Rockhampton

Rockhampton. right on the Tropic of Capricorn.

We're staying in the heart of Rocky at a fab little free camp beside Kershaw Gardens just near the heart of town. About 6 or 8 others here when we pulled in at lunch, about 20 for the night. 

Bugger! We forgot to fill up with water before setting up the van so we had to use the bladder. Not a big deal but inconvenient. 

Had to visit the Singing Ship at Emu Park :)
As underwhelming as previous!

We'll stay here for a few nights before heading towards Mackay.

Seventeen Seventy/ Agnes Water

The town of Seventeen Seventy is a significant spot in James Cook's journey up the Queensland coast. 

It's a beautiful spot, popular with locals and tourists enjoying Queensland's most northerly surfing beaches. 

Lady Musgrave is accessed from here, and if the activity at the boat ramp is any indication, the locals certainly love their fishing. 

We attended the Anzac Day dawn service at Agnes Water. It was really well attended and a good service at the very civilised time of 6am and 20 degrees. 

  

Two up of course at the local for the afternoon.

We're here for 3 nights, relaxing 😌 

Sunset over the East Coast... go figure!

Off to Rockhampton tomorrow.

Buon Viaggio!

Kandanga

Kandanga is just south of Gympie. 

It's a funny little town that used to be on a railway line. I did a little maintenance to help keep it in order. 

There's less than 100 houses in the town, and it has a pub, a grocery store with a petrol bowser, a bowling club with a well maintained gree and... A SWIMMING POOL!!! What the?

There's eight free camping spaces across the road from the pool, but around the corner is the bowling club where we parked up for $12 so no complaints there. 

An early night after last night's excitement of settling on the house we sold and the house we've bought in Balmain... we'll possibly move in in a few years from now.

We stopped just the one night here before heading north to...

Forster to the Gold Coast

We driveway camped with good friends at Forster for two nights (thanks Jock and Lorraine) and enjoyed a couple of beautiful days there. Walking, food and wine, coffee with other friends up at Wallabi Point... a good start to slowing down.  

We then made our way north and free camped beside a park at Ulmarra. After a walk around the town, we had some wine and cheese with a couple of other free campers who were on their way south. Fortunately we camped beside the bat laden trees, not under. 

Ulmarra is a small tiny town on the Clarence River near Grafton. Notable is the levee which runs along this entire stretch. Most of you will have driven beside this before the new Grafton bypass was built. 

Ulmarra is near Maclean, the town where Robyn's ancestors settled when they came to Australia in the 1800s. 

We found the Cameron of Lochiel tartan (pole #202 on the handy map guide!) 

We parked up at a friend's place at Tweed Heads (thanks Richard and Natalie) for a couple of nights which allowed us to say hello and goodbye to some family before moving on to...

Departure Day is finally here!

It's been a big 6 weeks!

I (John) retired on 1 March, and in the less than 50 days since then we've

• Sold our house
• Bought a townhouse 
• Sold a car
• Packed up the house to a storage shed in Singleton 
• Organised renting out the new house
• Stored plants there
• Moved all my tools into a cage at the new place
• Sold and given away fridges, lounges and other furniture 
• Given away our box trailer that we bought in 1987 to move to Adelaide. 37 year's service... it doesn't owe us anything!
• Moved the dog to my brother's house
• Tidied the house to pass final inspection 
• Made a last minute trip to hospital for stitches for Robyn's finger (!)

As a result of all this busy-ness, we are definitely ready for some R & R!

And so, after 40 odd years of hoping and dreaming,  this morning (Thursday, 18 April) we leave our house of 24 years to travel. We're a little surprised we are less nostalgic about leaving. This is the house with most of the memories for us and our children and family. It's hosted 18th and 21st parties, a wedding, our 50ths, COVID put a stop to our 60ths. We've had family Christmas celebrations with more than 40 for sit down dinners, mother's and father's days... lots of great memories. 

But it's time to move on and let someone else mow, clean the pool, empty the gutters, do the regular maintenance and fix the cracks in the walls of this old girl. 

We had initially thought we'd start travelling on about 16 March, but that plan centred around renting out our existing house rather than selling and buying. 

Because this house was older, on a big block with lots that could potentially go wrong... gardens, chickens, a pool, big trees etc., we decided to sell and buy something with less maintenance. 

This put us about 6 weeks behind schedule, so the plan now is to get to Rockhampton or thereabouts in 6 or 7 days and start the slow travel from there. 

First stop is Forster, driveway camping at friends for a couple of nights and a chance to breathe. 

We think we're ready. 

If you've read this blog from the start you'll know we made a lot of minor modifications to the van and car, and so with great excitement, and I must admit a little trepidation, we depart. 

Buon Viaggio!