An observation- Divining Rods

Over the last couple of years, I have been giving Divining Rods a try. Now, I don't know why or how, but I have been able to use them to locate underground pipes or perhaps its the water inside the pipe. Last year on the gem fields, we heard how people there, use divining rods to find sapphire. This year we heard how people use them to find the depth of the wash, where sapphires are located. The guy who owns the drilling rig that digs the 900ml shaft, brings another guy with him with the rods. Now get this... The diviner walks around the property with the rods pointing away from him, to the front. When he finds where the wash is, the rods cross over. To find the depth of how far the driller has to go down, the diviner stamps one foot, again and again until the rods uncross and the number of stamps equals the feet of depth, and it works. The stamping, apparently breaks the magnetic signal from the wash to the rods. The wash is where water used to flow.
I spoke to another digger who has a claim at Sapphire while we were both waiting for water at a stand pipe. I asked if he was from around here and he said yes, I have a claim over the hill. How far are you down? oh, the wash is at 42feet but we're finding enough on the surface at the moment. How do you know it's 42 feet? Divining rods...
Last year, during our tour of the Old Timers Mine at Coober Pedy, there were divining rods hanging in reception. When I asked about there use, it was to find opal. This year we found out how people use divining rods to find opal in and around Quilpie and Winton. Opal is chrystalised water droplets held in seams between layers of rock. Apparently, out Quilpie way, the bearded guys have more success divining than those without beards.All very interesting.

WUDU two week shoot

What a great two weeks! What an exhausting two weeks! All of that and exciting at the same time. Having been put in charge of leading the convoy over the Bolte bridge and over the Westgate bridge and knowing that some of the people following would not yet understand the critical issues of this first day, we set off from CIA (caravan Industry Association) headquarters in West Melbourne, bound for Warrnambool. Helicopters are very expensive to hire for aereal shots and this is one of the reasons that it is important to keep the convoy continuous and without anyone else butting in to spoil the flow/look of the team in line. Apparently it worked well and so we pushed on, headlights blaring(low beam) and a stop at Avalon BP for lunch. Lunch and the start of the catering by the "Sweet Seduction" ladies that had served us well last year, were back on board and was something else to look forward to. The next thirteen days would prove to be uneventful as far as my job of caravan liaison officer was concerned. It did mean though, that I had to attend the production meetings each morning and then pass on the relevant information to convoy drivers including weather, final destination and follow up on any of there questions or problems. The latter being very few.

The convoy went from Warrnambool, splitting after more chopper shots out around the twelve apostles with some going to Hamilton and the balance to Port Campbell and then Timboon. Lake Fyans in the grampians for the next two nights.

We finished the duties of the convoy by the time we had reached Wodonga on the following Wednesday week. Mini concerts every second night and drive back to Melbourne with a day off on Saturday then early start to get into the city by public transport Sunday morning for final concert in Fed Square.

Raising funds for the McGrath foundation to fund breast care nurses is a great charity and the people of Victoria have once again shown their generosity by digging deep whenever and wherever we asked. Final results not to hand as yet.

Back in Victoria

The lush green countryside is a fair indication to us of what its been like here over the last few months. From the photos I have put up on this and other sites, you would get a fair idea on how the drought is effecting 60% of Queensland. As we sit in our van with the heater on, rugged up with rain on the roof, we ask ourselves "why are we here?"
Been back in Victoria for just over a week and caught up with our kids and grandchildren. Wow. Is it time to stop yet? No, not yet. Friday was a big day at the RV Leisurefest at Sandown Park. Our first time there and we were really impressed. Great to catch up with the crew from WUDU, Vista RV's and Elite caravans. We had a look at the Jurgens range on display and liked the Tooradin, 23'6" and quite luxurious. We met Ivan and Sally for lunch, Brian and Willy from the Rec club at the Willows and Rob Lucas from CIA. All great to see and chat with. A tired two headed home by train and got back at about 6.00pm.
Yesterday the Woodend farmers market was on and not having found any markets for a while, managed to head that way as Marg was having a girls day with dau and gr dau.I was pleasantly surprised by the range and quality of the foods there. I bought, beetroot, pumpkin, parsley, grain sourdough, home made crumpets and two different cheeses. I also bought mussels from a guy there and cooked up some magnificent chili mussels for lunch. Today we have been looking after two of our grandys while parents had a day out. Is it time to stop yet? No, the Khumo tyres need rotating, yes we've done another 5000klms since Mount Isa. Meetings, appointments, here and there, life is like that.

