Goodbye to Sydney - On the road again
Though we would love to have stayed longer, we said a sad goodbye to the seaside suburb of Manly, and our lovely little apartment that we have made our home for the past 4 months. Manly was such a lovely place to live and a hard place to leave with it's warm air, happy atmosphere and tree shaded cafes, and of course the beach. We both felt, as we drove away in the van, that it wouldn't be the last time that we would see this place.
Our journey continued southwards along the coast towards our next milestone of Melbourne 1050Km (600 Miles) down the road. Living in the van again took a bit of getting used to after living in our own flat, and our first night was slightly trying. We couldn't find the campsite we were looking for and then got turned away from another by a grumpy old git. We soldiered onwards down the road to the next site in our book, an animal sanctuary campground, and happily found a warmer welcome there. When we arrived we jumped out of the van and instantly got eaten alive by the dusk swarms of riverside bugs. We hid, scared of super bitey things, inside the boiling van with all the windows shut for an hour feeling boxed in and cramped until we could take it no more and threw caution to the wind by throwing open all the doors and windows. But it was all worth it when we woke up the next morning and opened the curtains to a most beautiful riverside view and the sounds of the birds. We instantly remembered what this lifestyle was all about! We had breakfast as brightly coloured parrots shot past at a hundred miles an hour and a peacock strutted about.
By the afternoon we were in Jervis bay and the Booderee National Park. We parked up our van in our campsite (Green Patch) and headed to the beach. The sands were beautiful white and we walked around the rocks and found a private beach all to ourselves. We spent the day here playing bat n ball, swimming in the sea and reading our books. We tried snorkeling but the water was rough and cloudy and we saw nothing, especially compared to what we would see the next day. We returned to the van and spent a relaxing evening looking at the stars by the light of our paraffin lamp.
The next morning we drove to Murray beach a few k's away and were impressed by the beauty of the beach and it's white sands. The water looked much clearer and calmer than the day before and we soon donned our snorkels and got into the water. Within a minute or two we spotted a giant 2M stingray hiding in the sand on the sea bed. It's tail was spiky and barbed and tapered to a sharp point, and It's eyes were as big as clenched fists. To Becky's horror, Holland took a deep breath and swam down 4/5 meters to see it's tail closer. He wisely resisted the temptation to poke it and get it off the sea bed though, remembering that one of these beasts had killed Steve Irwin the Crocodile Hunter only a few months earlier. We moved on leaving the ray to bask in it's sandy bed and soon spotted an interesting looking tail hanging out from underneath some weeds, it looked decidedly sharky but unable to coax it out from it's weedy refuge we couldn't see any more so we moved on. The water became a little choppy around the rocks and after seeing a huge shoal of giant black and white angel fish we decided to head back to the beach. No sooner had we made the decision when out of the blue glided a giant brown ray maybe 1.75 Meters tip to tail. It was a truly awesome sight to behold as this amazing creature flew serenely past us. We watched it for a few magical seconds before it was lost to the deep. As we headed back to the beach we spotted some more rays of a different type sitting in the weeds. These rays had stripes like tigers and were about a metre long. Their bodies were bulbous and their tails were shark like and we realised that this was what we had seen earlier sticking out of the seaweed. Later we walked to the headland and looked across to a nature reserve island which had a colony of penguins.
We set off the next day and drove for our standard 3 hours, a short trip by Aussie standards. We stopped on the way and got out the gas burner and our camping kettle and made tea at a beautiful lakeside picnic spot. We must have looked so English! Eventually we decided to stop at a place called Mystery Bay (just because we liked the name!). It had a nice beach and our campground had fireplaces and wood so after sanding and painting some of the rust on the van we spent a pleasant evening with our own personal campfire. We had forgotten to go to the shops (still getting back into the traveling ways!) so we ate pasta and drank water and eeked out the last of the bug spray! Next day we took a morning stroll along the sands and sat on the rocks watching the sea. To our great pleasure four dolphins jumped out of the sea right in front of us and did their synchronised surfacing thing off into the distance. After a bracing swim in the ocean (getting further south now the sea is getting colder) we jumped in the van for another days driving.
As the day wore on the clouds thickened and the far off thunder got nearer and louder and we decided to stop at the next free campsite en-route. We set our sights on a picturesque sounding place in a State Forest. We took the sign-posted turnoff and were immediately faced with an un-signposted T junction. We decided on a direction and headed off into the woods on the dirt track. The van isn't the best vehicle for driving on corrugated roads (where the dirt backs up into regular troughs like corrugated iron) but we begrudgingly continued knowing the site was 2ks off the highway. As we got deeper into the forest the rain set in and it became instantly dark. As we bounced down the dirt track the thunder roared overhead and the lightning flashed revealing the crowding trees and illuminating the sheets of driving rain. After 2 kms we stopped and realised we had taken a wrong turn, briefly considering the un-cosy option of parking here in the scary woods we decided to backtrack and took the arduous drive back to the highway. We decided to stop at the next place we found on the main road and thankfully came across a caravan park 5 mins later,
Next morning we headed out on the last few hours drive to Melbourne. We had been invited to stay with our friends Dale and Kate, with whom we had walked the Inca Trail in Peru, and arrived at their home to a warm welcome. Their house is great with large spaces indoors and outdoors, a swimming pool and a huge TV! On our first night Dale cooked us a fabulous meal, we played Sports on the Wii console, drank beer and played Risk until the early hours. We think we will stay here a week (yay)!
