Travelling Home

Emma, Tiarre, Kate

We enjoyed 3 wonderful days in Adelaide with James, Kellie and Tiarre. We did manage to have a look at the City of Adelaide, an old looking city with very modern trams. And of course they have an Ikea, so we just had to spend a number of hours at Ikea so I could get my Ikea fix. Lunch at the Ikea cafe, the girls loved kids club and Darrin and I enjoyed spending time without the girls refurbishing our home Ikea style (lucky we were 1500km's from home and unable to transport it all home, but dreaming is fun!).

Adelaide Trams

I just love Ikea

With only six days before we have to return to work we wanted to enjoy them and drive only short distances each day. Leaving Adelaide we travelled East towards Tailem Bend where we found a rest area amoungst the trees to camp for the night. After the late night's we had at James and Kelli's we were all feeling quite tired so it was early to bed and we slept in until 9am the next morning. A nice easy morning we finally left camp around 11am. We travelled along the Mallee Highway and found it interesting visiting all the  towns along the way. Some of the small towns had a lot of the shops which had closed down, which I guess is an indication of the effect of the hardships during the drought and also the result of the increased buying from overseas countries. We did not get far when we stopped at a park for a play, some lunch and a cuppa. As we had only entered Victoria today we thought it would be nice to stay at least one night in Victoria, so we found a nice bush camp on the banks of the Murray River near the locality of Nyah. Having been spoilt over the last 6 months with crystal clear beautiful swimming the girls were not impressed with the caramel colour of the Murray River water so opted not to have a swim. We enjoyed this place to ourselves the green grass and a fire to toast our marshmellows.

Camping on the Murray River

Today is 12th October and my birthday. I could think of no better way to spend a birthday than living the dream of travelling this great country with my family. Darrin and the girls spoilt me with flowers and I had breakfast around the fire. I was nice to be in the peace and tranquility of the bush as well as still connected to the world of telephone - thank you everyone for the well wishes and thoughts.
After we had packed up camp we headed across the Murray River into NSW. As we entered NSW we were in the town of Tooleybuc, "wow look at that park, can we stop?". I must admit there are some awesome playgrounds in these outback towns, so we had to stop to try this park out.
When we reached Balranald we turned east onto the Sturt Highway and it was not long before we were in Hay. We found a park to stop for lunch, it was nice to stop and relax on the green grass of the park for the afternoon. After a number of hours enjoying the park it was time to look for a camp spot, we decided to camp on the banks of the Murrumbdigee River. We found a top spot to set up overlooking the river and plenty of firewood. Happy hour around the fire and another perfect night sharing our stories around the fire.


Camping on the Murrimbigee River

We are getting closer to home, we seemed to take our time today travelling only about 200km. We stopped at Narrandera for lunch, a good size town which seemed to have all the facilities you would need. An awesome playground which we enjoyed. I had a stroll down the main street to check out all the different shops. Further on we drove into Wagga Wagga, this place is only a few hours from home, but we had never been here. It was huge every shop you could think of except Ikea. But we were there for only 5 minutes and the traffic was getting too much for us so we kept going, leave exploring Wagga for another time.

Wagga Wagga

Dog on a tuckerbox near Gundagai

From here we could have made it back home for the night, but we were not ready for our adventure to end. We found a spot at Jugiong on the banks of the Murrumbidgee River for our last night. A locality with an awesome upmarket style cafe. The girls had been busting to give Darrin a haircut for a few weeks now so they gave Darrin a trim the next morning before we left camp and headed home.

The girls giving dad a haircut

It was Friday 14th October and time to go home, at this stage I was sad that our Aussie adventure ever had to end. But having been in touch with family and friends over the past week I was really looking forward to seeing everyone again. Life is not about where you live or what things you own, its about the efforts you make to get the most out of life and the people you have around you to enjoy life with. After spending 6 months with just Darrin, Emma and Kate we have grown so much as a family and we value each other more. The experiences we had together were just amazing. The friendship and the bond that the girls now have is something they will have forever, they understand each other better and the experience of the last 6 months will be something they will share forever. Darrin and I had a dream to take our children on a trip around Australia one day and that dream is now a real story we can share with everyone. I look forward to making our next dream a reality, but for the time being I will enjoy our life as we make it, the wonderful friendships we have and the family we have around us.

