Brisbane Trip Day 29: Newcastle -> Sydney

I wanted to make sure that I saw the girls and their Dad before they left for school and work so that I could say goodbye, so when I woke quite early I didn’t try to go back to sleep. I had enough time to go for a walk and this time went straight to the granny pool for a swim. The sky was grey and there was a light breeze blowing in from the ocean – the feel and smell of the air reminded me so much of swimming at Merewether Baths on a cloudy morning. The water was cool and refreshing and got to about chest deep near the gap in the wall, where the water flows in from the channel. I swam around for about 10 minutes then went back to the house to say goodbye and thanks for letting us stay.

After I’d had some breakfast I chatted to Tony for a while, then Caitlin said that the oldest cousin had missed her bus. I drove her to school (which also gave the girls a bit more time together) and then stopped at Woolworths on the way back to get some more bread and milk. The bridge was up again as we left Swansea. At home I was just about to start packing when Tony rang again, it was great to have a chat of more than a few minutes with him.

I didn’t start packing until 9.40, then had everything done, ready to go by 11.40 which I was very happy with.  I was hot and sweaty so had a cold shower and got changed, we checked that we had all our stuff and were on our way by just after 12.

We stopped for petrol at Doyalson – last year I’d bought a Pokemon DVD at this petrol station so Amelie wanted to see if they had more. There weren’t any DVDs that interested her, she and Liam bought some chocolate. The drive down to Sydney was fairly easy, there was a lot of traffic but it mainly kept moving. Getting through to Leichhardt had a few moments of tricky traffic with the trailer on, but we made it fine. As I approached our friends’ house I saw a parking spot about 2 ½ cars long, in front of a boat. It was long enough for me to drive into it, then reverse back at bit and wiggle back and forth to get the trailer fairly straight (and mainly off the cycle lane). It was only a few houses away from where we were staying so I was very pleased with the spot.

Our friends weren’t home until after work, so we had some lunch at the car, then walked down to the Light Rail station at Lilyfield. We stopped on the way to buy Opal cards, and I bought a scratchie as well which we did at the station – we didn’t win anything but the kids enjoyed scratching it. The train was very crowded and took a long time to get to Central. Once there we caught a regular train to Circular Quay – we sat upstairs which was exciting for kids used to Melbourne, single level, trains (and I always love catching Sydney trains). Getting off the train at Circular Quay we had a great view over the Quay, the Harbour Bridge and the Opera House. We stood at the edge of the platform and looked at the view, and noticed a street artist down on the path below – he was completely dressed and painted in gold, and appeared to be hovering in mid air – he had one hand resting on top of a pole, and was sitting cross legged about a metre off the ground. We headed downstairs to see if we could see how he was doing it, but he was packing up by the time we got there. From what we could see, the pole was firmly anchored in a base plate, but there was no other support – so we think he was balancing just on the strength of his arm on the pole.

We wandered around to the Opera House, looking at the markers showing the 1788 waterline. We admired a street artist’s painting of the harbour and gave him some money. At the Opera House we sat on the ledge around the edge of the point and looked at the Bridge, the boats and ferries going past, and the sails of the Opera House. We walked across the base of the steps and went down to the pontoon at Man-of-war steps, Amelie didn’t like being on the moving pontoon, so she played with some soft, sparkly sand on the path back on dry land. Caitlin and Liam had a look around, then we walked back up the Opera Houses steps and sat on one of the sloping parts in front of a window. It was tempting to run up to the top of the slope but there was a sign saying not to, so we sat at the bottom and looked at all the different aspects of the sails that we could see from there. We went over and touched some of the tiles and looked at the different patterns and how different they looked from a distance compared to up close.

Amelie wanted to see the Botanic Gardens so we wandered over there and the kids played around a sculpture of mother earth, Caitlin climbed a fig tree, and we went to look at gazebo that was installed recently, which had lots of symbolism about the colonial impact of Governor Macquarie and his wife. It was a gorgeous sunny afternoon so the backdrop was incredible, with the harbour and boats and bridge always in sight.

