrounds. We stayed there so we could meet with Deb & Pete who have offered us a house-sit from the end of November to the start of January 2011. They have a lovely 1 1/2 acre property, with a horse, a miniature horse, two cats and a dog (who according to Deb is a moron!). We’ve accepted this one with glee, as it covers the Christmas / New Year period. They are absolutely lovely people, and have three daughters aged between 10 and 16. (who we are NOT baby-sitting!)

The showgrounds themselves are quite nice, lots of area for both powered and unpowered camping. The toilets & showers might struggle a bit though if there were a lot of people there, as there are not that many in the blocks. The manager was very helpful, even though he had his hands full trying to fix the septic system!

24 August 2010–Petrie Park, Tiaro

2010-08-24T13:17:00.000+10:00

This was a really long, hard days drive – I think we travelled about 60km. Not our shortest by a long shot, but add in the van cleaning????

This is the first time we’ve actually stayed at Petrie Park, and it’s really quite lovely. On the banks of the Mary River just to the north of Tiaro it has two areas separated by a (presently) dry creek. Any sort of heavy rain, and I think they’ll have only one area! We had happy hour with our neighbours (as you do!) and got a really good nights sleep in the peace and quiet of the bush (a bit different from Hervey Bay).

19–23 August 2010–Australiana Top Tourist Park, Hervey Bay

2010-08-23T12:32:00.000+10:00

After leaving Booroobin, we headed north towards Hervey Bay to catch up with our son & daughter-in-law, Brett & Joanne. We had made a booking at the Top Tourist based on Brett’s recommendation, and it turned out to be a very nice caravan park. Very well organised, and the type of CP that will take you to the site, and make sure that you are parked properly. Very civilised.

Brett & Joanne popped around after lunch and after 18 months it was great to see them. It appears as if they have sorted out their problems now, and life for them is now much better. After seeing the state of the van, they decided that they would just have to come back the following day and clean it for us. Rick thought that was great, but when they turned up with the bags of cleaning gear and all of them had a really good look at it, they decided it needed much more than a bucket and cloth to get it really clean, so decided to take the van to their place in Toogoom on the day we left and get into it with the pressure sprayer.

They also took us out to lunch at the Hervey Bay Boat Club at Sinbad’s Restaurant. Lovely meal and company, and a stunning view out over the marina. The dollar value of the boats in the marina must be staggering.

When we left Hervey Bay on the Monday, the van got a solid and thorough scrubbing. She now looks much cleaner, but it’s an ongoing job.

17–18 August 2010–Standown Park (28km east of Gympie)

2010-08-18T12:13:00.000+10:00

Standown Park is a beautiful bush camping experience with new, modern facilities, where all campers, motor homers, caravaners and travellers are welcome. The emphasis there is on friendliness and relaxation, and everyone is encouraged to be part of the “family”. It is also a friendly and welcome retreat for Veterans of all services and conflicts. It is owned and managed by Rod & Pam Elkington who have done a magnificent job to develop this park from raw paddocks. Situated on 18 lush green acres surrounded by the pine forest on two sides and pasture paddocks on the others, the park site has an abundance of trees attracting many species of birdlife. Standown is just off the Tin Can Bay Highway so the Park is secure, and with the picturesque mountains in the near distance, it is the ideal place for parking the rig and resting while exploring the many attractions of the area.

This is the third time we have been to Standown, and it definitely will not be the last.

Check out the web-site: Standown Park

Purely by chance, we decided to arrive on 17 August. The park was absolutely jam-packed because the following day, 18 August, is Long Tan Day (Vietnam Veterans’ Day). The days’ activities were very well organised – commencing with a multiple sports (if you can call a balloon exchange race or playing darts a sport!) morning. This set a high and very funny tone for the morning which acted as counterpoint to the more sombre march and commemoration of fallen comrades which followed. The service was extremely moving and very well organised. Happy hour followed immediately afterward, followed by a fully catered Roast Dinner, with Pam’s Syrup Dumplings to follow. YUM! Then we staggered to bed, complaining of having eaten too much – hmmmm!