Home



Nullarbor

There are many ways to describe the Nullarbor, but the majority of people describe it a long and boring. Darrin and I have travelled this stretch before and I have memories of seeing so many things and the scenery spectacular. We had found a great brochure on the Nullarbor which the girls read up and believe it or not, it was seeing the longest stretch of straight road that they were looking forward - what visions must go thru their minds of what they are expecting?

Parmango-Balladonia Road



Deralynda Homestead


Preparing ourselves for the trip making sure we had all the essentials of fuel, water and plenty of lollies and chocolate, we were ready for the challenge or journey whatever it may be.
Leaving Cape Arid, the weather was still perfect we travelled the Parmango-Balladonia road, against advice from the tourist information centre that this road was boggy, sharp limestone rock and also sandy so therefore impassable. But we sourced further opinions from fellow travellers who have actually travelled this road and they said it was a good road. So we headed north to meet the mighty Nullarbor. The Parmango-Balladonia road was in excellent condition and we were surprised to see the terrain to be so rich with gum trees and flower, thinking it would be barron with low lying scrub like Cape Arid. Along the way we dropped into an old homestead which looked as though someone was living and working the land there one day and then abandoned it the next day.We all jumped out the of Troopy for a look around the buildings, within seconds we were swatting madly at the hundreds of overfriendly march flies, after 10 minutes enduring these friendly creatures I could see why this place was abandoned. The shed housed a carpet snake hanging out in the rafters and the small homestead looked like it was visited regularly by passing campers, with the contents of emergency food supplies, wood pile for the fire place and a place to escape the march flies. The homestead was built in 1890 and is called Deralynda Homestead, this homestead is one of many scattered from Balladonia to Israelite Bay which have been abandoned due the the shear isolation of this place.

Yes, we made it to the long stretch of bitumen called the Eyre Highway. Once we were on the bitumen the girls kept asking 'Are we on Australia's longest straight road yet?'. Luckily it was not long and we were at the start of it. Who would have thought 146 km's of bitumen could be so exciting!

The first detour off the bitumen was the blowhole. This blowhole was amazing, it was an air hole for the underground cave. As we stood at the edge of the hole the cool air was blowing out. It would be great on a hot day it would be like standing at the refrigerator with the door open.

Blowholes



First nights camp beside the Eyre Highway

 Our first nights stop was at a rest area just east of the Mundrabilla Roadhouse, it was beautiful weather conditions and we enjoyed sitting at the table for dinner as the sun set talking about what we all thought of the Nullabor so far. The next morning we were up at the break of day, as we were near the SA boarder and the time difference was 3 hours between WA and SA so the campers heading east to west were three hours ahead of us and up and about extremely early.
We stopped to have a look at each roadhouse Darrin was interested in the price of fuel with ranged from 1.68 to 1.94. The girls hung out to see what the playground had in store and I was most amused by the age era each roadhouse and motel represented. At some of the road houses I felt like I was on the set of a movie which would have been made back in the 70's or 80's with the big bessa brick, arches and very outdates decor. Even the playgrounds where just like the ones I use to play on when I was a kid with the traditional swing, see saw and long steep slides. But the girls loved every playground.  My favourite roadhouse would have to be Eucla Roadhouse because it felt like I was back in my childhood with the era playground and buildings represented.

Eucla Roadhouse

Eucla playground

Eucla playground

View of the coastline from Eucla

Old Telegraph station ruins at Eucla

Our first stop for the day was to have a look at the Old Telegraph station ruins at Eucla. The girls had an absolute ball crawling thru the doorways which were have filled with sand. The spent ages playing in the ruins while Darrin and I watched the Galah's playing in the nearby tree, it was if they had put on a show for us playing with each other.

Crossing the boarder

Exciting boarder sign!

The Great Australian Bite

As we got closer the the Great Australian Bite, we had great pleasure in show Emma what it looked like in person as they had covered this area in their unit of enquiry in term one. It was absolutely beautiful, the weather was just perfect as we crossed the Nullarbor - not a breath of wind and clear blue skies so getting out at each lookout was more pleasent and looked even more beautiful with no white caps. The shear drop of the massive cliffs and the gorgeous blue waters were just magnificant. We really enjoyed the scenery along the Great Australian Bite.

