Well, here we are again. On Tuesday we left BRUTHEN to head towards PARADISE BEACH. Right on BASS STRAIT, at the western end of the LAKES ENTRANCE inlet. If you can’t find it on a map, it’s south-east of SALE. We drove through a bit of rain (in Australia???) and I wondered whether we’d have to set up camp in the rain. However it stopped as soon as we got there and Cameron straightaway headed for the beach. This was right on lunch time and he is normally starving, but today he was more interested in discovering his surroundings and couldn’t wait for a sandwich!
Urban and I had lunch, with the occasional check on Cameron. I then headed to the beach to sit with him and we finally made it back to the caravan about 3 and half hours later! Cameron then consumed 2 double sandwiches in short succession. Our neighbours gave us a big bag of cherries and a local man came and gave us some brochures about the region. He came back the following morning with lots more stuff – posters and stickers – from the Royal Australian Air Force Base which is on the outskirts of SALE! Cameron was very impressed.
This was our first experience at free camping, relying entirely on our own power, water and toilet system. What a success it was! We spent no money what so ever on Tuesday! A nice change. But we were having trouble shutting our door, and decided to head back to TRARALGON to get it seen to. (We were going to be passing through anyway to our next destination – so no extra trouble) Just to tell you about the special door we have in the caravan – it comes in 2 sections. One is a security door, this is the locking part of the door. The second part is on the same hinges, but clips onto the security door and closes the door to the weather. Now the 2 parts were not connecting properly and every time we wanted to lock the door from the inside, the outer part would open up again. We eventually got it to work – and just as well because that night the heavens opened up and it poured down!
By the morning the rain had stopped again and we set off for TRARALGON. The door was easily fixed – we were just being too gentle and we needed to slam the 2 parts together. We left the caravan there while we went hunting for camping stuff and have now purchased a tent and other gear and a Waeco fridge – to put in back of the car. Supermarket shopping was also necessary and after all that we hit the road again to head towards the MELBOURNE area. We had read about a nice camping ground in the GEMBROOK area, just east of MELBOURNE. This is close to the Puffing Billy railway and other tourist attractions. From here we also hope to explore MELBOURNE itself, perhaps taking the train into the centre.
It started raining again as we got closer to GEMBROOK, and as we were in quite a hilly area, the roads were awash with water. Everyone was driving with their headlights on – it was not very welcoming. To get to the camp site we had to go down some narrow windy country roads for about 10km. At several places the water was washing across the road. When we arrived at the camp site the rain thankfully stopped again, but when we opened up the caravan we found the stove and oven face down on the floor under the dining table. We’re not sure when it fell out, but that should never have happened. We managed to fix it up, but now know that the stove was just sitting in its recess and not held in by any means at all! What else can go wrong?
In the mean time, Cameron discovered the swimming pool and was busy there for quite some time – he could not convince us to join him, but we did have a nice spa before having some dinner.
Here endeth another saga.
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