Arrawarra and the Freebie
A while back for something to do I entered a Caravan Park competition and won it !! There is a choice of parks all around Australia and we chose this particular one because it is on the way home What a magical find ! FOUR free nights with en-suite bathroom (ah Luxury!) There are numerous activities including Golf course (lots of wildlife frequent it too !) Large swimming pools and smaller ones for the nippers! and a very comfortable hot spa ! Lawn Bowls ,,Archery,,games rooms,,bar,, restaurant (the food is really good) There is plenty of wild life including large Goannas,Kangaroos (some of them getting in the way while we play golf !) Kookaburras in full song and a real pleasure of a park to be in The staff ar also very helpful and friendly This stay alone saved us $200 in fees If in this area use this park you wont be disappointed !! Our final trip home in Hervey Bay commences after the 4 days travelling thru Gympie
Homeward Bound
We are travelling almost directly home and stopped off a lovely pristine caravan park at Telegraph Point (sounds exotic?) and met other Grey Nomads Vern & Lois ,we sat and chatted about nothing but fixing all the worlds wrong, sipping white wine.We had a lovely evening and that is what these trips are all about?meeting wonderful people and they ALL have tales to tell.This way of life is so intoxicating !! We will spend 4 days at a luxury campsite in Arrawarra (won in a competition and valued at $200!) We have been given a site with our own private en suite and it is excellent !! Parked metres from the beach this place boasts a restaurant/bar swimming pools Spas Golf course and a stack of entertainment machines. We are currently 800 kms from home and will rest up for a couple of months before heading out to Asia and Europe I will still do a blog and will hopefully introduce lots more pics and update my blog page (it will be done when we get home) Our next Australian adventure will begin February 2013 visiting places we have not seen before PLUS a few of our favourites This life is going very well Me and Annie are still enjoying each others company and the new neighbours we meet on a daily basis ! Sporadic pics will be placed on here willy nilly BUT will remain we hope informative
On the Way Back
We have landed at Melbourne and we called in to see Annies long lost remaining cousin Kaye and her husband Keith who made us very welcome.We didn’t just have lunch we had a feast !! Kaye went to enormous trouble putting on a brilliant spread and supplying white wine The chat was good and I am envious on the positioning of the house in their neighbourhood! Their outside verandah has a raised excellent view of the playing field opposite.One of my passions is cricket and watching the kids across the way from a brilliant vantage point was a bonus !! Twas apleasure meeting up with you and thanks for a brilliant meal ! We traavelled further North to Canberra and decided to stay and catch Parliament live,We sat in the gallery and it was similar to watching a pantomime!! Julia was in full voice mentioning the 70 billion blow hole and the party opposite who van only say NO for the umpteenth time ! It was still good to see and experience tho The other old parliament had indigenous people camping outside protesting ( I can never understand fully what it is exactly that they want?)
Don Bradman Greatest Australian Cricketer (Batsman)
We motored thru Bowral home town of Don Bradman (27 August 1908 – 25 February 2001 and he was married for 65 years !!) and visited his museum, dubbed ‘the boy from Bowral’, rose to acclaim during times of hardship, depression and recovery. He represented Australia for 20 years, playing 52 Tests from 1928/29-1948.
Knighted for his services to cricket in 1949, he remains the only Australian cricketer to receive a knighthood for services to the game. He retired from Test cricket with a batting average of 99.94, making his Test batting achievements nearly twice that of the nearest Test batsman. He used a cricket stump and a golf ball (off a wall) to practice his highly honed skills as a batsm,an !! Happy Days
PENGUIN the last tourist day before we sail back to Melbourne
We visited this place on the last full day in Tasmania (sigh) and everything (for the tourists) revolves around fairy penguins and Im not being homophobic !! There are statues all around this neat little seaside village BUT apparently the penguins are not around in great numbers anymore No one could give a reason The village was void of tourists,possibly due to non existant Penguins !! However the short drive back to our final night in Devonport was incredibly beautiful !! There are numerous islands of shore and one in particular named Goat Island looks very inviting and IF we had the chance would love to go and look around !! From our viewing point we couldn’t see any wild goats on the island !!Between us and the beach runs a full sized train and can be quite scary when the train is thundering towards us !! Tomorrow we board the Spirit of Tasmania once more heading for Melbourne Tasmania has been a fantastic place to visit with plenty to do and see and the SIX short weeks we have had there seemed to go so quickly Anyone thnking of gong to Tasmania? GO !! you wont regret it
Tazmazia in Tasmania
This magical place is a MUST to visit if in Tasmania The village for Gnomes is accessible only by FOUR magnificent mazes !!Each one is very challenging and extremely difficult to navigate (if with Annie !!) Once the mazes have been conquered it opens out to an amazing village for the vertically challenged and the place is full of buildings including pubs hotels churches overturned housed a prisoner s area stocked with guillotines,whips, hangman’s noose etc. The gardens (and maze tees) are kept in pristine and tidy order There are also a couple of concrete mazes for the kids and easy to view whilst the children fathom it out The township is aptly named Promised and the outside road leading to it is called Road to Nowhere $20 entry fe but well spent and needs half a day to conquer
Ashgrove part 2
Too many pics for the first blog SO here is part 2 There were lots of coloured life looking cows and would be a shame to miss some of them This place is well worth a visit The Butterflies are on display in the Cheese Factory and are Annies favourite insects ( if you can have favourites?)The cheese tasting (free) is to die for !!One more full day on this wonderful Island sadly
Ashgrove Cheese Factory Part One
Ahh this place is magical ! Outside the building there are numerous life like full sized COWS ! Each one has been elaborately painted by experts and school children !There is a FREE cheese tasting table inside the building and we were taken by the Pepper Cheese we bought a block !!There i a viewing platform to watch cheese being made PLUS a viewing of the maturing shelves and there are literally 1000s of cheeses (?) on display In the display area is a good collection of decorated wellington boots and to keep Annie happy glas case of mounted butterflies (of which she is a great fan in as much she has one tattoed on her wrist !!)
Bees at Chudleigh
We made a wrong turning heading towards Devonport and came across a wonderful BEE shop!! This place had a brilliant display of products all involving something to do with bees ! Including a working hive ( behind glass thank goodness) and to see these busy little creature at work is mind bogglingWe sampled different tastes of honey and purchased hony ice cream (luverly !) amd most importantly BEES WAX for my poorly second Didgeridoo (whilst trying to play it my 3 yr old grandson decided o chew the mouth piece,bees wax of course) The lady running the shop hails from Holland and is a delight to speak with also very informative Well worth a visit plus items for sale were reasonably priced and a wide variety ALL with the theme of bees
Sheffield Tasmania & Murals
Today we ventured thru Sheffield ( that has absolutely nothing to do with steel!!) The tourist attraction is large murals painted thru out this well kept town. Behind the tons information are the best of the best on display and may be bought by the public Some of the paintings are very good and in particular is the one painted on the side of the hydro dam workshop shed It is painted along the building and depicts (in stages) the building of the dam over a period of time including a terrific snow scene showing the majestic Cradle Mountain in its full glory !!We stayed the night at the local campsite based at the base of the Cradle Mountain and was entertained in the evening by a travelling group of nomads AND a few hungry wombats !!
Watch me play Didgeridoo
Geoffs Life After Work ! 