16th August 2010–Booroobin (between Maleny and Woodford, QLD)

2010-08-16T14:48:00.000+10:00

We had received an offer of a house-sit in Booroobin, and today was the day chosen to visit and get to know the owners (Pete & Viv) and their property and pets. They have a wonderful 42 acre property, which is primarily bush and backs onto the Stanley River. They have three horses (two are miniatures) and three dogs as well as lots of birds and other wildlife. Pete took us on a trip down to the river in the ute. It is a steep track with lots of lumps & bumps. At the bottom of the track is a walking track to the river and the base of the falls, where there is a beautiful little pool. It is quite deep in the middle, and apparently very cold because it doesn’t get a lot of sun. Hmmm!

Pete & Viv cooked us a wonderful roast dinner in their wood-burner stove. It was a great way to get to know each other, great food and the odd glass or two of wine.

The sit is for the second half of October, and we are both looking forward to it very much. It is going to be a completely different experience.

The home is entirely self sufficient in power and water. If the solar does not generate quite enough, they have a generator to add the extra power. The wood-burner stove is used not only for cooking, but also for hot-water.

13–15 August 2010–Kilcoy Showgrounds

2010-08-15T14:34:00.000+10:00

This was the weekend for the Kedron Owners Group first Annual General Meeting. It was an interesting and very enjoyable weekend. I’m not a huge fan of politics or AGM’s of any kind, but due to some damn fine organisation, it was pretty painless. All positions were nominated, seconded and voted with a minimum of trouble. I suspect that the attendance was only 14 people had something to do with the ease of proceedings.

It was a lovely clear weekend, warm during the day, but quite cool at night. Hence the use of multiple “pigs”. For the non –camping / caravanning fraternity, a “pig” is generally an unused 9kg gas bottle, which has been modified to become a small but efficient wood-burning oven. Various metal plates are attached to the top so that cooking of all sorts of yummy food is possible.

There are many home-made but well designed ‘pigs’, in fact probably as many designs as those who have designed them!

10–12 August 2010 - Somerset Dam Campground

2010-08-12T14:29:00.000+10:00

Just beautiful – had one night of heavy rain, a day of mist and drizzle and then the sun came out. Because it is such a quiet spot, we really had a relaxing time. The second day we were there, which was the morning after the heavy rain, we heard a roaring sound coming from the dam itself. Seeing as the campground is BELOW the dam, it was a bit nerve-wracking, so there was an immediate rush to the river to see what was happening (especially since I was in the middle of reading a book about dams on the Colorado river in the US being blown up and breaking apart).

It was very good news to hear that Dam management had opened the overflow spillway. This raised the river levels by a couple of feet, but did not create any problems.

7–9 August–Kingaroy Showgrounds

2010-08-09T13:38:00.000+10:00

Spent 3 busy days interspersing shopping, catching up with the washing and a bit of tourism. The showgrounds are not a bad camp spot, but the price has recently gone up, and is now $20 per night for a powered and watered site.

We took a ride out to the local lookout at Mount Wooroolin where there is a 360 degree view of the countryside. It was actually quite impressive.

Then we went to Taste South Burnett. They offer exclusive tastings of Kingaroy Cheese and of course their home made fudge. Barambah, Kingsley Grove and Bellbird wines are featured along with a wide range of local and modern Australian products in their Cellar Door. We had a lovely cup of coffee and then a tour of the Cheese factory. The tour could have been a little better if the factory had been working, but being weekend – well, you get the gist. It was however very interesting, and the host was very knowledgeable about the area and his product considering that he and his wife had only owned the place for six weeks. They had however spent years visiting the place, and even got married there.

West to East– through the Centre

2010-08-08T15:08:00.001+10:00

Finally, it was time to leave Perth! We headed out early on Friday 16/07/2010 because our first stop was Kelmscott (not a really long travel!), so that Rob could re-install that **** diesel heater. Fortunately, after a lot of swearing and getting wet (oh! it was raining quite well too!) he finally got it going properly. Yet another $200 making $500 all up. This covered parts and labour, but was way more than we expected to pay for a simple service. Obviously, because of all the problems it was not just a simple service. Oh well, you learn these things the hard way.