Natural sciences loop road

Starting at Charleville, the natural sciences loop road takes in Cooladdi, Quilpie, Eromanga, Noccundra Thargomindah, Eulo, Cunnamulla Wyandra and returns to Charleville. The loop is just under 1,000 klms long and we chose not to do the remaining 200 odd from Cunnamulla through Wyandra to Charleville because our plan is to head south. We have veered off the road from Eulo for a couple of days exploring Yowah and the opal fields there.
Natural sciences because it takes in astronomy through the cosmos centre at charleville, birdwatching at the many wetlands throughout the area, dinosaurs at Eromanga where Titanosaurus (Cooper) was found and they are working on others as well. Geology through the oil, gas and opal fields. History and heritage, we were only 180klms away from the Burke and Wills "dig tree". One thing not mentioned is the Magic.. The magic of the red soils out here. The colour is just as rich as that of the deep centre of Australia and the magic appears to be that hold that the coloured sands get over you. If you have been to this type of country, you will know what I mean.
The people out here are friendly as well. Something that  is synonymous with the remote style of community here. We met Eddie again, the Opal Hunter from Quilpie. We first met Eddie at Winton where he was fitting out an old butchers shop as a new opal business for him. Just by chatting with him, he suggested we drop in at Quilpie and have a look around and we did. Eddie explained the areas that opal is found and strangely follows the shoreline pattern of the ancient Eromanga sea that stretched from the Gulf of Carpentaria to the great Australian bight.On the map you can see how these areas are linked. At quilpie, the altar in St.Finbarrs catholic church is opal, as is the pulpit and the font. All beautiful stone. Today is the first continuous rain that we have seen since leaving the sunshine coast in June and the sound of rolling thunder, the odd strike of lightning and this area are all magic as well.
Yesterday we saw a couple of "new" parrots and upon consulting the book were able to name them as ring necked parrots, the same sort we had seen in the Flinders ranges two years ago.

Every Picture Tells a Story

Every Picture Tells a Story

Every Picture Tells a Story

Willows and beyond

Our time at the Willows this year is rapidly drawing to a close. We leave here next Wednesday morning and head West to Ilfracombe overnight. A couple of nights after that will see us at Mount Isa again.
My last report stated that not much had been found here this year and I am able to report that I have kept up that average despite shifting a lot of rocks and sifting a lot of dirt. Thats the way it is on the diggings. The Gemfest at Anakie has been and gone for another twelve months. Our first this year so we bought a $20- passport that gave us admission over the four days. Admission is usually $10- each per day so we went on 3 of the 4 days of the event. We took our stones in to be sent to Thailand to be cut and we had 32 of them which included some of our garnets from the Northern Territory that we found last year. We look forward to getting a nice little package in the mail in a few weeks time. Thailand because they are honourable, honest and cheap cutters/polishers of your valuable stones.They send representatives to Gemfest each year for that sole purpose.
The mercury has started to rise and several people complaining of the heat. We had 31C in our annexe yesterday and now have the air conditioning on again today.
Liz Speed from Emerald Photographics came out the other day to take photos of Marg. and I and our vehicles and the magnificent Kumho tyres. Kumho want to use us in a National release soon, stay tuned.
We will miss the friends we have met up with from last year at the Willows and some new ones as well. The Owners, Steve and Rea have sold the park and are hitting the road after 20 years here.The park may change by the time we are here again. Bon Voyage you two, enjoy the lifestyle that you have served over those years.....