We wandered back towards the station, stopping briefly to share a cup of delicious lemon sorbet. We got to the platform just in time to jump on a train – one of the newer ones that I don’t think I’ve been on before. We admired the old fashioned style of Museum station as we went through, then got off the train at Central. The light rail train was just pulling in as we arrived at the platform, we were able to get on and get seats this time. The trip back seemed much quicker, and we wandered up the hill in much cooler temperatures, just before sunset.

Our friends were sitting on the front steps waiting for us when we arrived. We had a drink of water then sat out the back for a while and the kids played tennis with small plastic rackets, until the mozzies got too bad. We had delicious pizza for dinner and all the kids got on well. (Our friends’ 2 kids and another friend of theirs who was sleeping over). The younger kids played with loom bands for a while and did some puzzles, Caitlin sat with the adults and we played a game called Love Letters. The boys played Uno then started to watch our game, and we switched out players so that everyone had a turn. My host and I had a cocktail and it was a fun night, full of laughter and catching up.

Brisbane Trip Day 20: Brisbane

None of us had any plans for today, nowhere to be at any particular time, and it was quite pleasant to know we could take our time over getting up or doing whatever we wanted to do. I spent a while on the computer and chatting to my friend and the kids. As the big girls got up they decided they wanted to go shopping, so in the late morning my friend dropped them at the shopping centre in Ipswich. She came back and we kept chatting, she was dehydrating a heap of food so we sat in the kitchen while she did that. The other kids played Roblox and Minecraft and Amelie played Pokemon a bit on her DS. As usual there was also playing with kittens when they were in sight. The girls rang and asked if they could catch the train to Redbank, which we said was fine. I did a little bit of organising of our stuff so that it won't be too hard to pack up when we leave, and started to think about how much longer we'll stay. My friend and I spent some more time laying on the bed and watching TV, and we both ended up having a nap in the late afternoon. Another friend of hers called around for a little while. I'd just woken from my nap when the girls surprised us by walking in the door - they'd caught the train and bus home themselves - we were pretty impressed that they navigated the public transport system on their own, the other girls had never done it before and Caitlin doesn't know Brisbane at all. They were pretty proud of themselves, although very very tired.

The boys and Amelie spent some time outside playing on the trampoline and with water balloons. The big girls decided to put up the roof top tent on the bus, but it had lots of ants in it so they decided not to sleep there. The boys played in it and on the bus for a while. My friend and I moved out to the lounge room to watch the big TV while the kids were all busy. We ate dinner and the boys played xbox in the bedroom for a while, and the big girls watched netflix in another room - by the end of the evening all the kids were on the lounge with us. Another very relaxing and very fun day - we're all feeling good and really loving spending time with this wonderful family.

Half-lap Day 43: Darwin

A wind came up in the night and I was feeling quite disoriented, couldn’t figure out which way the tent was facing, and I slept quite badly. The weather was much cooler in the morning though, very pleasant. Tony had a sleep in and felt much better when he woke up, although his knee is still quite sore. We had breakfast and pottered around the tent, Tony put the awning up, I had another go at everyone’s hair, we haven’t quite managed to get rid of all the head lice yet. We chatted a little to our hosts then had some sandwiches for lunch.

In the afternoon we drove in to the Darwin Museum. The kids spent a lot of time looking at the natural history part – displays of shells, birds, reptiles, desert animals, Darwin Harbour creatures, fish, dinosaurs, mangrove dwellers – all based on animals that live (or have lived) in the Northern Territory. We moved on then to the Cyclone Tracy exhibit – I loved it when I was here 20 years ago and it was pretty much the same, although equally as moving. Having experienced the strong winds we did in Hahndorf last month, the kids could really appreciate how much stronger the cyclone’s winds must have been to cause the damage that they did.

From there we went up to see Sweetheart the crocodile – a mounted skin and skeleton from a 5.13m crocodile that drowned when it was being moved many years ago. I’d been trying to explain to Millie how long saltwater crocs can get – and seeing the actual size of a big one boggled all our minds. It is hard to comprehend that a living creature could get so big. It was also cool to see a skull replica of the ancient crocodile ancestor which was at least twice as big as the real crocodile.

