I'm home! Five weeks and 4671 kilometres later, I'm back where I started. My! It's a long way to Brisbane! But it was worth it since I was able to spend a lovely relaxing time with my brother and his family. Simon had catered to perfection for Christmas (and the next day and the next and ...) and we enjoyed the cricket, playing scrabble and generally chilling out over the Christmas break. Each morning, Maggie and I got up very early to go for our walk, trying to beat the heat, and we discovered some hidden gems in the Birkdale area, such as an area of bushland near a cricket oval. Maggie discovered water dragons (scary!) and rabbits (delightful!) but was happy to get home each time, away from the humidity and strong sun.
Walking around the streets, I was delighted by the range of colours of the frangipanis
Maggie with her Christmas bandanna
Aleera 'helping' unwrap the presents
But much as I would have liked to laze around, I needed to get home. So I gathered up my belongings, tossed the dog in the van, put Sila's beautiful rendang in the freezer, hugged everyone goodbye and set off. I was going to end up doing some of the biggest days of driving yet ... much as I love Van Morrison, he's not an easy drive so in the past I have usually kept to a 250+ km day. Not this time! You know how it is. You start on the homeward journey and you just want to get there. No distractions, no shilly-shallying! Mind you, I did do some detours ...
The first day ended up huge! Eight hours driving! Mind you, it wasn't meant to be like this ... I had planned all my stops (free camps) for the trip home but somehow I didn't stick to the plan. The first problem was at Beardy Waters which was full. OK, plan B said go to Mother of Ducks Lagoon at Guyra but they had lied and there wasn't a toilet there. OK, so onward and onward ... the showground at Armidale was closed ... and eventually back to the lovely Bendemeer. I deserved a night out after that marathon so Maggie and I went to the pub. I recommend Bendemeer campground and the pub to you all, a beautiful river, fantastic beer garden, great food ... but don't tell everyone!
Maggie loved the river at Bendemeer, also the rabbits, the free dog treats at the pub and the fact that we had stopped driving!
Around Beardy Waters, the Rotary Club had built a whole lot of pi symbols. I was impressed with their idea of bringing maths to the camping fraternity ... but then someone ruined it by telling me it was because Stonehenge was just up the road.
Rejuvenated, I set off the next day aiming for a camp near Dubbo. This is where I did a few detours. Detours around enormous potholes and also to a couple of places I'd not visited before. I finally got off the ruined New England highway and headed to Dunedoo. Now this was a little town worth the stop. It had some rather interesting sculptures, two beautiful pubs and a silo painted with Winx (evidently the jockey was born in Dunedoo). Maggie and I explored this little town (basically a very long main street) and then it was back on the road. I rejected my next two possible free camps ... it was New Years Eve and the camps were either full or full of ferals. No thanks! So I ended up in the caravan park in Wellington.
From Wellington (sorry, but there really wasn't anything even vaguely interesting about Wellington since it was totally shutdown, being New Years Day) I used a series of C, D and possibly E roads (I don't think they have the D and E classifications ... but they should) to get to Oura Beach on the 'Bidgee (just out of Wagga Wagga). Oh! Another delightful campground. There was so much space, lovely grassed areas and the Murrumbidgee was flowing rapidly passed a beautiful sandy beach. If that itch to get home wasn't itching so much, I would have stayed.
Nearly home ... I went through Coolamon to go to the cheese factory (closed) and some shops I remembered (also closed), headed south to The Rock, climbed up Morgan's Lookout, checked out more closed shops in Walla Walla and finally got to Wangaratta, where I had a lovely relaxing time with friend Carolyn. It was great to have a good sleep, having discovered that Van Morrison is quite uncomfortable to sleep in when it's hot.
Maggie was exhausted after battling the VERY strong current, chasing balls and evading a rather amorous labrador
Bliss!
That's rain coming!
Looks awful but it's flowering clover - the sheep were loving it
So I'm home! And there's lots to do. I walked into the house to discover spiders have taken over. The garden is full of thousands of weeds (although the vegie garden is looking pretty good, thanks to friend Kath) and the paddocks have enormous scotch thistles about to flower. Some are almost 3 metres tall! And I'm getting chooks again so that's exciting. So I think there's enough to keep me busy for quite a while - I've packed up Van Morrison and told him "That'll do, van. That'll do".
WEEDS!!!!
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