Typical nullarbor sign

Windmills of Penong

The big Galah

Our next feature was Penong - to town of many windmills and just as I remembered there are also lots of ruins around this area, just heaven for photographers. We were driving thru Penong just before sunset so the colours in the country made it look even more spectacular. We set up camp for the night just out of Penong ready for a big day of travel to get to James and Kelli's home in Adelaide for Saturday night.

A big day travelling from West of Ceduna to Adelaide, we did really enjoy seeing the change in the country side and besides have Hungry Jacks for lunch a highlight was stopping to see the big Galah.

Arriving at James, Kellie and Tiarre's late Saturday afternoon were looking forward to enjoying their company and Hospitality for a few day.

Esperance

Hopetoun beach

After a great nights camp at the Overshot Hill Nature Reserve just 9km north of Ravensthorpe, where we enjoyed watching the sunset over the green country, with emu's pecking amongst the wheat field just next door and a campfire to toast our marshmellows.
We woke to another fine day and travelled south to meet the coast at Hopetoun. Once again we enjoyed the white sandy beaches and clear waters of the coastline, stopping for morning tea, a swim and soak up the sunshine on the beach. We did the great ocean drive to Esperance enjoying the true beauty of this coastline and the mass amount of wildflowers and so many varieties, they were beautfiul. We found a camp just west of Esperance for the night.

Great ocean drive coastline

So many wildflowers

Sammy the Seal

The next day we woke to an overcast day, with scattered showers. There was not much to explore in Esperance, just the beaches and find Sammy the seal swimming around the jetty. The girls were so keen to find Sammy so we headed straight for the jetty and walked out to the end. There was no wind or rain which made it a more plesant walk, we looked and walked right to the end of the jetty and did not find Sammy. A bit disappointed, but we had a chat to different people who were fishing off the end of the jetty for squid then headed back to the beach. Just as we got back to the start of the jetty Darrin spotted Sammy, it was very exciting, there happened to be two seals so we got to see two Sammy's. We were there for about 45minutes just watching the seals swim and eat. As far as the girls were concerned thats it we had seen what we came to Esperance for - Sammy the Seal.
Although the rain had cleared and there was still no wind, it was overcast and there was a severe storm warning for the erea due to hit that night. So we opted to go to the town centre and visit the tourist information and do some shopping then book into a caravan park for the night just incase the storm hit. There were lots of kids around the park because of the school holidays so it was not long before the girls had made some friends and were busy playing for the afternoon.
That night after dinner in the camp kitchen meeting other holidaying familes we had movie night in the camper. Lucky the storm never hit that night but we did wake to the same weather conditions of overcast, but there was no rain or wind so we decided to pack up and move on to Cape Le Grand and Cape Arid National Park.

Lucky Bay - Cape Le Grand National Park

As we drove east of Esperance to Cape Le Grand National Park the rain started to fall. We drove through Cape Le Grand National Park with the rain sprinkling and it still look amazingly awesome in the wet weather. Once out of the National Park and further east towards Cape Arid National Park the sky was clear blue with not a cloud about so things were looking good. We wanted to camp at the Poison Creek section of the park so headed down the track towards this section. It was a 4wd recommended track and as we turned onto the road it started to become a track which was narrow. We came to a large puddle in the road and I hoped out to take a photo while Darrin drove thru it, but it was deeper and the clay mud was very sticky so the Troopy stopped in the middle. Out came the trusty winch once again to get us unstuck, we had been warned about the tracks in this area being impassable after rain so we were a little concerned about the track further on. But looking on the GPS we then realized that this was a minor track to the Poison Creek section and there was a more major road to choose, so we drove on and found the good gravel road to Poison Creek. Finally we could see the ocean in the distance driving thru the low lying scrubs towards the sand dunes which revealed white sandy beaches and clear blue waters. We found the clean well maintained campground amongst the paperbark trees with massive sand dunes between the campground and the beach. The sand was so clean, white and made a squeaking sound when we walked on it. A walk along the beach and play in the sanddunes as the sun was disappearing then dinner back at camp with the nearly full moon shining bright and the sky remaining clear and promising for tommorrow.

