We packed up last night and gave a lot of thought to the drive home south through inland NSW, with the horrendously hot forecast. By comparison, the night and morning in Fingal Bay was cool.   Its difficult to prepare for extreme heat when your eating breakfast in really mild tempertures by the beach with a cool sea breeze. The problem was Melbourne was quite mild today and stinking hot tomorrow and Sunday;  inland NSW was horrendous today and tomorrow.   We decided to play it by ear and see how the drive went.   We stopped for fuel in Yass and opening the car [ ... ]

Although the holiday is not officially finished until we arrive home, today is effectively the last holiday part of the holiday. We pack up all chairs, tables and toys etc. The awning gets rolled away and the kayak gets strapped down on the roof of the car. Ross was planning an early morning fish out on the bay this morning, but he unfortunately hurt his back packing up the morning we left Byron Bay. His back was getting better, but the chinese massager at Salamander Bay yesterday appears to have busted more than she fixed. To [ ... ]

Today started with a wonderful cafe quality creamy hot chocolate for Barb …. provided by Ross’ s new coffee machine. The machine was purchased yesterday because it was “so cheap, he’d be crazy not to buy it” We all know that that is a line straight from the good book of Female Logic, but in this isolated case …… it might almost have been true. One things is for sure, had the hot chocolate been crap, Barb would have been very vocal about the entire project.   Barb gave it 5 stars. (She wont be so impressed with the coffee varieties) The machine is similar [ ... ]

A question to ponder.   Barb often forgets her wallet.  In fact, as late as yesterday in the chemist, Barb apologised with a wry giggle.  The odd thing is she never, ever forgets to make sure Ross is in possession of his wallet before we leave the camper. Not sure about the signed time limit on alcohol free areas, its not like drunken irresponsible dickheads will vanish.Should be worth the trip up for when they turn the grog back on, on the 1st of Sept 2015 after a 4 year dry spell. There’ll be some pretty thirsty dudes around by [ ... ]

“Evolution, have you heard of it?” Thats what Daniel asked Ross this morning. Ross replied yes why. Daniel went on to explain that man had evolved from apes, with which Ross was very impressed with Daniels general knowledge. Daniel went on to add, that Ross hadnt quite evolved as much as he perhaps could have. It became apparent the possibly Barb may have been behind the evolution lesson. Nice one Brab. Barbs evolution lesson wasnt very successful. Ross fails to see any comparison ………. No resemblance …… ??? The caravan [ ... ]

It Continued to drizzle for most of the night for our last night in Byron Bay, but these two guys could count their lucky stars they had that awning on their camper to keep the rain out. We were driving for most of the day yesterday to get from Byron Bay to Nelson Bay. It is about 8 hours of driving time plus fuel, toilet and food stops on top of that. The day until later in the afternoon was uneventful, then we were off the air without phone or WIFI until this morning when we headed [ ... ]

Our last day in Byron Bay before we start heading south towards Fingal Bay in Port Stephens. We’re booked into the Fingal Bay caravan park for a week on Sunday. Tomorrow night will probably be in the bush or a road side camp somewhere an hour or two north of Port Stephens. Just like Carrie Bradshaw in Sex in The City, season 3 episode 7, where Carrie desperately wanted to buy the fabled Manolo Blahnik Mary Jane shoes; our Carrie (Sarah) replayed the scene with pin point accuracy. The Manolo Blahniks were replaced with Tiger Lily and the shoes, or [ ... ]

It Daniels 8th birthday today, and he was extremely fortunate to have Finley here with him to share it with. Daniel was so spoilt at xmas, which was combined with Ross and Barb being well under prepared, so the gifts were actually quite pathetic. But Daniel wouldnt have appreciated anything on the holistic wellness scale, which is about all thats on offer in Byron Bay. We had a cursory wander about Ballina a couple of days ago, but the inspiration wasnt jumping out. Anything worth having, Daniel alread has. We needed the [ ... ]

The boys both slept in the annex last night … swapping the inside berth with Kieron and Sarah. Ross and Barb were a little nervous that the cheap arse air mattress may be exposed for what it is. The sleepout started off as an adventure but Daniel soon after complained because the cheap air mattress was too uncomfortable. We said keep your voice down, Kieron and Sarah think that the air mattress is an expensive quality unit, with therapeutic side benefits. We were bypassed by a thunder storm, and got a few spots of rain during the night. A hot morning [ ... ]

After we arrived in Byron from Mooloolaba, Barb took Daniel to the park and video taped the “chance” meeting for Daniel and Finley. (Its a 9mb video and will take while to load, so be patient) Click to view video. Byron Bay was blown out today. We packed up kids, surfboard, boogie board, lunch and beach toys and headed to Clarkes Beach just south of Byron itself, closer to the headland. Only problem is no-one bothered to have a wander to beach 50 feet from camp where they would have found it blowing sand around like a sandblaster ….. we [ ... ]

