Halloween

Last year, Louka really wanted to go trick-or-treating, but I wasn't prepared so I put her off. This year when I suggested she go, she wasn't so keen. However, when I arranged to go with her school friend she got into the spirit... demanding to dress up as the monster Ichabod from Deltora Quest. So I spent this morning shopping for red clothing and red cardboard, and watching and pausing episodes of Deltora Quest to sketch Ichabod's face.


After school she dressed up and we drove to her friend's place. Another classmate also came along. We headed off along the two streets we'd been told were good. There were lots of spiders, skeletons, pumpkins and other creepiness.


After an hour Louka got bored and wanted to go home. But she was keen to hand out lollies to other trick-or-treaters who came by our house. So we put out a balloon and a bowl of lollies.

Road trip 2011 - part 2

The next stop was Girraween National Park, just inside Queensland, chosen purely for its location as a good spot to break up the journey. Its website claims it is noted for large rocks and for Spring flowers. It had both in abundance - and fine weather!

Big flat rock areas:

Balanding rocks:


Split rocks:


Gaps between rocks:


Lots of flowers:


After an afternoon and a morning bushwalk it was on to Maleny to see my aunts and uncles. When we got there uncle Bob was working in his vegetable garden. I looked over the fence and said "Hello" and he asked what I was selling. "Five-year-old children" I replied and Bob said he didn't want any of those. Then he came over and kissed me.


Louka soon got to work drawing pictures and writing notes to her new-found relations. She was very impressed with Bob's home-made "monster bread" (mixed grain bread).

Next day we went round to Rita and Kevin's place for a family reunion. There were Rita and Kevin, Bob and Connie, Brian and Margaret, Bill and Viv, my cousins Alison and John and John's children Oscar and Ella. Oscar is 1½ years older than Louka and Ella 1½ years younger, so they got on very well.



Chatting to my aunts and uncles, we found that Bill and Viv have a lovely new house near the Glasshouse Mountains, where Bill has built Viv the most expensive clothesline in the world. So next day we followed Connie and Bob to see it (and the rest of the house as well). It is a lovely house, with gorgeous polished timber floors, but unfortunately I didn't take any photos. Graham was very impressed by Bill's shed, which is even bigger than our garage that extends under our entire house. Oh, and the clothesline was fine - the expense being in excavating a flat area for it.

I'll write about the trip home in a new post.

Road trip 2011

I wanted to visit my aunts and uncles in Queensland: Graham wanted a camping holiday. So he suggested a road trip. I was pretty dubious, as I thought Louka would be bored with long drives and would miss her toys and TV. Turned out I needn't have worried. She loved camping, and though she got a bit restless and fractious during long drives, there were in fact only three of these as we spaced out the camping spots pretty well.

We used the second week of the school holidays to drive north by the inland route and the first week of school term to take the coastal route south, avoiding some of the traffic and crowds.

First night was at Dungog showground - the only camping accommodation I could find within a few hours drive of Sydney. Surprisingly it was almost empty. Also, it rained.


Next morning it was still raining and the 18km drive on dirt roads to the campground at Barrington Tops didn't appeal. After lunch at Scone we headed to Apsley Falls in Oxley Wild Rivers National Park.



It was still raining when we arrived, so we spread the tarp over the back of the campervan. But the sky did clear a bit.


Also there were free barbecues to cook dinner.



Day 3 and it was damp but not raining, so we set off for a bushwalk. This sign confronted us:


As we continued, we found why the bridge was closed: it had been swept away altogether.


However, there was plenty more to see and do there.




After two days, two waterfalls and two impassible footbridges (the second was still there, but under fast-running water too deep for Louka), we moved on to Dangar Gorge campground in another part of Oxley Wild Rivers National Park. Here there were no barbecues and no flush toilets, but a fancy firepit and no-one to collect camping fees. The short walk to the falls lookout was pretty crowded, but the longer walks were empty and we saw wallabies, kangaroos, echidnas and a scorpion. No monsters, despite Louka's searching. And the footbridge was usable!




Next day (day 5) we were back on track with our plans - off to the small town of Tingha to visit Green Valley Farm. What can I say about this place? It's the strangest place I've ever been. 10km drive on partly dirt road from a small country town then down a long dirt drive, you come to the entrance - through a museum of odd stuff. Old tools, a two-headed calf, religious memorabilia, a hairball from a cow, a skeleton couple in a coach...



Then you're through to the amusement park itself, where everything is human-powered and most is home-made from steel pipe. Unfortunately it rained, but that didn't stop us, but it did stop me taking many photos. The roller-coaster was scary - you push the carriage up to the top, hop on (no seatbelts) and push off. Down it goes to the bottom then up towards the old tyre at the other end. Then backwards, and forwards again till it comes to a standstill at the bottom. The mini-golf rink was half underwater, but we played a round anyway. There were ducks and peacocks wandering around.





Then beyond the amusement park were the animals. You could buy a 50c bag of seed to feed them. The best were the kangaroos, which held our outstretched hands with their black paws to nibble the seed. The emu and ostrich pecked, which was slightly painful with their big beaks. The goat licked - yuck.







The camping area turned out to be a sloping paddock with sheep wandering through (and fertilizing the grass), but it had nice hot showers, a washing machine, and a camp kitchen with barbecues and a proper sink. All in all, if you have kids and happen to be in the NSW Northern Tablelands, highly recommended.

This post is getting ridiculously long, so I'll continue in a new post.