So, leaving Kelmscott like the devil was on our tail, our next stop was to El Caballo Golf Club in Wooroloo. We called in there to see Rick’s cousin Nick and his partner Edna. It was fantastic finally being able to meet them. They are both lovely people and we hope now that we can stay in touch. Stayed in Northam that night in the caravan park. Nice little spot but very crowded. We were lucky to get a spot at all.
17 – 18/07/2010 – Karalee Dam, Kookynie

19/07/2010 – Niagara Dam is a funny little spot, with quite a bit of history

20/07/2010 – Leonora Caravan Park

21/07/2010 – Minnie Creek Rest Area

22/07/2010 – Yarla Katjara Rest Area

23/07/2010 – Docker River Rest Area

24/07/2010 – Yulara Campground

25 – 30/07/2010 – MacDonnell Range Caravan Park

31/07/2010 to 01/08/2010 – Harts Range Showgrounds

02/08/2010 – Boulia Caravan Park – Back in QLD – Yay!!!

03/08/2010 – Waltzing Matilda Caravan Park, Winton – No Photos – not worth it!
Dreadful place – all vans were so crammed in, we had to park on a road and had only about 2 feet on either side to move!! Would never stay there again.
04/08/2010 – Charles Lloyd Jones Weir, Barcaldine
Met up with Toni & JB. We meet them for the first time at Standown Park Veterans’ Retreat maybe 18 months ago, so it was a nice surprise to catch up with them again.

05/08/2010 – Bailey Bar Caravan Park, Charleville
Lovely spot for an overnight stay – they were serving a Lamb on the spit for dinner. Yummy!

06/08/2010 – Judds Lagoon, Yuleeba
Beautiful area. Quite a large spot, well maintained but with no facilities. There were only four campers there (including ourselves).

07/08/2010 – Kingaroy Showgrounds
Good spot for a showgrounds, although the price has gone up to $20 for a powered site. We are now catching up with all the washing. And given all the dust and mud – there is a fair bit of washing and cleaning going on. The view below is from the Kingaroy lookout, viewing the town.

The final picture

At Last – JRTE Golden Reunion

2010-07-27T13:06:00.005+10:00

Woodman Point Caravan Park is 10km south of Fremantle (on the way to Rockingham and Mandurah). It’s part of the Top Tourist group and owned by Aspen Parks. We spent three weeks there, and despite the fact that we were busy every day, we still missed out on some of the things that we really wanted to achieve. Between shopping for the Reunion (most important), service and repairs to the car and the van, visiting and hosting friends and doctors appointments, we spent most of the three weeks running from spot to spot. We also spent quite a bit of time re-planning where we were going to stay for the reunion. Initially we had planned on the Central Caravan Park in Ascot, just north of Perth, because it was the closest spot to the Burswood where most of the reunion events were to take place. Then we found out that the Fremantle Village, about 5km from Woodman Point was owned by an ex-Junior Recruit and he was offering substantial discounts to Reunion attendees. The fact that buses had been arranged by the Memorial committee also made an impact on our decision to change our booking to Fremantle Village. A nice spot if a little expensive normally, but we managed to get a good drive-through site Then we sat back and watched all the ex Junior Recruits roll in.

For the non-initiated, I have taken the liberty of including an extract from the Foreword of a book written by Rear Admiral Brian Adams AO, RAN (rtd) – “HMAS Leeuwin: The Story of the RAN’s Junior Recruits”. The Foreword itself was written by Vice Admiral RH Crane, AM, CSM, RAN who is the current serving Chief of Navy.
“Overly nearly 25 years, between January 1960 and December 1984, approximately 13,000 15 and 16 year old boys joined the Royal Australian Navy (RAN) as junior recruits – a group the size of our current Navy workforce. The world of the ‘JRs’, as they were called, was often a very different one from the modern entry processes to the RAN. The majority served in warships before turning 18, some experiencing active service in the Indonesian Confrontation and the Vietnam War.
Before joining the Fleet, most of the boys trained for a year in the Junior Recruit Training Establishment located in HMAS Leeuwin, a Navy base located on the banks of the Swan River at Preston Point in Fremantle, Western Australia. Some received their junior recruit training at HMAS Cerberus, a base near Westernpoint south of Melbourne, Victoria.
Most of these former Junior Recruits have retired after serving Australia in peace and war for up to 40 years. However, some still serve throughout the three Services of the Australian Defence Force. I myself joined Leeuwin as a JR in 1970, making the long train journey from Queensland to Perth to pursue what has become my life’s career in the RAN.
This book is the story of their – our – experience while under training and of how, late in the 20th century, the Australian Navy still relied on boys to help crew its ships. It is also a record of a unique training scheme that had its origins in the Royal Navy of Nelson’s day, one that is unlikely to be used in the Australian Navy again. Paul Kerr, a junior recruit of the 60th intake, began researching and writing the story; it was completed by Brian Adams of the 22nd intake with the willing assistance of many other former junior recruits. Our gratitude is die to all of them for their tenacity and effort in recording this unusual chapter in the history of the RAN.”

