ANZAC MORNING AT COOLANGATTA BEACH, SOMETHING VERY SPECIAL

Week two at Tallebudgera Creek, and the weather continues to be nothing short of glorious. The mornings are a bit cool, (how sad I hear you say), but with what we are hearing about Melbourne weather, we have nothing to complain about (and hey, we're not complaining!). Friday morning we attended the Anzac Dawn service on Coolangatta Beach - they did it well, complete with bagpipes, fly-over, a navy band - it was a very emotional service in a beautiful setting - photos included. Sunday afternoon we took the bus to Skilled Park and watched the Gold Coast Titans flog the Auckland Warriors (NRL for those of you uninitiated!) We have done lots of bushwalking this week, including a wonderful 12 k walk at Binnaburra (Lamington National Park). Google it, it's beautiful. However, 12 ks was possibly just a tad too far for these poor old buggers, as most of it was up hill! But well worth the slog, and we pulled up pretty well today considering! Add this to swimming, fishing, reading, shopping, eating ..... well, it's all just a bit too much isn't it! But this week the fish have won, not even a bite!
The park is really quiet at the moment, NSW school holidays having finished this week, so we have gone from being chockers, to about thirty vans and tents (and all about our age or older, strange to say!). However, this is set to change this weekend, as it is Labour Weekend up here. Monday morning we pack up and shift up the other end of the Gold Coast, up to Main Beach caravan park, closer to Surfers, also closer to Seaworld which we want to visit next week. So we will get a chance to explore up that end. Then it's off to Brisbane, where I will post the next blog. Bye for now.

Sunshine on the Gold Coast

At last we have nice sunny weather! We are at Tallebudgera Creek Tourist Park, a great spot right beside the Gold Coast Highway, with the creek on one side, and the beach just across the road. It is a fabulous big park, lots of room and great amenities. We went fishing yesterday with opposing results! Warren's fish was my breakfast this morning, nothing like fresh whiting! My fish, needless to say, was thrown back. We felt he needed a bit more growing time, ha ha!

We're off to Pacific Fair for some retail therapy - woo hoo!

BEAUTIFUL YAMBA, RAIN ONE MINUTE, THUNDERSTORMS THE NEXT!!

this first photo shows the view from our site when it's not sunny, the second when it is!

This is such a pretty place, but the weather here is atrocious - blew a gale all thursday night, so much so we took down our awning. then last night it started to rain, and rain, and then some. take a look at the weather map of australia. the only place it is raining is down the east coast of australia. and where are we?????????????? enuff said! still, mustn't grumble. hasn't stopped us walking and fishing and things. wozzie now has two fish to my one, and we still haven't got a photo to prove it! we are having a thunderstorm at the moment, but cooking tea in our kettle-oven thingy which my work gave us at the same time, it is brilliant for both barbequing and roasting. we have learned so much in the past three days here, lots of poeple wander over and tell you things, including one chappy who was watching us put up the awning with this bemused expression on his face. When we had finished (we thought), he wandered over and said - um, you realise you're not putting that up properly? ah, no! says we. well, if you slide that piece out, it will lock the stays into place. oh, says we, THAT's what those black knobs are for! it's been a huge learning curve, that's for sure. but lots of laughs. Yamba is a wonderful fishing town, with lots of bays and inlets, and this amazing breakwater, which we walked this morning. We feel sorry for the people in tents and campervans, at least we are warm and dry with plenty of room! We move on to the Gold Coast on Monday, and the longterm forecast doens't look too hot for there either! oh well, can't do much about the weather. I'm sure I'll be complaining about how hot it is before too long!

NAMBUCCA HEADS

We loved it here! we had another visitor, as the photo shows!

visitor!

we had a little visitor at breakfast this morning.

WELL AND TRULY ON THE WAY

After spending two nights at Cobram, and getting covered in red dust from the dust storms up there, we headed for home, packed the rest of the stuff in the van, said goodbye to our family and friends, took the van down to the carwash and tried (unsuccesfully) to get the dust off, and headed off into the hills at about 8.30 thursday night. we drove as far as the GrassTree rest area, and spent the night there listening to the trucks coming and going in between snatches of sleep. Driving with a caravan behind you is a totally new experience! The car is managing okay, we go up the hills really, really slowly, but down the hills much faster, and use TWICE as much fuel as normal, but it's doing the job, so we're pretty happy. It's quite interesting (for want of a better word!) when trucks go past you, as they kind of suck you towards them just for a second or two. they obviously break the air currents going round you, and form a kind of vaccuum between you and them. It's a bit disconcerting at times, particularly when it's windy. but we are getting used to it. I even had a drive on Friday. We went as far as Yass on Friday, pulled up at the caravan park, went inside and booked in, came out and car wouldn't start. One very dead battery! Apart from that though, no problems. We arrived at the Entrance Saturday lunchtime, got ourselves set up in this very nice caravan park by the beach, and headed off to see Warren's mum. spent two days with Mum, took her to church etc. Sunday morning. Got there nice and early to pick her up (we forgot it was daylight saving end didn't we). The looks on our faces when she opened the door in her dressinggown must have been priceless. We left The Entrance yesterday morning (Tuesday), having fixed all mum's little jobs that needed doing, and set off for Forster. Getting nearer to Forster it started to rain, and rain and RAIN - the most torrential rain I've seen for ages and ages. There are no water restrictions up here, the guy was hosing down the paths around the camping ground this morning! So we were setting up camp in the rain, not fun. but we got there. the rain stopped just enough for us to get everything unhooked fortunately. Times like this it is so good to have a shower/toilet van!
Weather today (Wednesday) is so much nicer, got the washing dry, dried out everything, and even put up the awning. Went for a drive into Forster and Tuncurry today. It is very pretty, ocean on one side, lake on the other, just like most of the towns on the NSW east coast. So now we are here until Saturday, then head for Nambucca Heads. Catch up with you all later!

it's ours, finally

picked up the van on tuesday, 1st april. it's stunning! just everythng we imagined. so here we are now at Cobram RACV just trying out everything and get used to shower blocks and toilets and things. life is good, we are so blessed.