Willows- Gemfields

It is difficult to realise that we have been here for three weeks already. Believe me when I say that we are busy while here. Digging and fossicking for sapphires is usually a morning thing, right? Yep, right. Off we go out to the diggings that in themselves can change incredibly from place to place. We have dug at the area known as "Steptoe" and have given it ago at the "Duffer" and more recently we have dug out the back of '"Bonanza" which is a commercial mine.
Afternoon, the shadows and therefore, the light changes, so not many dig, sieve and/or wash after 2.00pm. This change in light changes the circumstances to the point that sapphires are more easily seen in morning light.
So, return to camp, covered in dust, get showered changed and a leisurely afternoon until the fire is lit. Around the fire at happy hour, mixed reports come to light, generally this year, not a lot being found. Go figure???
 Sapphires are the product of a volcanic explosion millions of years ago and are actually, the cooled down sparks. The time it took to cool gives them their various colours. At the willows, the traditional (major) colour is green, but you can still find blue sapphire or yellow or brown (star) or pink or it seems even Australian diamonds here. YES DIAMONDS!! WOW.
Camp ground activity is not restricted to fire pit conversations at all, indeed  Tuesday afternoon, ladies craft and at night there is darts for those who would like to participate, no experience necessary. Friday arvo for ladies craft, Saturday mornings a forge is lit for pick sharpening and Saturday evening, the local rec club have an evening cook up with raffles and a singer. Pork on a spit, Christmas in July (7 courses) and tomorrow its a stockmans feed (3 dinner courses, pea & ham soup, corned beef and veg and bread and butter pudding) sounds pretty good. Problem we have had so far is the massive size of the serves. Park owners put on free pancakes each Sunday morning before we head off into town.Sunday market is on at Sapphire about 30klms away with lunch at Rubyvale, another 8klms and home for fish and chips from the rec club. The guys leave the fire to go, have a beer while waiting for the order to be cooked, return and eat around the fire.. All very nice and reasonably priced.
We also allow ourselves a longer trip for more general shopping to the largest of the nearby towns Emerald which is a good hours drive from here, with all the National supermarkets represented there.. Lunches have been very good at the local Irish Tavern.
Emerald is still a major service town to the mining industry and I expect that this will continue. As such, it is difficult getting into a caravan park here and mining vehicles are the major types of vehicles on the streets and in the supermarket car parks.

Fraser Island and Rainbow Beach

Its been a while since we stayed at Rainbow Beach, about 30 years as a matter of fact. Rainbow has lost none of its beauty, seascapes or wonderful sand dunes including the coloured sands.Now there is quite an up-market shopping centre that caters for all needs. Not your grand Stockland or anything like that, this IS Rainbow Beach after all. We had a great meal at the local pub on one of  "My turn to cook" nights but the rest of the time we self catered. Any shopping requirements were ably met by visiting the local IGA. We also had a few pre-dinner drinks at the local Bowling club and that was fine. The highlight of our stay though was undoubtedly our trip to Fraser Island. Stay tuned for more details on that one.
We met a lovely couple from Port melbourne, Bill and leigh, their site was diagonally opposite ours and we hit it off well. Bill and I went pumping yabbies together out at Inskip Point and later fished together at that same beach. We had a few happy hours with them and they left the day before we did. On that day, we went out to Inskip on  our own and had a go at the deep sand to get into, but not on, the beach. The Khumo tyres worked a treat. This was really deep sand and i didn't even have to engage low range to get through. the Landcruiser and the Khumos make a formidable team. Our next time there I engaged low range, as well as using the diff locker and it was even easier. The furrows in the sand were about 30cm deep and we had no trouble at all.
We have moved on and have left the coast behind as we left Yeppoon, Rockhampton and Emerald travelling West. A couple of nights at Sapphire/ Rubyvale and on to The Willows gemfields where we have met up with Ivan and Sally once again.The first day after set up/ arrival yesterday for us both and we are out on the diggings searching for those elusive sapphires. Nothing to report on that front at the moment but wait for it, it will happen.....

Rockhampton

Today we take the run into the Big smoke. Yesterday a little bit of exploring. We went to yeppoon for a little shopping after going to the causeway market in the morning. Instead of the Scenic highway, we took the inland route to Emu beach. Not an emu in sight. But there is a beautiful sculpture on top of the hill in town called the singing ship.

Up the Coast

Finally got a spare day to let people know whats been going on. I think the last report we were still at Stockton beach, Newcastle. Well a lot has changed since then and we have crossed the border into Queensland.