Altogether, almost 2,000 JR’s and their partners registered for and attended the reunion. That is a huge amount of organising work which was undertaken by the Golden Anniversary Committee over the course of three years. They did a fantastic job and should be commended for the success of the events which took place over the period of four days.
The first day’s event was the Meet ‘n Greet which was held in one of the main rooms of the Burswood Conference Centre. The idea of the event was to pick up name tags and all pre-purchased items, and then gather together with other members of the same year or intake and partake of the odd drink or two. Burswood thought they had a handle on the amount of booze that 800 or so old farts (sorry, sailors) could drink. WRONG!!!!! These so-called old farts drank the place completely dry. The story goes that the Burswood got in extra stock of about 2.5 extra pallets of beer for the event, and the thirsty buggers drank the lot!!
The following day was the Memorial Dedication at the former HMAS Leeuwin which has now passed over to the Army and is named Leeuwin Army barracks. The date itself, 13 July, is the 50th anniversary of the first intake in 1960. The Junior Recruit Memorial itself is very, very good, and the dedication service was fantastic, and very moving. The estimate was about 3,000 people attending. I have included a link below to the July 2010 newsletter for the Memorial Project itself.
22nd Newsletter for the JR Memorial Project
And then, that night the Gala Dinner was held in the Grand Ballroom at Burswood. Burswood management had learned the lesson of the previous day, and the service of dinner and drinks was flawless. The 1100 to 1200 attendees had a universally fabulous time, ably assisted by the Royal Australian Navy Band – Western Australian Detachment. They played everything from Glen Miller to the Rocky Horror Picture Show (and including Abba). The most remarkable sight for the night was hundreds of 60 to 70 year old dancers, not only jigging around with the best, but also singing all the words to the songs. It was hysterical to watch. It was a brilliant evening, and we all went home having had way more to drink and eat than the usual quota.
The following day was the Recuperation Function which was held at Ramon’s Restaurant in Perth, owned by yet another ex JR (the buggers are everywhere!). A much quieter occasion than the dinner with most people drinking soft drink. Funny about that! The location was beautiful however, with a large duck pond out the back.
They have a lot of weddings there as well as catering for large groups. This was the last function that we were attending, so it was time to say adios to all the renewed friendships, BUT, next year on Melbourne Cup “weekend”, Mildura RSL will be hosting a reunion for the 1963 6 & 7 intakes. That is Rick’s intake year, so we hope to be able to attend that.

Then and Now

Dunsborough to Fremantle

2010-06-24T12:40:00.002+10:00

We’ve been in Fremantle for a week now, after leaving the South West. We had a lovely time in Dunsborough, looking after Jane & Len’s home and Oscar. I’m sure the cat has multiple personalities – one day he would be really sweet and affectionate and wanting to spend time indoors with us. Another day he would be completely stand-offish and treat us like complete strangers. And then he got picked up by the Council Rangers. Wasn’t that fun! When he didn’t come in for breakfast or lunch one day, we got a bit worried. But when he didn’t arrive for his tea, we got really nervous. By next morning, with no sign of cat, I was ready to have a nervous breakdown. Before we rang Jane with the bad news, I decided to ring the Busselton Pound. After the Ranger checked her list, she came back and said ‘Oh, yes we’ve got him here, he was caught in a cat trap (no hurt, just a square boxy thing).’ THANK GOD!!! Then it turned out that Oscar wasn’t registered. He actually belongs to Nicole, Jane’s daughter, who lives in Perth. So, long story short, $130 dollars later, we were able to bring him home. Talk about upset – that was one very peeved moggy! He cried for the entire 30km between Busselton and Dunsborough, and refused to go outside for two days. He was kind of clingy! Despite the fact that he is completely demented though, both Rick and I missed him quite a bit when we left.