Caitlin and I wanted to look at the indigenous art section, so Tony took the others to the Discovery Room for kids. The art was fascinating, especially looking at the very different styles from different parts of the continent. In the Discovery room the kids were playing with blocks, the did some drawings and looked at the animals displayed around the rooms. Tony went out to watch a bit of the Collingwood game on his phone, and Caitlin and LiAM and I had fun with a poster where the names of colours were written in a different colour and you had to say the colour of the ink rather than read the word – it was really difficult. Caitlin went to browse the gift shop and LiAM and I played with some cogs and wooden bars on a little tool bench – we were trying to move a bar from one spot to another using the cogs – we refined our design probably 7 or 8 times and eventually got it to work, it was a lot of fun.

We all went to the gift shop then and there were things that everyone wanted but they weren’t specifically Darwin related things, more cool museum toys that we can probably get in the shop at Melbourne Museum so everyone decided to leave them. I still haven’t found any aboriginal art that I like that I can afford, so thought I might buy something from here with art printed on it, after a while I found some lens cleaning cloths that I really liked with a beautiful print, and the proceeds go back to the artist’s community, so I got that.

We had a look at the fish pond, seeing a pig-nosed turtle and lots of archer fish (my new favourite fish) and rainbow fish, then wandered down to the harbour shore. It was pretty exciting – when we left Port Augusta 30 days ago we said we wouldn’t see ocean again until we reached the other side of the country, and here we are! It was so vast and so blue, and the afternoon sun was shining brightly on it – very pretty.

We wandered around on the shore for a while, found some tiny little brown crabs that were so camouflaged we really could only see them if they moved, a shell with a crab in it, a tiny spider, lots of skimming stones for Tony (the water was really smooth), and lots of cool rocks and shells. The kids didn’t have hats on and the sun was pretty strong (less humidity today but still hot) so everyone got tired really quickly. We had stressed to the kids that we don’t swim in the harbour because of crocodiles (and stingers) but there were people tubing and in the water – not something I’d want to be doing.

Happy to be back on the coast

LiAM with crabs and shells

Back to the car and we went for a drive around East Point reserve, seeing mangroves and the sun on the cliffs back near where we were, and the big gun turrets from WWII. Everyone seemed fairly uninterested in exploring further, so I drove us in to the city to have a look around there. It was cool to see places I recognised from last time I was here. We were trying to decide whether to just head home or to have something to eat before we went, and ended up going out to Nightcliff and getting hot chips and watching the sun set over the water. There were so many people at Nightcliff, but we drove a bit past the jetty and found somewhere to park and a spot on the beach that wasn’t too crowded. We sat on some rocks that made a ledge over the beach – LiAM jumped down onto the sand a few times – and ate and watched the sun set and the water change colour continually, it was incredibly beautiful.

Once the mossies came out we headed home, driving back a different way and seeing a bit more of Darwin. Back at the tent we had a quick chat to our hosts then got ready for bed and read a few chapters.

Half-lap Day 13: Flinders Ranges -> Pimba

We woke to another sunny day and began packing up our campsite. We didn’t rush, enjoyed the scenery and the morning and got things done as we could. I went for a walk with Caitlin and LiAM to see the things they’d discovered in their explorations – a tyre in the dry creekbed they’d named Wombat Tyre (as it looked like a wombat from a distance), Sun Fence Hill, and Magpie Mountain. It was very pleasant wandering through the trees and rocks of the hills surrounding our campsite, and we came across several wallabies as we walked.

Exploring near our campsite

We left in the late morning, and enjoyed the views of the Flinders Ranges as we drove away. Even in the light of the middle of the day they were impressive. As we drove south again we saw many more ruins of stone houses and barns – I’m guessing the droughts of the early years of farming out here meant that most people left and their buildings fell apart.

We stopped in Quorn when we saw the steam train from the Pichi Richi railway was in town. We ran over to the station in time to see it reverse out of the yard, heading down the line to get water. It wouldn’t be back to leave for it’s trip to Port Augusta for another hour or so, so we didn’t wait around for it. Millie and I had a browse in a little art gallery/homewares store, and saw some beautiful paintings and photos of the surrounding area.

Driving from Quorn to Port Augusta (listening to Harry Potter) we crossed the railway line several times, seeing some cool bridges and driving windy roads through the hills. It was exciting to see the gulf as we approached Port Augusta – we haven’t seen much water at all on the trip so far, and won’t see much more until we get to Darwin (although the 2^nd part of our trip will involve much more ocean). We stopped in Port Augusta to get fuel and groceries, and the kids played along the foreshore for a little while.

