This Adventurous Age

Adventures travelling and working around Australia.

Category Archives: 2017 Travels


by 1 Comment

2017 Travels May 2

TUESDAY MAY 2     MARONG

Although it was first night back on the Bus beds for a while, we slept well – and until 8.45am, in my case.

There was some sunshine about, although it was still cold.

Marong site

I did the usual morning routine with dog – a walk around the park, on the lead. There were lots of lovely, fresh overnight, rabbit smells to explore. She was meandering along on the lead, nose down and sniffing, when she was rushed at by two madly barking Pom type dogs who came racing out from one of the cabins. They were not on leads. A woman raced out after them, still in her nightie. She was apologetic, but as far as I was concerned, she should not have let them out unchecked, in the first place.

Couey only ever wants to run away from aggressive little dogs, so she was happy to retreat back to Bus, and her breakfast.

Obviously, this park has a cabin available for dog owners. I noticed later, there was a little kennel and a water bowl outside, even after the lady with the little yappers had left. It is really great to see caravan parks begin to cater for dog owners in this way.

It was too chilly to eat breakfast outside. After eating, I read for a while, then started crocheting my newest project – a rug, in autumn tones.

John slept in till about 11am. After his breakfast, he walked Couey up to the back section of the park for an off lead ball chase.

Outlook from our site

My phone had gone flat, again, as it was doing with increasing frequency. Clearly, it needed a new battery. As we were to go meet daughter at her place about 2pm, there was not really time to go chasing all over Bendigo looking for same.

Daughter was having a week of leave – well timed for us. When we arrived, she had just returned from collecting an ailing son from school, apparently with a migraine headache. He was sick and then started to feel better.

The household had a whippet dog, quite a timid little girl. We brought Couey into the back yard to see how the two might get on. After the mandatory sniffing of nether regions, Couey just wanted to explore the yard, with whippet following her around, seeming a bit mystified by this large black creature that had appeared. There was a very secure dog pen in their yard, built because whippet and her now-dead brother were great escape artists in storms. Once we’d gone into the house, Couey wanted in, too, and added her scratches to those already on the sliding door. So it was into the pen for them both. Couey barked and howled.

Left dog in the pen and went with daughter to collect the five year old from school. Daughter had not told either boy we were in town, so us being at the school pick up was meant to be a surprise for young J. However, he spied us through a window and, as soon as he saw his mum, announced to her: “Grandma and Grandad John are here!” As if she didn’t know. Then, he was adamant that we be introduced to his Principal, who was seeing students off, and the boy’s teacher.

We were most impressed that said Principal already knew the boy by name, obviously for good reasons. The school – a different one from where the older lad went – was new, modern and very nice.

Daughter took us to a Telstra shop, which could not help with a new phone battery for me, but suggested a place in the town centre. While we were talking to the Telstra man, little Mr Confident carted John off to look at a games shop. Bought some wine for tonight, then were taken into town to the phone shop, where I was able to get a battery for my Samsung.

Back at daughter’s place, Couey was still barking in protest, but was still in the pen. I hadn’t quite trusted her not to try to climb out.

We had a good look over the caravan the family had bought, before Xmas. We’d had a hand in the purchase because the van, an older Jayco, had been for sale near our home. My son had inspected it, as we had, and pronounced it a fair buy within their limited budget. Every summer, the family spends a month camping at Narrawong, and they do other smaller more local trips through the year. Their tent camping gear had seemed to radically increase each year, especially after the arrival of young J. They’d bought an enclosed trailer to transport it all, but packing, setting up and the like was increasingly onerous. The caravan had been intended to make all that so much easier and had been a success on the most recent summer holiday. They had done a lot of small things to improve the van, and it was these we had to inspect.

Had a very nice meal with the family. A had just about recovered from his migraine. Daughter’s partner came home from work, and her mother came to see us as well. Young J was not going to let his new captive audience of Grandad John get away, without being much read to, and talked to – non-stop. The boy’s reading was most impressive, after only a few months at school, and apparently his understanding of numbers was “freaky”.

Daughter cooked chicken Kiev’s, corn, squashed potatoes, and a very nice tomato, zucchini and cheese bake. There was apple pie for afters, too.

Couey eventually stopped the barking. I think she ran out of voice. I felt a bit mean after the whippet was brought inside and Couey had to stay in the pen. . But the whippet was very quiet and well behaved and just curled up on her bed and stayed there. Couey would have been exploring everywhere and annoyed us – and shed fur too, over their always immaculate house.

