Winter 'Warmer' Camping

A short camping trip to Budgewoi, about 1 hour North of Sydney, mainly to escape the freezing Canberra weather, but also to try out Holly’s new hobby.....Kayaking.  The campsite was on the shore of a huge lake and just 2 min from the beach. It aslo took dogs, so Wilson was able to join in the fun.  

We all really enjoyed using the single kayak on the lake, and quickly realised that it was an activity that we could all enjoy together.....it was great to see Holly exploring the lake for hours.

Crazy hair (and leggings) time...

Rasta

Levitation.

Team Dorsett’s enthusiasm for ‘our’ new water sport nicely coincided with a local chap selling his ex-hire gear, so after a bit of hard bargaining with the kid‘s inheritance we were all equipped to take to the water.       

 

A lovelly start to our last day, a family trip out on the water.
Wilson enjoyed it as much as we did.

Happy Days – Immi’s asleep on Sal, not being sea sick as you may think!

 

 Yet another relaxing trip with the caravan.

Catch up photos

Morning mist across the Serengeti Plains, Wildebeest waking in the morning sun....

......no, just the view from the house.   

 

The young kids.

The old kids!

Our quarterly Sydney 'fix'. 

Katie loving a 2 day dance workshop at the Sydney Dance Company.

Instruction by top end pros, just a few hundred meters from the Opera house..
......the 'Pineapple dance studio' of Australia.

 

Immi makes the Netball Team!

Ok, so they all made the Team, but that’s not the point.

After a few practice sessions last year (ball skills, basic netball rules etc) Immi’s is now playing for Team Sunrise 8Yr unders every Sat morning.  Last weekend was her first match – four full 15min quarters.

First quarter was entertaining as they had only ever done ball skills before, which were only done standing still – The whistle went and both teams were completely static. It was like a game of subbuteo, but with less movement! By half time things were moving a bit better, with only the occasional reminder needed to stop both teams playing in the same direction. 

Immi loved it and will be back out on the court again every saturday morning throughout the winter......personally, I’ll be staying in, and watching from, a nice warm car. ;-)

Gym's Make-over

 

Time to go crazy in the gym, with paint........exercise!?....far too much like hard work.  

That said, we can honestly say that we go to the gym every morning.

....on the way to the back door! 

Take Shelter!

With Winter on its way, Snoopy needed a shelter in his paddock. Unlike the UK, we just couldn’t find a mobile shelter..............time to DIY yet again!

Blue Prints – Glenn you’ll appreciate the detail and accuracy in these fine plans – only 2 fonts used.

As the ‘monster’ grew in the carport, the cunning plan of transporting it 300m to the field was looking questionable.

A Team effort with friends got us to the field in kit form – driving slowly through the estate, with people either side in case things departed – bit like a Mardi Gras float!

Roof on in the field, a few finishing touches and its good to go............does Snoopy now sleep in luxury or remain in the wet weather under a tree?............its early days, give him time.    

Demanding client

All done..........whats next Sal?

Budget Tree Surgery

Following an informal quote of $5K to remove an old rotten tree in our garden, it was time to DIY........how card can it be! Biggest challenge - the entire tree was leaning over our neighbours fence and more importantly their brand new septic tank system. No room for error......oh, its its my first complete tree felling experience.  

After cutting the first small branch with a chainsaw, it made me realise that balancing at the end of a ladder whilst cutting chunks from the very tree that is supporting the ladder is a recipe for disaster. The only escape route, was drop the chainsaw, get down the ladder and run – a bit too slow to escape a falling branch. So, a bit of research on the interweb and we have a homemade Dorsett rope saw. Plan 2 – throw saw over branch, stand to the side of the tree and saw the blade back and forth, run when cracking is heard – easy.  

I now know that trees a heavily over engineered. I found that the first  ‘crack’, which was followed by me doing a Linford Christie style sprint, came about 10min of sawing before a branch was even near breaking.  Noting that there are only so many times that I can beat Linford out of the blocks, it was time for Plan 3 – saw until first ‘crack’ and then pull the thing down with rope.      

Now you can probably see the flaw in my plan in the above photo. I took all of the easy branches first and left the biggest, most threatening until last.  The last branch was the one which, if it fell naturally, would destroy the neighbours septic tank and that would be messy in many ways. Time for plan 4   - 2 mates, several tensioned ropes and a Land Rover.....all trying to get the tree to fall in any direction but the way it wanted.

One hour of nervous cutting (with the neighbour watching!), low range power in the Land Rover and it falls perfectly.....Job done...............the $5K quote doesn’t seem so bad now.  

Firewood for another cold Canberra winter

Port Macquarie Summer Holiday

After our great New Year celebrations in Eden, we drove up the coast to Port Macquarie. On a map its a distance that represents about a quarter of the Eastern coast of Australia.......so, as you expect our planning was based upon the assumption that a 25% isn’t much, so cant be far and wont take long.... 6 hours easy drive, was my guess.  The night before the little drive I finally get around to putting the destination into the TOMTOM and OMG – 11hours, 989KM and that’s without a stop!!! All to be done in summer traffic with the caravan on the back and three (4) very very bored girls.   We start calling campsites for a night over campsite but everything in full, so it was time to just get on with it.

Ignoring the 103KPH in a 100 zone (error on TOMTOM!), check out the remaining distance (844Km) and time (10hrs) - I have never watched a TOMTOM so much and willed it to count down more quickly.  The good news is that it didn’t take 11 hours it took over 13, 3 tanks of diesel and 7 movies.......I think we might plan in greater detail next time.    

The drive was actually worth it, we woke in a beautiful campsite in the town of Port Macquarie.  It’s  a part of the World that we all loved and is probably ranked No1 on our list of places we would like to live.

Koala Hospital - each had a very compelling story.  These beautiful animals are so special and we were very lucky to have one resident in the caravan park. We met him on the last night when he walked within a few feet of us on the way to one of his favourite trees – very memorable.  

Beaches, so many to choose from and all just fantastic......although some of the sights on the nudist beach were not so impressive!

The girls are getting so good at making sandcastles ;-)

 

0800 and its BBQ Breakfast on the beach – joined by a friend!!, a very large friend. He seemed very happy with the bits of bacon that we gave him.......not sure if he’s vegetarian? Oh no, we may have converted him!

They aren't all that scary...

Happy Days

I challenge anyone to get a brush through that.

Wind was blowing on the last day, so a great chance to remove the cobwebs and get out.
So nice to sail without a wetsuit. 

Port Macquarie, in our eyes, had everything. Its a short 7 hours drie from home and we are already looking to book for next Christmas. A fantastic holiday.