Every Picture Tells a Story

Mid North coast of NSW

I hope that the title of my blog today is in fact correct. My geographical knowledge of New South Wales is not what it could be, that is, it could be a lot better. Mind you, it is getting better every day and from here, we will explore the North coast and Northern Rivers, so there!!
 Been nice here at Forster. We knew it would be, after all of the people we have spoken to over the years who had been before us. Intriguing community here as well. We have the usual shopping strip over the way with several coffee places, a plethora of hairdressers that accommodates both men and women.A large shopping centre has opened about a kilometre away from the traditional centre and as usual, the strip has suffered. Stockland seems to be expanding fairly quickly if Queensland is an indicator, and so, the demise of several different businesses from the strip is the price these people have paid. Vacant shops of various sizes makes you wonder if anyone is game enough to attempt to have a go here. Time will tell.
Exploring has been good as well. We had been told how good seal rocks was. A trip of about 30klms south and we were there. Another beautiful beach, a community that seems to be based on fishing, with small boats and nets in abundance. First time we have seen a warning sign about "hauling cable across road"....Seal rocks leads to the Sugarloaf lighthouse, now a b&b. The walk to the light was worth every step. The walk from the buildings to the light itself, a steep gradient, was 160 steps and tiring in the short term but the view was exceptional. Taking in about 270 degrees covering the lighthouse beach, cliffs, blowhole and all the way around to seal rocks, spectacular. Caretaker, Terry, suggested we might like to take a look at one of the restored light keepers cottages, and we did, lovely. Terry had also mentioned that several whales had been seen offshore and can be seen, with patience. We chilled for a while staring out to sea ever hopeful of seeing the leap, the splash or the spout and there it was, a splash, and then another. So we knew that we weren't seeing things. A quick look for confirmation through the binoculars and all was ok. The walk, the steps, the splash, all worth it.
We returned via Bulahdelah and Nabiac just in time to get inside as the sun had set and the breeze was  up.
Yesterday we had a look around the other part of the area, seperated by a bridge. The Western town is Tuncurry and has a good business area and a nice new Woolworths which suited our shopping needs. Fishermens co-operative are worth supporting , like village butchers and bakers, and the Tuncurry co-op was no exception. Fresh,local fish, reasonably priced, local prawns and oysters, they've got the lot. On our departure we were met by a rather large pelican, looking for a feed. I spent a couple of hours attempting to catch anything longer than about 5" but to no avail.
Today we had a bit more of an explore locally. We left the van on foot and walked to the shopping strip. The usual Op shops are always great and finding the local post office, we picked up our mail that had been forwarded on. A couple of more hours fishing, or feeding the tiddlers was nice.Tomorrow we move on towards Port Macquarie .

Passing traffic

Some pretty big ships come in here. As youcan see, the weather not exactly brilliant here at the moment.
This ship, the Formosabulk Clement weighs in at 170,000 tonnes and measures 289mtrs X 45mtrs... I told you they were big.

Old and the new

At Stockton today we found some rusting old hulks that were exposed by the low tide. These sorrowful looking remains were in close proximity to some new vessels and some oyster leases. they could be the remains of service vessels for the oyster leases. beside them on  the shore, was the remains of an old slip way, including this hand winch, some rusting railway lines that went back into the water and this lovely stone wall....The winch area capped off by an abandoned plastic chair.

Every Picture tells a Story

Gulgong the town on the $10- note

Gulgong used to be on the old paper $10- note along with a profile of Henry Lawson. Lawsons mum  was born there and Henry was born in Grenfell, but spent a great deal of his childhood in and around this lovely town of historic 1850's buildings and the narrow streets to match.

"The night too quickly passes
and we are growing old.
So let us raise our glasses
And toast the days of gold."
So starts one of my favourite Lawson poems. Can you guess the title?

We press on to nearby Mudgee for a few days. the plan at this stage is to use Mudgee as a base and go out each day and explore the old gold areas around here. This has been on our "To Do List" for a number of years. A Ross Dainton painting that we still have, was titled "Hill End" and that is the first stop out of the Hill End /Sofala historic sites area. Glorious day today with temps about 25C on our arrival, we dropped the van at the caravan park on the river and moved straight into town. Info had it there was a market on run by the local Lions club. Off we go, before lunch and the market was quite good with about 50-60 stalls. I got sucked in by a woman selling her own lemon butter and a passionfruit butter YUMMO....