We left about 8.30pm – bedtime for school children. It was really cold.

Back at the Bus, the fan heater did not make much headway against the chill that had built up. I went to bed early, to get warm!

That had been a really pleasant afternoon and evening.


by 2 Comments

2017 Travels May 1

MONDAY MAY 1     HOME TO MARONG    240kms

There had been a rather leisurely preparation and pack for this short trip, in amongst tests, scans and appointments. With the news that a necessary specialist appointment would not be until May 17, we had a clear fortnight – and were away!

John was up early and sent the dog in to wake me at 8am. Crude, but effective. 28 kilos of dog doing a flying leap onto the bed, than going into the so-happy-to-see-you routine, is impossible to ignore.

All organized, dog on board, house locked up, Terios on back, we drove off down our street at 10.15 am. A couple of hundred metres along, John managed to collide Bus with a large green wheely bin, fortunately empty. It was minding its own business on the nature strip, but he was trying to activate one of his dashboard gadgets and strayed from the road. There was a most impressive noise, and bin bounced off, somewhere. Obviously, our solid bull bar was not going to be injured, and he did not stop to check on the welfare of the bin. According to John, it had no right to still be out there, since collection day was last Friday.

The day was cloudy and cool.

Took our usual route via Yarra Glen, Yea, Seymour, Heathcote.

There is a property between Coldstream and Yarra Glen that I always look at with interest. Once it used to have alpacas grazing but now there were very handsome sheep, with black faces and legs. I don’t know the breed, but they are much more attractive than the standard variety plain white sheep.

Topped up the fuel, as usual, at the Glenburn servo, where there is plentiful room to get the rig in. $1.149 cpl for diesel.

Stopped at the old railway station rest area at Yea – mainly for a comfort stop for the dog. We walked her across into the area that once was tracks, and let her have a run. Ungrateful creature! There was one small patch of mud where a tap was dripping and, of course, she found it – and wallowed in it before either of us could reach her. I swear the look on her face meant something like “I know you are cross with me – but it was worth it!” I’d gone to the trouble and expense, last week, of taking her to the grooming service at the Animal Aid, for a bath, so we would have less of a doggy smell about the place. Now there was a distinct swampy doggy ambience.

Old railway station Yea

After Yea, there were some encouraging patches of blue sky appearing to the north.

Next stop was Heathcote, for lunch from the bakery there. John took dog for another walk, firmly on the lead, while I did the buying. A pastie and sausage roll for John – he had been looking forward to the yummy pastries from here, for days. Egg and lettuce sandwich for me, a couple of coffees and a pumpkin and garlic scroll to have with tonight’s soup. $29 in all. Supporting small town economies…

I had been coming through Heathcote regularly, over the fifteen years that daughter had been living in Bendigo and had noticed how much this small, historic, Goldfields town has revitalized in that time – much of it due to the impact of tourists.

1.30pm when we left Heathcote for the last leg to Marong. Good timing as far as making our way through Bendigo before school traffic time.

John was happy with the feel of the new clutch. He had feared it would be very stiff, but not so. The gear changing seemed smoother and easier.

Lake Eppalock must have been really full as Mt Ida Creek, just to the west of Heathcote, was overflowing its banks. This links to the Lake and I can’t remember seeing it this full, here, before.

Our Garmin, with me carefully checking its instructions against my paper map, took us on the through traffic route that skirts the centre of Bendigo. It involved a few turns and the need to be in the correct lane in advance, but was not too hard.

Arrived at the Big 4 Marong Holiday Park at 2.30 and were allocated en-suite site 1, the same as we occupied last time here. We would be comfortable. The site cost $37.80, after discount.

I had not let daughter know we were going to be in the area until we were actually on our way, given how things had been going for us, lately. We decided not to actually meet up with them until tomorrow, because John wanted to nap for a while and then see if he could get his newest tablet working as a mobile hot spot/modem for the internet for our laptops.

Both ventures were successfully accomplished. I relaxed on my bed, and read.

Tea was cucumber soup brought from home, some slices of cold roast beef left from the weekend roast, and the scroll, which was very nice eating.