Our Byron Bay location on Google Nothing to do with our holiday, but Ross’s son Ben and his mad mates used an excavator to build a 60metre slip’n’slide on the side of a hill into a farm dam …. the Youtube video The day started out with a “walk”. Now a walk in Ross’ s coding is a casual stroll, in and out of a few surf shops, interlaced with the odd flat white; possibly a focacia. A walk can never be catergorised as fitness ….. unless you walk with either Barb, or as Ross discovered ex-military Kieron. Ross already [ ... ]

The joys of sleeping till 6am. Although its actually exactly the same time in space as 5am in QLD (no daylight saving in QLD), the mind set of waking and seeing 6 on the clock instead of a 5 makes a huge difference. Leaving the clock set on Melb time while we were in QLD would have had the same effect, in fact nothing would really have effected us because even all Foxtel programming is on Melb based time … so we could have just operated on Melb time all along. For the first time since we have been away, [ ... ]

We left Mooloolaba with a heavy heart this morning bound for NSW. The turning point where we “U” turn and start to head south is a crap feeling because every kilometre is a kilometre closer to Vic. We crossed the border with sad faces, although Poo Poo Head had a slightly different angle on displaying his sadness We stopped at Maccas outside Mooloolaba at a service centre to raise up Ross’s caffeine quota to safe levels. The maccas carpark seperated this From this We’re not sure if its an inappropriate location for McDonalds or a direct [ ... ]

Ross was up at 5.30am prepping for a fish today. He scoured the internet, weather bureau, fishing forums, solar cycles and tide charts. Ouija board, horoscopes and moon stones. He even secretly sneaked into our neighbours boat hoping to find a trace of some clues. He wandered off to the beach to check the physical conditions …. but he still has no idea how to catch fish. If enthusiasm makes up for skill, he should do ok. But he isnt prepared to allow a complete lack of knowledge of fishing get in the way. [ ... ]

Our rear neighbours are one of the regular long term xmas campers to this park and have the huge tarp setup. They camp here for 6 weeks Nice people, in fact all the campers around us are very friendly. The bulk of the park seem to be relatively local people who return year after year. It has a feel much like we expect Rosebud foreshore is to Melbourne’ites. Everybody knows everbody. Theres no yahoos, the noise stops relatively early and the kids dont run amoke too early. The lady out back washes clothes etc in [ ... ]

The shit food cafe last night was Olivers, Ross ran past it this morning. Back to Starbucks where “Barbra” bought Ross his morning brew (at lunchtime) A hot and windy day today. The beach was blown out, choppy, hot with dirty dumping surf. No beach today. The planned fishing trip in the kayak has been postponed. Ross seen an aerial shot of the entrance to the river, and the area outside looked very inviting. …. just not in this choppy windy sea. Mooloolaba Bar trawler crossing Youtube vid We went for a walk to the rocks at the northern end of [ ... ]

Its painful to invent titles for each post, so we’ve reverted to place and day Took the Poo Poo Head to the skate park this morning.   The beach was a little blown out so it was convenient In his travels last night running around getting supplies for Daniel, Ross found, purchased and issued 3 water squirters on his return.  They’ll be getting wheeled out at the next beach outing The skate park is between Mooloolaba and Maroochydore, at the Alexandra Headland surf club, which won best surf club 2013.  We’re not sure what aspect of the club won … it could have been [ ... ]

The esplanade and foreshore in Mooloolaba is beautiful.  The highrise buildings arent high enough to block the sun like Surfers, and they dont dominate the skyline. Tomorrow we’ll grab a couple of pics of the foreshore which is also really nice. We went for a long run this morning.   Ross was tied up with some building paperwork and phone calls so the temperture crept up and by the time we left it was really hot.   By the time we got back we were both completely knackered ….. but the beach was calling.   You cant describe the enjoyment of living in shorts and [ ... ]

Our site at Mooloolaba Beach CP Ross was up at 5.30 am and went for a walk to the beach.   There was a swag of people already walking along the beach and swimming like it was the middle of the day.   Once the true holidayers were up and about we wandered the short stroll into town and had breaky at one of the gazallion cafes along the strip. We unfortuantely picked an expensive and less than impressive example, but it was edible at least and the view was pretty good as all the cafes are Youll note the expensive toast that Daniels travel [ ... ]

We packed up this morning, said bye bye to the Gold Coast and headed north to the Sunshine Coast.  The drive is about 2 hours and its a good run for the most part. There is an Ettamogah Pub along the way near Caloundra on the side of the Bruce Hwy.  Its an interesting sight very much the same as the one north of Albury.   Ross pulled off the hwy for Daniel to explore but Daniel was lost in Minecraft and couldnt care less.  So we drove off the highway, through the car park and back onto the highway We were very [ ... ]