Heading out was exciting, especially once we passed through the intersection where we could head to Darwin or to Perth – we’ll come back to that spot in a few months time. For now though we were heading up the middle to the outback. The terrain became very flat, and there were large areas without any trees. Suddenly the land dropped away to our left and there was a large lagoon (with some water in it) and a couple of large hills poking out of it like islands (it’s called Island Lagoon). It was unexpected and quite breathtaking. We also started to see road trains – huge trucks with 3 trailers.

We stopped at Spuds roadhouse at Pimba – a free camp, where we set up in the large parking area with lots of caravans. The ground was too hard for our pegs, so we tied the guy ropes to the fence, and put LiAM’s bed across the bottom end of the tent to hold those corners down. The girls were happy to just sleep on the thermorests and not get their beds out. 

Train at Spuds roadhouse, Pimba

We had hot chips for dinner at the pub (when we arrived the smell was so enticing, and it was fun sitting in the beer garden eating chips and drinking soft drink as a treat). We saw a great sunset across the plains, and a couple of trains went past while we were setting up. Caitlin had a shower then we all settled in for some Brisingr and tried to get to sleep while battling off mossies.

Half-lap Day 7: Hahndorf

Sunday was mothers day. We were up earlyish and hung around the tent, reading, catching up on email and so on. The kids gave me their presents - dark chocolate honeycomb from Millie, and a block of 88% dark chocolate from LiAM - it's the darkest I've eaten and it is delightfully bitter, really satisfying and I love it. Caitlin had already given me her present before we left - scented shower bombs, so I'm looking forward to using those when we get back.

Tony cooked bacon and eggs for breakfast - the bacon was amazing, thick and tasty, a perfect mothers day breakfast. The rest of the morning we spent pottering around the caravan park - playing air hockey and fusball, chess, and playing games at the tent. I was downloading some audio books to our computer when suddenly it turned itself off and I couldn't get it back on - this has happened before and I did get it fixed, but wasn't happy at the idea of trying to fit that in to our time in the Adelaide Hills.

Tony started to work on installing the dual battery in to the car, so the kids and I decided to go exploring. I discovered we could catch a bus from Hahndorf to Mt Lofty - we needed to leave almost immediately though unless we wanted to go much later in the day and I felt like the weather would be worse by then. It was already drizzling quite a bit. Tony drove us in to Hahndorf so that we could buy bus tickets - the mothers day traffic heading in to the town was slow and heavy. He dropped us off about half way as walking was going to be about as quick as driving from that point, and it was easier for him to get back from there. We went to the newsagent to buy tickets and she said she didn't sell them, I'd have to go to Mt Barker. After a bit of discussion I found out that I could buy them on the bus (I didn't find that info on the website) so it was fine - although it did mean that we could have just caught the bus from out the front of the caravan park, without all the rushing around.

Anyway, we finally got on the bus and I really enjoyed the trip through parts of the Adelaide Hills I hadn't seen before (Bridgewater, Aldgate, Stirling). Really really pretty. We changed buses and went up to the summit of Mt Lofty. The rain was falling hard here, and the mountain was covered in cloud. It was icy cold as well - and still fun to go and stand at the lookout and see nothing but cloud below us. We could look at the pictures of what the view normally was, and enjoyed the experience of really being in the elements. We went for a quick 10 minute walk around the base of the lookout - I love walking through the bush in the cloud, it really means I focus my attention on the foliage around me, and it was beautiful. It's obviously recovering from bushfire which always fascinates me too. The kids popped in to the gift shop for Millie to buy my birthday present.

We had the choice of catching the bus back after 30 minutes or waiting 3 1/2 hours, so we chose the quick trip option. We sat at the bus stop eating ritz and tuna in the rain and then jumped back on the bus. Changing buses at the base of the mountain we found the driest place to stand was outside the bus shelter, up against the wall - the rain was swirling around inside the shelter. Back on the next bus (with the same driver as the first time) and through the pretty suburbs again and to our caravan park.

We hung out at the tent reading and playing games through the afternoon. I was a little frustrated that my computer wasn't working, as I'd planned to do more work while I had wifi and power handy. I researched how to fix the problem and found a possible solution, but I needed a tiny screwdriver which I didn't have - I figured I'd sort it out on Monday.