Our journey continued southwards along the coast towards our next milestone of Melbourne 1050Km (600 Miles) down the road. Living in the van again took a bit of getting used to after living in our own flat, and our first night was slightly trying. We couldn't find the campsite we were looking for and then got turned away from another by a grumpy old git. We soldiered onwards down the road to the next site in our book, an animal sanctuary campground, and happily found a warmer welcome there. When we arrived we jumped out of the van and instantly got eaten alive by the dusk swarms of riverside bugs. We hid, scared of super bitey things, inside the boiling van with all the windows shut for an hour feeling boxed in and cramped until we could take it no more and threw caution to the wind by throwing open all the doors and windows. But it was all worth it when we woke up the next morning and opened the curtains to a most beautiful riverside view and the sounds of the birds. We instantly remembered what this lifestyle was all about! We had breakfast as brightly coloured parrots shot past at a hundred miles an hour and a peacock strutted about.
By the afternoon we were in Jervis bay and the Booderee National Park. We parked up our van in our campsite (Green Patch) and headed to the beach. The sands were beautiful white and we walked around the rocks and found a private beach all to ourselves. We spent the day here playing bat n ball, swimming in the sea and reading our books. We tried snorkeling but the water was rough and cloudy and we saw nothing, especially compared to what we would see the next day. We returned to the van and spent a relaxing evening looking at the stars by the light of our paraffin lamp.
The next morning we drove to Murray beach a few k's away and were impressed by the beauty of the beach and it's white sands. The water looked much clearer and calmer than the day before and we soon donned our snorkels and got into the water. Within a minute or two we spotted a giant 2M stingray hiding in the sand on the sea bed. It's tail was spiky and barbed and tapered to a sharp point, and It's eyes were as big as clenched fists. To Becky's horror, Holland took a deep breath and swam down 4/5 meters to see it's tail closer. He wisely resisted the temptation to poke it and get it off the sea bed though, remembering that one of these beasts had killed Steve Irwin the Crocodile Hunter only a few months earlier. We moved on leaving the ray to bask in it's sandy bed and soon spotted an interesting looking tail hanging out from underneath some weeds, it looked decidedly sharky but unable to coax it out from it's weedy refuge we couldn't see any more so we moved on. The water became a little choppy around the rocks and after seeing a huge shoal of giant black and white angel fish we decided to head back to the beach. No sooner had we made the decision when out of the blue glided a giant brown ray maybe 1.75 Meters tip to tail. It was a truly awesome sight to behold as this amazing creature flew serenely past us. We watched it for a few magical seconds before it was lost to the deep. As we headed back to the beach we spotted some more rays of a different type sitting in the weeds. These rays had stripes like tigers and were about a metre long. Their bodies were bulbous and their tails were shark like and we realised that this was what we had seen earlier sticking out of the seaweed. Later we walked to the headland and looked across to a nature reserve island which had a colony of penguins.
We set off the next day and drove for our standard 3 hours, a short trip by Aussie standards. We stopped on the way and got out the gas burner and our camping kettle and made tea at a beautiful lakeside picnic spot. We must have looked so English! Eventually we decided to stop at a place called Mystery Bay (just because we liked the name!). It had a nice beach and our campground had fireplaces and wood so after sanding and painting some of the rust on the van we spent a pleasant evening with our own personal campfire. We had forgotten to go to the shops (still getting back into the traveling ways!) so we ate pasta and drank water and eeked out the last of the bug spray! Next day we took a morning stroll along the sands and sat on the rocks watching the sea. To our great pleasure four dolphins jumped out of the sea right in front of us and did their synchronised surfacing thing off into the distance. After a bracing swim in the ocean (getting further south now the sea is getting colder) we jumped in the van for another days driving.
As the day wore on the clouds thickened and the far off thunder got nearer and louder and we decided to stop at the next free campsite en-route. We set our sights on a picturesque sounding place in a State Forest. We took the sign-posted turnoff and were immediately faced with an un-signposted T junction. We decided on a direction and headed off into the woods on the dirt track. The van isn't the best vehicle for driving on corrugated roads (where the dirt backs up into regular troughs like corrugated iron) but we begrudgingly continued knowing the site was 2ks off the highway. As we got deeper into the forest the rain set in and it became instantly dark. As we bounced down the dirt track the thunder roared overhead and the lightning flashed revealing the crowding trees and illuminating the sheets of driving rain. After 2 kms we stopped and realised we had taken a wrong turn, briefly considering the un-cosy option of parking here in the scary woods we decided to backtrack and took the arduous drive back to the highway. We decided to stop at the next place we found on the main road and thankfully came across a caravan park 5 mins later,
Next morning we headed out on the last few hours drive to Melbourne. We had been invited to stay with our friends Dale and Kate, with whom we had walked the Inca Trail in Peru, and arrived at their home to a warm welcome. Their house is great with large spaces indoors and outdoors, a swimming pool and a huge TV! On our first night Dale cooked us a fabulous meal, we played Sports on the Wii console, drank beer and played Risk until the early hours. We think we will stay here a week (yay)!
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