THE END

Today, 3 years and 2 months ago, we set off to see Aus. We told our tenants they had a guaranteed 18 months in our house and they are still there. We'd never owned a caravan or 4 WD and didn't know if we'd enjoy the lifestyle. Now we know we do!

Last night we stopped to fill up with diesel and the man beside us asked where we were off to-Russ said "home" and I nearly started to cry. I'd love to keep going, but if I did, I'd get house sick and want the house. I'm excited to be moving into our new little villa but so sad to be finishing our most amazing journey. I've always loved the reaction we get from someone when they ask "so how long have you been on the road" and somehow feel a bit of a quitter. I've loved watching the kilometres and the months tick over.

However, we will be better able to get to places like the Gulf and Northern Queensland leaving from Victoria. It's hard to travel up and down and around and arrive in the right season for a particular place if you've left somewhere up north at the end of its good season (if you get what I mean).

Lots of people ask us where our favourite place in Australia has been and that's been almost impossible to answer-I love anywhere any of our kids and partners are, I love anywhere the fishing is good (Tasmania, Walpole, Exmouth and Coral Bay (all WA)), Denham because we have wonderful friends who go there every year and the Ningaloo Reef because the water is warm, the fishing is good and the weather is perfect for a few months a year! Litchfield National Park (NT)was great, yabbying on Fairburn Dam (QLD) another highlight, so were the WA goldfields. And the Kimberly and Pilbara in spring was beautiful. In the end though, coming home to Warrnambool to the people we know is really the best of all (especially when we know we can pack the van up and go again!).

I don't think a blog about life in Warrnabool is so very exciting and have decided to finish it now. Thanks to ALL you people who have written or told me how much you enjoyed it;so did I and I was so lucky to be able to go do it!

Easter and 10 nights in Traralgon

Thursday night, we went over to Verity's parents place for a little party for Kobie. It was a nice family one with sausage rolls, little boys, fairy bread and an Iggle Piggle birthday cake. The birthday boy stayed up long enough to have a little to eat, accept his gifts and play in the cake, then he had a spa and was off to bed!



Friday we took a heap of fish and some squid to sister Glenda's to share for lunch. Glenda had also done a lovely smoked trout pate-about 12 of us were there. We ate dinner with Mel and Michael at their cabin in the caravan park that night.



On Saturday it was my birthday. My son Mick had suggested we go out to Chinese-15 of us had a really good night at Traralgon Lion City. On Sunday, Daniel decided a family BBQ/picnic would be fun at Newman Park. It has good BBQs and a great playground so about 20 of us had a fun time there. It's especially fun to watch Kobie enjoying the swings and slides now! We had a couple of quiet nights Sunday and Monday night.





On Wednesday after baby sitting Kobie for the day, we had dinner with old friends Ruth and Bob Duljas. Thursday, we sat Kobie in the morning, then drove to Sale via Maffra, then home along the highway. I used to live in a number of small towns in the area, so I always enjoy a look around. I was rapt to get a couple of replacement pieces for a new dinner set we bought in Tasmania at Sale's Target store (one was missing and one broke being carted all over the place on rough dirt roads). Thursday night we had dinner with another old friend Christine and husband Gary and her two daughters Dee and Shannon and SHannon's husband George. I met Chris at my 21st when the girls were 2 and 6, they are 35 and 39 now. We had dinner at Shannon's beautiful new home and about a million drinks. It was a very late night (morning), a taxi ride home and a very slow day Friday with dinner out at la Porchetta but home to bed by 8.30.

I cooked dinner for the four of us at Glenda and Peter's on Saturday night, then today we drove to Port Fairy stopping for lunch with daughter in law Leah in Melbourne. I'm working for Kirstyn at the B&B in the morning (poor girl has a cold) and dinner out tomorrow night with Paul and Wendy (who we met in Tas).



I was pleasantly suprised with the Park Lane Caravan Park. We've spent an awful lot of time in parks over the last three years and it was one of the very better ones-really clean amenities, nice pool, spa, mini golf, good play ground and good sized sites. I'd be happy to stay there any time.

Now we are hoping the titles come through for our house this week and we can settle up and start moving in.

Narawntapu National Park

Narawntapu National Park is about 35ks from Port Sorell (you look at it across the Rubicon Estuary and the park sits between that and the ocean. We hadn't visited it, but had a couple of hours to kill yesterday (due to high level of organisation packing the day before ;-) )



It (the park) was a former spud farm and is really quite flat and featureless, but it has some nice camping areas, a lot of birds and wild life and is unique in that you can take along horses (there is a large holding yard) and ride on designated trails. The yards have a camping area alongside, so it would be wonderful for horsey people.

We were rapt to see a wombat and her baby grazing on the short grass by the visitor's centre-it's the first time I've ever seen a little on up so close.



Finally we got on the boat and had another super smooth trip across Bass Strait. I forgot and left a glass on the kitchen bench. It was in exactly the same place I left it when we arrived in Traralgon. The boat docked at 5.50 and we were off and on the road by 6.10am. We'd planned to go to Leah's for breakfast, but figured Jan and Russ at 6.15 would be too much for the poor girl and headed to Traralgon. We were at the caravan park by 10.00 after stopping for breakfast in Bunyip. The chatty roadhouse owner somehow got to telling us lots of travellers were passing through eg, the people beside us were from Warrnambool. What a small world. They live on Caramut road and their daughter lives in flats at number 14 Panorama Ave (we live across the road at 15!

We got set up, then went and had lunch with Dan, Verity Kobie (the birthday boy today) my ex Allan and his new lady friend Sue. Tonight we are off to a little party for him at Verity's parents. Kobie cried when he saw us but cheered up when we produced one of his birthday presents (a Koala camping chair) which he really loved.

The Birthday Boy

Is My Face Red?