Hay, Hillston and the Rabbit Trap Hotel

After a short stay in Bendigo, yeah, that's right, bendigo. We had been up the central coast of new south wales just after Easter when i had to head back for a check up in Bendigo. Well, after getting the all-clear, I couldn't wait to get going again. We caught up with the kids and headed up the Cobb highway hoping that the MYSTERY town of Hay would hold the appeal that it has had for us for several years. We have wanted to explore more of this old, riverina town with classic architecture since visiting on one of our "paddlesteamer wreck finding tours" of years ago. That was when we found the wreck of the PS Viola downstream of Hay, went on then to Maude, the junction of two great rivers, Lachlan and Murrumbidgee. Anyway, Hay had been labelled as the NEW inland capital of Australia, before Walter Burley Griffin developed his theory as Canberras site. Why? Simply, Hay is equidistant between Melbourne, Sydney and Adelaide..Q.E.D....
This explains why the main lenders of the day, The Bank of New South Wales (Westpac), The Great Union Bank, later English Scottish and Australian Bank and even later ANZ Banking group, The Hay council and the magnificent Hay Railway station, are such splendid if not grandiose buildings.

After exploring Hay, firstly from the Hay showgrounds, which is a cheap but convenient overnighter, and secondly from the hay caravan Park (The Top Tourist park) we found that Hay had not developed to our previous expectations but still does a great job for the surrounding community with all services well covered.

Hillston was our next goal and we had been told at the Hay showgrounds of a small caravan park over the lachlan river and just past the Lake Cargelligo intersection. This place, Billabourie, was a family farm set up with a few powered sites. Off we go...

10 kilometres of gravel road off the main road and we see the park logo, a Hart-Parr tractor(vintage) hitched up to a nice old plywood caravan at the front gate meant that we had found the right place.The drive in had seen several different things from this low lying river type landscape. we have seen this country before from the family farm at Balranald where the cattle seemed to grow fat on nothing much down by the river amongst the trees. This time, Black Angus and a few herefords were seen on the way and then a field of harvested cotton bales waiting to be loaded and taken off to the gin at Hillston or somewhere else North. We had already come past paddocks where sowing of grain was happening even so by dry sowing. Crops of citrus trees and neils trucks from Moama laden with potatoes..

Three nights was not enough here. Jeff and Steph, from Adelaide had left us although Robert and Janet and Barry and Trish, all from Ballarat were staying on until after we left they kept up the wood supply and Barry caught good Yellas every session he went out. My score was not as good with one, but it was a beauty.

We have changed our tack again, now, instead of heading North into Queensland, we have the time to go back, across to the coast and complete our original goal of doing the East coast. Heading back over the Lachlan we follow it for ages. Lake Cargelligo, Condobolin and beyond before it swings back towards Orange/Cowra and the hills of the Great Dividing range. Camps 7 has the Rabbit Trap Hotel as a cheap site with power and water so that's our next destination. The hotel is at a small place called Albert, population 11, made famous this year by Jason Owen, runner up in X factor last season.

There is a car rally due in town today so we decide to head off and get outta their way. Heading up through Narromine, Dubbo and on to Dunnedo we have time to walk the 600 mtrs up the main street for a look and say g'day to a few surprised locals. I have felt a lot more comfortable the last few days because I'm back in HAT country and people don't stare at me when entering shops or anywhere at the moment..

The Long Paddock

We have been wanting to do this for a while. The Long Paddock is a section of New South Wales that has a great deal of history associated with it and this time it's because of the droving industry.The long paddock comes from times when there was no feed at home for the graziers to feed their stock so, they hit the road, or the long paddock. In this part of New South Wales, it was part of the National stock route which, basically lead from the Gulf of Carpentaria, to the Southern Port of Melbourne.Take notice when you drive out of Moama, heading North and see where the fence boundaries are, you will see they are up to a kilometre apart on either side of the cobb highway. Founder of Echuca, Henry Hopwood, had a boiling down works on the river bank, just out of Moama, at about where  merool caravan park is today and that is the southern  end of the Long paddock. Hopwoods works, abattoir, took advantage of the herds coming through that would normally be swum across the river, to the point of him building a punt that would ferry them across, and, at a price of course.The place where Hopwood chose for his ferry site was downstream of where a fellow Tasmanian convict, James Maiden, had the earliest punt at about the front gate of Maidens Inn caravan park today. Enterprising chap, Hopwood. His punt location meant TWO river crossings, Murray and Campaspe and he charged to cross BOTH.
The Long Paddock leads to the Kidman Way, another famous Australian grazing name, You may recognize that as belonging to Nicole, but Sidney Kidman was her ancestor and he marched his cattle from the Gulf through Queensland and New South Wales to Victoria. Sir Sidney was once the owner of Murray Downs station at Swan Hill. Kidman was known as the Cattle King and there is a book of that name worth reading.
Our visit last year to Camooweal and the tourist attraction there, "The Drovers Camp" was a real eye opener. The research about this industry and the effect and importance

it had on the country is fascinating and so it is worthwhile visiting that complex if in the area.