We went to Busselton first for a couple of days to get the car serviced and pre-trip checked. Then Mandurah for another couple so that we could catch up with Lorraine, who is Rick’s newly found half-sister. Then we headed for Lane Poole State Forest near Dwellingup. The plan was to spend three quiet, peaceful days there before heading for Fremantle. As usual, the plan went completely tits-up.

On the day we left Mandurah, it had rained a little the previous night, so we were a bit concerned that the ground might be a bit slushy at Lane Poole, but when we got there, all was well. Even better, there was only one other camper there, right at the other end of the park. It was a lovely day, cool and sunny and we thought it was wonderful. No phones, TV, radio or internet. Peace and quiet. Then it all went to hell in a hand-basket!!

Not long after we went to bed, it started to rain. And it got heavier and heavier and heavier. By morning, there was a very muddy swimming pool under the van, and water running down the hill cutting channels in the mud! Fortunately we were camped well above the creek at the bottom of the hill, or I would have cacking myself all night.

At that point we decided that discretion was the better part of valour, and started packing to pull out! Didn’t take all that long either, as we had visions of the mud getting deeper and deeper. Thank heavens we’ve got a 4WD, as it took 4WD LOW, to manoeuvre the van up the hill and onto the road. Any other type of tug, and we could have been there until summer!!

So, now we’re in Freo possibly until 8 July, then it’s off to the north-side to get the van serviced and into camp for the Reunion.

Oh – and we got the reply back after the Veterans’ Review Board last Saturday and it was a real bummer! Flat out knock-back! It was very demoralising, and doesn’t leave us much room to advance it. But we’ll recover – Onward and Upward being the tradition.

DON’T LET THE BASTARDS GRIND YOU DOWN!!!

It’s been a while!

2010-05-09T12:24:00.002+10:00

Looking back to when I last posted to this blog, once again I’ve been backward in recording our journey. I’ve spent a lot of time in the last couple of months putting together a submission for Department of Veterans’ Affairs and Veterans’ Review Board. This involved a lot of research and writing and finally topped out at 28 pages. The purpose of the submission was to provide as much detail as we could for the Veterans’ Review Board, so that they can make a decision on Rick’s claim for war-caused Post traumatic Stress Disorder. This claim has been hanging around for three years now, and we just want to get it finished and over with. A date has now been set, and Jeff Wake (Rick’s advocate and close friend) and I meet with the Board probably on May 28. Rick will not be attending as it will put way too much stress on him, but we’re hoping that Dr Malcolm Roberts, Rick’s trick cyclist will be able to attend and put forward the case. I also have a few things I want to say!!! Now that that is finished, I can spend more time working on the Family Tree. It has been sadly neglected in the last two months.

We left the house-sit in Rockingham on 6 March 2010. We were both kind of glad to leave this property. Not because there was anything wrong with it – it was just so big! Two stories! It was also very hot during that period. I don’t think we had any days under about 34 degrees for the whole month. Unfortunately, the night before we were due to leave, our van fridge died, so we had to change our plans slightly. We spent a week in the Mandurah Caravan Park, while TRYING to get it fixed. It’s a Top Tourist Park, very nice and customer service to die for! They lent us a huge esky while we had no fridge, and we used the Engel in the car as a freezer. It was still very hot, so we were very thankful for the help. Sadly the Fridge company we arranged to look at the fridge were idiots. The serviceman came out (he was pretty good), checked it out and told us that the electronic controller for the fridge had died. So, he disappeared back to the office to get the manager to order one in. So far, so good we thought. WRONG! After numerous phone calls to the manager, and then contacting Camec (the supposed supplier) ourselves, we still didn’t have a controller. According to Camec, it would take them two weeks to get one from over East?? We absolutely had to leave Mandurah after the week was up, because of medical appointments in Perth, so when we arrived in Coogee Beach caravan park, once again rang the fridgie. He wouldn’t even talk to us that day, so I left a message – by this stage getting reeeealy cranky. Guess what – to this day (9 May), we still have not received either a phone call or a new part. Rick ended up calling Glen and Leisa at Kedron, and we had one in our hands within two days. Got hold of another fridgie in Perth, and it took him twenty minutes to install! Fantastic! Don’t know what happened to the guy in Mandurah, but don’t really care!!

