Our First Week on the Road

 I forgot to show you the photo of Michelle taking Trice out to the van.


We have survived our first week and discovered some beautiful parts of the country although after showing this photo I may not. We are travelling around 250 to 300 klms every 3rd day so that we can get to see a the local sites. Our trip from Wooli to Crowdy Bay was a nice drive and went without much trouble until I hit a post in the camp area which made a hell of a noise making everyone look at me driving. I felt like a goose and had some ugly marks on the side of the van. Luckily I had packed some wet and dry sand paper, battery drill and and a few other bits and pieces and it is all fixed now.

This is the road into Crowdy Bay which was about 5klms of dirt road. The car and van have been packed very well with no rattles and nothing breaking.


This is a National Park with very clean and modern facilities but only cold showers. I thought what the heck I will leave the hot water for Trice as we only have one tank full and I will try the cold showers, they can't be that bad. My god it was freezing and I did notice that everyone else was using solar hot water bags.

Cooked a great Camp Oven meal in the new Gas bottle stove, works a treat.

The beaches are long, wide and uninhabited, we were walking for an hour and not seeming to go anywhere. The funny thing is that you are in the middle of nowhere but you get great phone service.

Being a National Park you do get you fair share of wildlife, kangaroos and a giant goanna and then Trice came across a brown snake but it was only a baby.

Natural Arch Diamond Head

We came back from a walk to find a mother kangaroo and her joey having a sleep on the floor of our annex. We assumed that when we came back that the mother would get a fright and move on. Not only did she continue to make herself at home she also wanted to share Trice's lunch.


We met some great people who all have the same attitude, it is just so refreshing, they just want to have fun and see this beautiful country. Interestingly our van got nicknamed the Starship Enterprise because of the 'stuff' on the van.

Off to Lake Macquarrie

Just south of Newcastle and twice the size of Sydney Harbour this is magic. Staying in a caravan park you do have the benefits of camp kitchen rather than cooking on the camp oven, hot showers and shops. I prefer to stay in the National Parks because people do not have the same goals and dreams but it is nice for a change.

Visited Murrays Beach, Swansea and then back to Caves Beach and The Caves which were a highlight.

The beard is growing but it is white

 The caves were fantastic, you just wait for the waves to back off and you can run into the caves where there are many other caverns and arches leading to other beaches

Saw a sign for the 'Catho' pub which is a historic pub not far from The Caves, so we decided to investigate.

We couldn't help but notice that as we got closer to this old historic pub that the amount of tyre rubber on the road from burnouts appeared to be getting more frequent and then we saw it. It is a very old pub which is a biker pub, barmaids with more ink than skin, Harleys and a full rock band going nuts all on a Saturday afternoon. Walked in and ordered a Pure Blond and a Lemonade Lime and Bitters in a deep voice. We then found out about the rubber on the roadways, as each patron leaves the pub it appears that it is necessary for them to do a burnout up the street, bikes and cars.