"Cheryl' the tent lady

On arrival at El Lago caravan park, we noticed a small green tent in the next row of the park. Some time later a single lady came wandering past and went to the tent. That night, it poured rain. I am not sure how much rain we had but it was at least 25mm. there were puddles in the grassy areas around the park and "Cheryl" was in her tent. A polite "good morming" was about all the conservation we had with her but amongst us vanners, "Cheryl" was the topic of conversation more than once. Elaine had said that the boys, John and Rob, had helped her put up the tent two days earlier and she arrived with tent, blow up mattress and sleeping bag all stuffed in a shopping trolley and had come from Sydney where she had been sleeping "rough.""Cheryl" had no refrigeration
 or cooking facilities. We don't know how or where she ate. She hated Sydney so she told the boys.Anyway after the rain, a small white car arrived one morning, "Cheryl" had packed up her goods and they were all placed in the car and she left. More conservation this time more about the "thank goodness, someone has taken her into care" type ones. All agreed that this was good.
We said our goodbyes to John Elaine Rob and Lorraine on the Friday morning and guess what happened Friday afternoon, "Cheryl" returned with shopping trolley, new larger tent and goods. She had a bit of trouble putting the new larger tent up and knocked on our door for some help. Of course I will.....and she was back.

Central Coast of New South Wales

Having lived in nsw for the last 17 years or so, we still know very little about it. Lets face it, it's our oldest state and with our love of all things historic, we need to find more. We chose to stay at Gerroas Seven Mile Beach caravan park for Easter. South coast is a place that we visited about 35 years ago and we haven't been able to get back in that time. Seven mile beach lives up to its name and there is plenty of WOW factor.The park is divided into two distinctly different sides, beachside, where we stayed, and riverside, on the other side of the verybusy road. A visit to riverside showed many of the sites were annual or long term residents, several canvas cabanas backing on to the river and sites suitable for large tent groups, like school groups and the like. Some large groups of teenagers were spotted when we were out, on a surf school/camp. This type of business fits in well along this coast and the beauty of seven mile is that there are no killer currents or high rough surf.
At beachside there were nice modern beach hut style cabins, modern amenities and a pool with different sections that suited from toddlers to adults. The lounge had a few coin operated games , a pool table and a big screen. Outside the lounge a bbq, sink and a pizza oven. First one we've seen in a park. The jumping pillow was just along from us and it had a fair workout over Easter. Lots of tents in ourarea as well and they took up ALL of their site. Annexes, tarps and gazebos were what looked like "compulsory". The park was full as expected over the peak Easter period. Shopping centre is at nearby Kiama and the traffic there was also bedlam. We did a littleshopping at a lovely little IGA at Kiama downs, just out of town away from the traffic snarls. Back to camp and into "lockdown" mode for the next few days. About 25ml of rain overnight and it was quite heavy, next couple of days, just lovely. Drive to Nowra via Shoalhaven Heads gave usa good look around. We were last here when our good friends the Gibsons lived here and we had a holidat at Ulladulla. We met up again with the Gibsons and had a lovely meal in Kiama at Hanoi on Manning and a great catch up. We hope to meet them on the road somewhere.
We moved on from Gerroa back up the highway1 to the Hume and on to Richmond. It was in the new Camps 7 and is attached to the Richmond club. Wanderest has powered sites and water for 12- per night for clubmembers. Showers and toilets there as well and all sites are on bitumen. This area was part of the earliest settlement after Sydney cove began expanding. The Hawkesbury river valley provided fertile soils for farming and vegetable growing in the area.St.Matthews at Windsor has some very early graves in its graveyard beside the church. We found a first fleeter married a 2nd fleeter and their descendants in there as well.