After tea, rain started and lasted for most of the very chilly night, but we were snug and cosy in Bus.


by Leave a comment

2017 Travels April

APRIL 2017     JUST WAITING AROUND

I succumbed to another round of the mysterious allergy that had sometimes affected me in recent times so tests and treatments were needed. As well, a new leg ulcer had developed. I was starting to think the two might be linked somehow. So medical stuff delayed us through the rest of April.

Last year, we had set out to explore some of the Victorian goldfields region, but did not get as far as we’d planned, running home ahead of the deluge that flooded some of the places we’d been heading for.

Part of that trip was to have allowed John to visit the site of the second one-teacher school he’d had in his early career – Boolite. So, we could try again for that. It would work in nicely with visiting some of the rather new phenomenon of the painted grain silos of the Wimmera region, which I was curious to see.

In my somewhat stop-start forays into researching my ancestry, had recently discovered that a hitherto – and apparently twice bigamous – great-grandfather was buried in the Wedderburn Cemetery, I wanted to visit that to see if his grave could be found. It might throw some light on his life subsequent to totally disappearing from Tasmania around the time of grandfather’s birth, about 1865. His use of two different surnames had obscured the facts for a while, too.

A middle name that could double as a surname was useful!

So there were the bones of a short swing through the Wimmera and our first trip for 2017. It would also be the first outing of Bus since the new clutch was installed, late last year.

Later in the year,  we would probably need to revisit Canberra and John’s family there – maybe even get in a couple of visits, as they would be off overseas on another posting, next year.

The north coast of NSW beckoned, too. The area around Coffs Harbour was a favourite two-week school holiday destination, in our working days. There was so much of that coast, from Newcastle north, that we had not really explored.

So, still no shortage of ideas about where to go.

We issued an invite for friend M, recently back from a few weeks exploring New Zealand, to accompany us. But she thought she’d be too busy planning her coming jaunt to Paris and England.


by Leave a comment

2017 Travels March

MARCH 2017     WHERE WILL WE GO THIS YEAR?

With autumn’s onset, our thoughts – well, mine – turned seriously to this year’s travels.

Back in summer, we’d talked about doing a 3 or 4 month trip this year, to be away through the worst of the Melbourne winter.

A friend, actually former boss from one of our working holidays, was now based at Dimbulah in Far North Qld. We had been reading his latest book – Camp 64 – the story of his 2011-2012 solo walk from Camooweal to Birdsville following the Georgina River system, and using goats as pack animals. This sparked the idea of heading north again, visiting some places we had yet to see, and maybe calling in to have a yarn at Dimbulah.

The cover of Owen’s latest book

With that in mind, I had started a serious hunt for house sitters. The length of time was too great for the as-hoc arrangements we’d had for the past few years.

I e-mail contacted some fifteen sitters advertising on the housesitters site we’d used years before. To no avail. Some were already booked but had not updated their ads. Others really did not want to be in Victoria in winter. Couldn’t blame them for that.  So I put in my own ad for house sitters wanted, specifying a mature-aged couple, with no pets. I already knew, from past experience, that we would get replies from any number of younger, single people, often with both children and pets. And thus it proved.

We are not as prejudiced as people might think, from the above. Although our swimming pool is fenced, we simply do not want to take the risk of having children living here that we are not supervising ourselves. Some of our carpets never fully recovered from the less than house trained dog that our home minding son had, years ago. So – no pets, no kids.

After replying “Thanks, but no thanks” in effect, to a number of people, I was left with three possibilities. All had the added benefit that they were already around Melbourne, so we could meet in person to discuss the role. Theoretically, anyway. One lot proved very difficult to pin down, with several broken appointment times, and in the end I jettisoned that one as too unreliable to bother with.

Then, I thought we’d found a very suitable couple. We’d met here, they had seen the place and were keen. We arranged the date for them to move in here and thus for us to be away on our travels. Then came the news that the owners of their current sit wanted to stay overseas for another three months, so they would not be available after all. Damn.

Then, the final possible phoned to say they had just accepted a sit that started earlier and went longer than ours, which suited them better. That phone call came an hour after we were due to meet here for afternoon tea. The scones went into the freezer.

I couldn’t face starting the whole rigmarole all over again. So North Qld was off the agenda. It was more my idea than John’s anyway. It would just have to be more of the shorter trips, where leaving the house wouldn’t be an issue.

We started to make tentative plans for the first of these to be after the Easter school holidays, in mid-April this year. Threw some destination ideas around.