Bogged in the sticky clay mud puddle

Driving thru Cape Arid National Park

We woke to perfect warm weather conditions, so put on our swimmers ready to hit the beach. Firstly we drove along a few kilometres to Seal creek where we could then drive onto the beach, then along the top of the sand dunes which gave great views of the water. We spotted so many whales, some were playing showing their tails and body some mothers and their calf's, it was great spotting all the whales. Looking for a good swimming spot with some waves for the boogie boards, we thought we would go check out the the other end of the camping ground.

Driving along the sand dunes from Seal Creek

Seal creek



Watching the whales and dolphins

 We could not drive onto this beach so we went for a walk to see what the beach revealled. Darrin was first to get to the protected bay and yelled 'there is a whale in the bay'. It was right in the small bay just metres from the waters edge and at first it looked like a rock boulder in the middle of the bay but watching it move it turned out to be a whale and a calf. We were all mesmerized at how close this whale was and how enormous these creatures are. You could even see the barnicles growing on the whale it was that close. Then we spotted a pod of dolphins also swimming with the whales. We watched the whales head come up out of the water and the calf was rolling sideways and show its tail. We walked to the rocks on the edge of the bay to watch the whales and dolphins as the swam back out to sea and then they turned bay and went back into the bay. Whale watching could not get any better, an awesome experience to have.

Walking along the rocks to watch the whales and dolphins

The rest of the day we enjoyed relaxing on the beach, swimming and building sandcastles. Cape Arid was our last WA destination to discover and proved to be a memorable and fantastic place. Now to tackle the Nullabor.

Kate having fun with her boogie board

Catching the waves

lunchtime

Wave Rock

Reading up about wave rock

Wave rock is literally in the middle of nowhere. We took a 400km odd detour just to visit this amazing Australian Icon. The girls were so looking forward to seeing the wave. Reading up on the facts from the brochure Emma filled us in on the way there: “Did you know that the wave is 110m long?” “The rock is made of granite” and “Wave rock is at Hyden”.

Travelling North-East of Albany the drive proved to be quite a pretty and interesting drive so it took longer than anticipated. We passed the magnificant Sterling Ranges, some more pink lakes and many buildings and other structures  that make driving thru the countryside interesting.

This countryside, commonly named 'The Wheatbelt Region' is rich in wheat farms so the girls got to see not only paddock upon paddock of wheat, but also the wheat silos, wheat holding bays, loading facilities at the stations ready to load onto the trains to travel to the Albany port to be loaded on the ships.

Sterling Ranges

 We arrived at Hyden to find a small country town which, like most small country towns, had a real community feel about it. We stopped at the sports ground for morning tea, which looked like a well loved sports club and grounds, which was clear to see that community sports was big in this town. Across the road was where we found some awesome country talent displayed with a story of how life began in Hyden told with metal structures of people, animals and mode of transports. All sorts of scrap metal was used and the attention to detail and creativity used was incredible.

Porcupine

Mother and child

Reading about the statues and history

The mode of transport

Surfing the breakers

It was time to move onto the 'Wave'. Excited we drove 4km out of town and then comenced our walk to the 'wave'. Wave rock is huge; it starts at the 'breakers' which is a smaller version of the wave. Darrin and the girls had so much fun challenging each other to see who could get further up the breaker. It is so steep and the rock surface so smooth which makes it difficult to get up high without sliding back down.
Further along was the 'big wave' it was huge and proved too much of a challenge for the girls to walk even midway up the wave.

Who will win the callenge up the wave

surfing the huge wave!



Wow this is one big wave!



There is so much more to discover than just the 'wave'. The massive rock as a whole is called Hyden rock and the wave sits on the northern face of the rock. We walked further along to see what other unique features Hyden rock has to offer. We found crevices, caves cracks to play in and around. Then Hippo's yawn was just like a hippo yawning -amazing. We walked back along the top of the rock to find round boulders and loose rocks to build towers with. And not to mention the amazing views from the top. It was a fantastic Aussie Icon to discover.

Hippo's yawn

on top of Hyden rock

building our rock castle

Someones front gate display