Whilst in Perth, Rick took part in a sleep study to check for Sleep Apnoea. Within two days, he had a CPAP (Controlled Positive Airway Pressure) machine, and his sleep became much easier. Instead of snoring and stopping breathing all night, he can now sleep peacefully and quietly.

From Perth, we spent a week in Busselton at the Mandalay Holiday Resort. This is another well run and lovely park. It’s the second time we’ve been there (last time was in November last year), and it’s the sort of park that’s easy to return to. Then onto Albany for a week at Kalgan River Caravan Park. We were there over Easter which meant we did not have to hit the roads during that awful period. It was busy at Kalgan River, but not totally chaotic as many other places were. It’s a lovely spot too, on the banks of the Kalgan River about 10km east of Albany. Met some really nice people there too, which makes it more memorable. There was a really big thunderstorm the first night we were there. We didn’t get too much water through the camp-site, but some people took a couple of days to get rid of it. Weather was pretty good after that.

And then on to Dunsborough for the last house-sit in WA. We arrived on April 10, and it’s really hard to believe that we’ve already been here for a month. Jane & Len, the owners, are such lovely laid back people, and the house is wonderful. They renovated the original house and added a large living, games, bar, etc type room at the back. It’s possible to open all the doors and bring the outside inside. The kitchen adjoins the room, so the cook is never cut off from the happenings outside, and can pass food, drink, goodies through the screened windows. We’re looking after a cat, Oscar. He’s a big fella, and spends most of his time curled up in the garage asleep. Occasionally deigns to come and visit us, funnily enough it’s usually a mealtimes? He’s certainly not a high maintenance cat.

So, we have another month here, and then we’re probably going back to Perth for the month before the Junior Recruit’s 50th Reunion in mid-July. We’ve got to get the car and van serviced before we leave here, as well as attend doctors appointments. Then, after the reunion, we hit the road again. The decision has been made (finally, after a lot of discussion) to head back to Queensland via the Great Central Road. This will take us from Perth to Leonora to Alice Springs (via the back of Uluru) and then onto Winton. Not quite sure where we’ll head from there, but probably down towards Brisbane eventually. We need to be there for 2 September, ‘cos it’s my Dad’s 80th birthday. We’ve then got a Kedron Owners Group gathering at Millmerran on the first weekend in October, for the bi-annual Camp Oven Festival. We were there four years ago, and had great fun.

Rockingham, Western Australia 17 January – 6 March 2010

2010-02-22T17:17:00.002+11:00

After leaving Darling Downs, we spent the first two and a bit weeks in the Rockingham Holiday Village. We’ve been having a problem with the car not holding battery power, and need to get it looked at by an auto-electrician. It actually took most of that time for the sparky to diagnose what he thought the problem was. We had to get the isolating solenoid replaced which helped one problem, but there is still an issue with the main batteries draining power if the car is not used for two or three days. At this stage there are a couple of ideas, and we’re monitoring the situation.

On February 5, we moved into a lovely house-sit in Palm Beach, Rockingham. We are 80 metres from the beach with a fabulous view across the bay. We have started walking every morning along the beach footpath for about 30 minutes. The first few days were a little tough (haven’t done much walking recently), but it’s getting much easier and we’re both feeling better for it.

Since moving in here, we’ve managed to meet with three of Rick’s unknown close relatives. It turns out that Rick’s Dad was married twice. The first marriage produced three children and for the second, to Eileen, Rick was the only child. The eldest child, Patricia died only a couple of years ago in BRISBANE of all places…, but we have been in touch with Colin who is now the eldest half-brother, and have met Rick’s half-sister Lorraine. Additionally, there are three close cousins and uncounted numbers of nieces and nephews! There may also be some in Brisbane apparently. So Rick has gone from believing that there was very little in the way of family on the Avey side, to having more than he knows what to do with. Of course, because of the circumstances to do with Rick’s Dad’s marriages and family, all contact is reasonably circumspect at this stage. But hugely interesting.