We were just about packed and ready to leave the caravan park when we decided to check our ferry ticket for the latest we could arrive at the terminal.
I looked and looked again hoping I was wrong, I asked Russ the date, then finally accepted we were booked to sail on Wednesday 8Th NOT Tuesday 7Th like we (I) thought.

Fortunately, we hadn't disconnected the water, power and waste water or wound the legs of the van up. More fortunate, we could stay on this site until 6pm Wednesday night. So out came the TV, antenna and our picnic tea we had made to eat on the boat. Luckily, we were able to change our booking in Traralgon (got that wrong too) and contact my son, my sister and Leah.

Our solicitor rang last night and the title for our villa has finally been lodged, so she thinks we will be able to take possession at the end of April. Hooray! It will be almost two months late, but it really isn't a problem to us.

Cradle Mountain

Pencil Pine Falls Cradle Mountain NP


Cradle mountain is one of Tasmania's most visited National Parks, so we thought we better go see it before we head home tomorrow night.

We had a bit of lunch stuff hanging around, but needed to get some ham at the local supermarket. After forgetting to do that, we drove through Railton to Sheffield (the town of murals) where we stopped for a walk and to get that ham. We found a BBQ pack (containing 3 burgers, 3 snags and 2 small steaks) on a throw out special for $2, so bought it instead. Sheffield has one free public BBQ in the middle of a park in town-by the time we cooked our feast, the day was cold and getting colder, but it was so good! Sheffield has over 50 murals-painted to "save" the town about 20 years ago. It seems to have worked, as the little town was really busy while we were there. Lots of new homes seem to have gone up since we were last in town too.

Sheffield sits at the foot of Mt Roland and the drive to Cradle mountain takes you right out past it. It was very beautiful.

Cradle Mountain and Dove Lake


By now it was getting colder still and when we arrived at the Dove Lake car park it was sleeting. So much for the iconic view of Cradle Mountain reflected in Dove Lake. We did manage a couple of short walks in the area, but had hoped to do a couple more. Even with the rain and cloud, it is a stunning national park and I think we'll come back in a year or two and do it on a nice day.

SNOW! (in April)


We came home via Wilmot and Forth. We stopped and bought some of our favourite Dutch Cream potatoes from a farm gate to bring home with us, plus some local carrots and spray free apples. We were kept entertained spotting mail boxes on a 10k stretch of road out of Wilmot. We spotted Tin Man, dogs, wombats, Ned Kelly, Motorbikes, Cars, Rockets, Horses, you name it we saw it. Dozens of properties have the craziest letter boxes.

Mt Roland

Beaconsfield

Mining Heritage Centre

We've had a relaxing few days here in Port Sorell. The park is almost completely empty so is very quiet. We find we've been sleeping really late without the usual early risers and packer upers. It's wonderful.

On ^Tuesday we caught up with our laundry and did a bit of shopping-there is a great little strip of shops at near by Shearwater.

Wednesday, we put the boat in on the estuary. I caught a good sized flatty almost immediately, then only one more just size fish in the following three hours. Russ caught a couple of undersized ones in the same time. On the way home, we stopped near the boat ramp and he caught one more good sized one. When we got back to the boat ramp, both were still very alive and active, so we let them go. There are big tides here and that meant our drifts were probably too fast to catch fish-but it's better to d4rift over flathead than wait for them to come to you. Oh well, there had to have one shitty fishing spot!

On Thursday we drove along the old coast road to Burnie. We haven't been there for about 10 years (since my mate Henry lived there) and it seems to have really gone ahead. The CBD is much nicer and the shops seemed busy. We had lunch in a Chinese restaurant, then bought a new doona set and two new dinner sets for the house, and lastly stopped at the Lactos factory and treated ourselves to some delicious cheese. We had a couple of drinks with Blair at the Devenport airport before he flew home to Melbourne which was great.



Today we drove to Beaconsfield to visit the Mining Heritage Centre. It's a pretty decent museum-well laid out and enough to read without going into overkill. I think the most amazing display is the one that deals with the mine collapse and rescue of Todd Russell and Brant Webb in April/May 2006. There is a replica of the pipe that was eventually laid and the cage they were trapped in for two weeks. It's a dreadful feeling just to pop your head up into the space and try to imagine spending two weeks there!



I was surprised at what a pretty area Beaconsfield, Beauty Point, Kelso and Greens Beach is and how many people live there.

Port Sorell-Our Last Stay in Tassie

Paddymelon by the Van


Yesterday, we were supposed to leave Mt Field NP, but had both had a lousy nights sleep, it was raining and we decided to extend another night. We spent a lazy day, just taking a little walk through the tall trees. After dinner, we rugged up and walked to the falls with our torch to see the glow worms-they were a bit of a non event, but it was still fun.

Tall Trees


We drove from Mt Field NP to Port Sorell today-it's 330ks and about as far as you want to drive in Tassie towing a van. We arrived here after 6 hours of driving (with a quick stop for lunch) feeling like we'd driven double the time. We are staying 8 nights here with a late check out on the last day to keep the freezer plugged in as long as we can before we board the ferry for the trip home. I should mention that we stopped in the inevitable bakery in Ross and had THE best pies ever-Tasmanian Salmon and Brie. We both thought we'd died and gone to pie heaven. When we get into our house, I'm going to have a try at making them.

The caravan park here has 8 tourist sites and all but one have en suites. It was amazingly cheap for the 8 nights-$21.50 a night with the en suite.

We stopped on the way in Longford at the meat works and stocked up so the freezer is full to bursting for the trip home. We find it travels better like that, and good looking whole porterhouse was $9.99 a kg.

I got a lovely e-mail today offering me some work when we get home at one of my long time favourite casual jobs, TAFE canteen. I'm thrilled and it made my day.