This is my first trip to Steve’s farm property in Trida. 
I nick named the farm Radiator Springs from the Pixar Cars movie. We planned an impromptu last minute jaunt up to the property to check the boundaries positions as best we could prior settlement; hoping we could get some measurements that were close enough to avoid a expensive surveyor.
Armed with precious little actual knowledge, a few hours internet research, a couple of GPS units, some Titles Office co-ordinates and a couple of “permanent marker” co-ordinates we set off into hillbilly country.
After convincing Steve I can use a perfectly good Panda with all the comforts of home, we ditched the tent (and unfortunately Steve’s sleeping bag, but thats a later story) and hooked up the Panda for it’s first “off road” adventure.
The first thing I noticed was the drive up. It was easy and picturesque and very much like a afternoon drive through the Dandenong’s. At the property, the views are really impressive and I discovered the Panda’s first “off road” adventure was limited to about one kilometer of dirt road, but that wont stop me from dressing this story up into a full on dangerous outback struggle, not for the faint of heart.
Full mobile phone, digital television and wireless broadband internet service didn’t hide the fact we were in remote and dangerous country
We were limited to where could set up camp. The access tracks limit movement to 4×4 and the width of the tracks and steepness of the slopes made it unlikely I was ever going to take a brand new Panda any further than 100 metres inside the gate where we set up camp. We set up camp on the edge of the slope overlooking the valley
The views from the camp were pretty impressive, as were the views from my bed across the valley. Steve had no views from his end of the Panda, but because he forgot his sleeping bag and was sleeping in 5 layers of clothes under a couple of towels and a rubber picnic blanket I’m sure the pretty views were far from his mind
Steve being stalked by a cow, it somehow knew we had cooked beef sausages on the fire the night before. LOOK OUT STEVE !!!!
Surveying meant setting the known boundary points into the GPS’s, navigating to those points and checking visible boundaries with the known co-ordinates and the actual co-ordinates at the points on the ground. To check accuracy we needed the permanent markers in the area. These markers are permanent markers that give fixed and comparable co-ordinates to work off, eliminating error. They are recorded by the Titles Office and used by surveyors. That way we could continually check the accuracy of the equipment and therefor the accuracy of our boundaries.
That confidence kind of evaporated when we found one of the a permanent markers in the middle of a cow paddock, a few kilometres away on another property.
The task of surveying was made slightly easier with the 4 x 4 motor bike borrowed from the neighbour, and I mean slightly easier because the bloody thing kept konking out ….
Steve didn’t have much success with the hash browns … if fact he’s trying to cook the bloody things again right now as I type this blog. The cows started to hang around like we had just fried up a relative. Even the cows were put off by the hash browns. 4 hash browns went into the fry pan, but nobody could identify a single hash brown when Steve had finished with them.
Camping doesn’t mean you have to live rough. Certainly when I have anything to do with it. Doing it rough means having having only a small LCD to watch.
A couple of views of various points around the property. The diversity property consists of plantation timber, cleared pasture, lush hidden valleys and steep slopes.
The view of our camp on top of the hill across the valley from a neighbouring property. It looks like a long hard walk back …. that’s possible because IT WAS
Steve wanted a nice photo of the sunset and set up his camera ……………………. I dont think so
And we found Fatso
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