2015 TRAVELS     JANUARY – APRIL

The year started in a similar way to last year, with ongoing health issues.

The first few months were a battle to find treatments that would: 1: heal my leg, which now also featured dermatitis caused by previous creams and potions; 2: control the pain from same; and 3: bring down the spiked blood pressure caused by treatments for the previous two. Aaargh…..

Some rare but welcome good news was that special scans of the arteries and veins in the problem leg showed no impairment of circulation at all, so the leg ulcers did not result from issues there.

John started doing some bus driving – a Coaster – for a friend who was running a small local bus hire company. This was done as a favour, not because he really wanted to do it – or enjoyed ferrying partying groups to the football or stags’ nights!

Summer literally ended with a bang – a massive thunderstorm directly overhead that saw Couey barking at the noise.

Bendigo grandson spent some time staying with us. He enjoys spending time with John, and of course, loves the pool in the warmer months. Good that someone can get some pleasure from it…

Early in March, John spent a night in hospital after having five significant skin cancers removed from one leg. According to the plastic surgeon he will be a “work in progress”, and this will probably be a regular occurrence. Fun times!

Cleaning out the used peanut butter jar…

Later in March, the three year old Bendigo grandson spent time in the Childrens’ Hospital with a mysterious swelling in a knee that eventually, after a couple of hospital stays,  turned out to be some obscure condition I’d never heard of. He gave them quite a scare for a while there, as well as much expenditure of time and fuel as one or other of his mums commuted back and forth from home each day, so there was always someone with him. We had the older grandson, now twelve, to stay for some of the time.

This was the year of turning seventy. M had her celebratory party mid-April, a little early in order to accommodate her planned trip to WA. This would be a genuine outback experience for her friend C. Hopefully, it would go more smoothly than last year’s one where he suffered injury and illness. Or the one before that, come to think of it. M’s Troopy boiled going up the Moonbi Range near Tamworth. In playing the knight rescuer heading off to a nearby dam to get some water, C straddled a fence, which he found out, via a tender part of his anatomy,  was electrified…..Then the dog at the house sit M was going to, bit him. One had to say the man was nothing if not game, to go adventuring again this year.

The trip would take them quickly through SA and the NT, across the Tanami Track to WA and on to Broome. A small ship cruise along the Kimberly coast, between Broome and Wyndham would be a real highlight – one I was most envious of. After that, they would explore parts like the Gibb River Road, before making their way back home after about five months away.

Things do not always go according to plan, though. The Troopy broke down on the Tanami Track and the travellers spent a couple of nights camped there, before help arrived. All part of the travel experience, as far as M was concerned, but apparently C was much less sanguine about the experience. Troopy was eventually trucked to Broome for major repairs, like a new engine,  and the cruise was wonderful. The stress of it all appeared to affect C’s health, though, and he returned home rather than venture into more wilderness along the Gibb. M met up with friends, as previously planned. One of these was a solo lady traveller with a motorhome tough enough to tackle the Gibb, so M teamed up with her to do that, whilst waiting for the Troopy to be repaired.