We’re here in Rockingham for another two weeks, before hitting the road for five weeks. The plan will take us to Esperance for a couple of weeks, then heading to Albany for the Easter period. We then have a two month house-sit in Dunsborough. It’s a hard life!!

Darling Downs, Western Australia 31 Dec 2009 – 17 Jan 2010

2010-01-17T15:19:00.000+11:00

OK this is going to be a rather long 17 days. The weather is hot (35-40degrees), and the house has no air conditioning, and fans only in the bedrooms. We’ve hooked up the van to power, so we can can run the air-conditioning and keep cool. I’ve also moved all the computer gear back into the van where we can use it in comfort. The house is lovely, a large open plan home, but once it gets hot it stays that way until there is a change in the weather.

The dogs can be a bit of a trial. Individually, they are three lovely dogs. Masai is a Belgian Shepherd male with a really sweet, slightly shy nature. However, he is very protective of his property, and has a tendency to bark at almost anything going past on the road or the bridle path at the rear of the block, and this sets off the other two. Jessie is a black Kelpie bitch who is a real sook. And Harley! What can I say about Harley? On his own he is gorgeous. He’s the youngest (about 5) and a cross between a Red Heeler and we think, a Kelpie. He is smart, protective and thinks he’s boss cocky. Unfortunately, so does Masai! Thank the Lord they have both been de-nutted. All three of these dogs can be very attention demanding (look at me, look at me!!!) and we have to treat them evenly to avoid spats. Harley and Masai have had a couple so far, and Harley and Jessie really had a go at each other over a bone. Both Harley and Jessie have had occasion to spend time on the chain (the naughty corner) to think about the error of their ways! All three dogs are really working dogs, and, we think, get very bored. They’ve got 5 acres to run around in, but it’s not quite the same as the human attention. Their ‘Mum & Dad’ both work full time.

Australind, Western Australia 7-31 December 2009

2009-12-31T15:02:00.000+11:00

We spent this period looking after Cheryl & Keith’s home while they went over East. It was a lovely place to stay and very well kept. The outside area is quite large and well suited to al-fresco dining and BBQ’s. They also have a cute little fish pond which is home to 8 or 9 small Koi fish.

Got to know the area a bit while here (this is the major benefit of staying in one place for a while). The Leschenault Estuary and Peninsula are really quite pretty, and there are plenty of places where you can drive onto the beach and up and down the coast.

We also checked out places like DonnyBrook, Capel and Boyanup. Lovely country – both farmland and bush. And pretty nice drives too!

Cheryl & Keith came back on the 30th, and we have a fun night of photos and movies from there trip. The photos of the Whitsundays really made me want to return to Airlie Beach again sometime soon.

Bunbury & Australind Caravan Parks, Western Australia 1-7 December 2009

2009-12-07T14:57:00.000+11:00

Didn’t really do a lot during this period other than cleaning and a bit of needed maintenance. The plan initially was to stay at the Discover Holiday Park in Bunbury for the period up till the 7th when we move into Cheryl & Keith’s. Just be on the safe side though, we only booked for 3 days. Unfortunately, that was three days too long!! It is quite the noisiest caravan park we’ve ever stayed in. For starters, it was way too close to the Busselton Highway (quite a busy road). OK, we could see that, but the manager told us we’d have a quiet site. Way wrong! Then he parked a big truck belonging to a cabin liver one site away from us. This cabin person left at 05:30AM every morning, and wasn’t quiet about it. And then, as the last straw, another cabin guy brought his truck AND chain saw home, and gaily set about pruning a couple of trees – right during Happy Hour. ABOMINATION!!!

That same night, there was a reasonably big bush fire a little further south which made for a lot of smoke and a really beautiful sunset.

So, we left and went to the Australind Caravan Park. Much better, and we had three peaceful days, mellowing out under the trees.