Tony cooked a chicken curry for mothers day tea, it was delicious, and lovely to sit cosy under our annex eating a warm meal while it rained outside. We headed to bed pretty early, everyone was tired and happy to go in and read Brisingr.

Half-lap trip Day 2: Creswick -> The Grampians

We were up a few times in the night with people needing to go to the toilet, rearrange blankets and so on. It was cold, but bearable in the tent. There was a strong wind blowing all night, it sounded like heavy rain as it blew through the tops of all the gum trees – but being down in the creek gully the tent was not shaken at all, it was very protected.

In the morning the kids got up and explored the gully some more. There were lots of dry rivulets which would have been great places to find gold many years ago. Near our camp was a log which had fallen across the creek bed, so the kids spent a lot of time walking back and forth across that and made up a game about people surviving in the woods and needing to escape crocodiles and other hazards.

Tony got the fire going again and throughout the morning we had cups of tea and toast and cereal as we felt like it. Millie and I went for a walk through another part of the surrounding creek bed, and found some cool holes in the ground, lots of new trees growing up through cracks in the rocks, and old trees that had fallen as the creek beds have been eroded. Back at camp our neighbour had come over to say hi – a prospector called Barry, who told us a lot about the gold he’d found in this and other areas, a bit of the history of the area, and about how he uses the black cockatoos so help predict the weather based on how they are flying and calling. He showed us photos of some of the gold he’s found (biggest find was about 10oz) and brought over his divining rods – all the kids had a go and Caitlin in particular was able to use them really well, when she walked over some bottle lids on the ground the rods swung together, it was amazing. The kids also collected and then cleaned lots of quartz – we left most of it behind when we left though.

Our campsite down among the trees

Caitlin with the divining rods

We slowly packed up throughout the morning, it was lovely to take our time after the rush of the previous week or so. The only hurry was to make sure we got the tent down before it rained, and we managed that. I spent a fair bit of time  rearranging how things were packed – it still needs a bit of work but we’ll get better at it each time I imagine.

We finally headed off (after packing for a while in the rain) at 2pm. First stop was Ararat – Tony took us to see the house where his mum grew up, and showed us other sights and houses that he remembered from visiting Ararat as a kid. We stopped to get some steamed dim sims which Tony remembered were the best he’d ever had, but the shop was closed which was quite disappointing. We called in to see Tony’s uncle and his wife – it had been a few years since we saw them and we had a lovely visit, so glad that they were home at the time we passed through (they’d been out all morning so we only just caught them). Noel was very pleased to meet all of our kids again and have a good chat to Tony.

We headed west in the rain then realised that Caitlin’s hand bag was still at Noel’s, so we went back in to town and Tone dropped me at Woolworths to get milk and something for tea, while he went and retrieved the bag. I grabbed a hot chicken as I figured it would be cold and dark by the time we arrived at the Grampians, so we ate hot chicken in the car on the way and felt warm and nourished by the time we arrived.

It rained a lot of the way to the Grampians but had stopped as we got close. There were a lot of kangaroos along the edges of the road and in the paddocks we drove past. As we drove the last 8km out to our campsite (Plantation Campground, a free campground just north of the Grampians National Park), we had to slow down several times for rock wallabies  who were drinking out of puddles in the middle of the road, and were reluctant to move until we got quite close.

We arrived at the campground a bit before 6. I’d rung to check availability and the lady said there’d be plenty of room, however there were several school groups and a number of other sites in use – we found somewhere easily though. The site we selected had a wallaby nearby when we arrived, which felt like a good sign. The kids went and explored the bush while Tony and I set up – only took half an hour to get the tent up tonight.

We made hot drinks and had the rest of the chicken, then set up the annexe so that we had more shelter. It’s only the 2^nd time we’ve ever done it so didn’t know how hard it would be – it wasn’t too difficult and we figured out things that we’d do differently next time so it will get easier. We got it up just in time as there was more rain – bizarrely though we could see all the stars above us when it was raining!

Millie fell asleep early and the rest of us tidied up our campsite then got in to bed around 9pm, talked for a while and gradually went to sleep.