This is Mat Urquhart, and he is the General manager of Tyrepower at Sunbury. Have I ever told you how much these guys are dedicated to customer satisfaction and all round do-gooders....Our first experience started last year when we were leaving Port Augusta and I needed a couple of tyres changed over from the van to spare and we called at two bridgestone dealers on the way out of town and both more or less said, Come back Thursday..This was Monday morning. great help. On we push to port pirie and the Tyrepower branch there had had a change of owner and it was lunch time, not a good time to call generally , but wait...Yeah wheel her in, said the owner and they changed the tyre straight away. How much, mate? ooh thats alright, no charge today. That was the start. On our return to Sunbury area I went to see Matthew about replacing the tyre that had been on the spare. well he tried very hard to replace the Simie tyres but apparently they are not made anymore. He did recommend a couple of light truck rated tyres and fitted and balanced for a very good price. light truck tyres are recommended because of the higher pressures they take rather than a normal car radial. The extra pressure because of the load they take.

My latest episode with Matthew Urquhart and Tyrepower Sunbury came just last week when I am considering changing my Coopers preferably for more Coopers. that was not to be at $370- per tyre. Matthew showed me some information on the Kumho KL/61a good, well wearing tyre that would suit our useage with 70%bitumen and 30% off road- sand and mud etc. The price included balancing and i asked about a wheel alignment and that again was no problem. Cannot speak highly enough of the service we have received at Tyrepower branches in Port Pirie and Sunbury. If you are in the market for a set of new tyres, give Matt a call on 97407755 and tell him Bruce sent you.

St.Leonards, Inglewood, Upwey, Macedon, Moama and further

Well it's  been a while since writing and quite a few things have happened since we left St.Leonards.I was right in thinking of maybe Inglewood and we stayed for a few days there. The frustrating part is that we still haven't been out fossicking yet. We go there and get busy with other things, like the WUDU magazine or an article for the website and before you know it, we're off again. Exactly what happened this time. Few days at Inglewood and then off to Romsey where we left the rig hitched up, took the "For Sale" Territory to Upwey for another WUDU shoot. This was a reunion of people involved in the Summer Series and will front the new season of Whats Up Downunder when it goes to air on the 30th March (check your local guides.)
Sunday morning and we are packed ready to leave and our host Col has arranged for us to meet his good friends Terry and Kaye. Terry has a great car collection that Col reckons I will enjoy. After winding our way through some very dry parts of the Dandenong ranges, we reach there magnificent house and several outbuildings on about 5 acres overlooking Cardinia creek reservoir. Terry DOES have some interesting vehicles indeed, as well as a great Elvis collection and an extensive museum collection of all sorts. Makes us feel a little older when you see things on display in glass cases and we both say "oh I remember those."
Terry has a "Tucker" motor vehicle, No.45 of 48 produced in the world, he is a member of the Cord and Duesenberg owners club of Australia and also drives in hillclimbs competitively. Thats the difference...Terry took 10 seconds off the record for class in his '64 mustang at the Bathurst hillclimb recently.Nice record breaker there, Terry.
My brother Dean was bringing Mum down to my sisters place at Wantirna south and our daughter Elise, was also going to meet them their with her two children, so as we were in the area, decided to surprise them and call in as well.A nice get together and a chance for a four generation photograph.We left there, back to Romsey, pick up the van and headed for Macedon.
 We hadn't been to this park before but it has everything we wanted, peace and quiet as well as being on the Bendigo train line, all good points. Not too far from Elise either.
Once you are able to settle into a park or area, start to appreciate and fit into your surroundings, a greater appreciation of the area develops. How so? Well, a forinstance..the local c.f.a. were holding a "flea" market on the Saturday so we decided to go and have a look. Well, we had no idea  how big this thing was. Kids jumping castle and special kids activities, food stalls a bric a brac shed and a book shed where a bag of books was $3-, unbelievable, then the auction started. Donated goods from which you could furnish a house were put up to sell with the MOST entertaining auctioneer we have seen in action for a long time, knocked the car park full of donated goods down to the highest bidder. Sattelite dish went for $2- Wow. Marg tied my hands behind my back otherwise we would have needed another storage container I reckon, and this only take place ONCE a year..Great event.
Left Macedon after about a week and headed back to Moama for another board meeting and catch up. Stayed in Shady River park as we had before and it's close to the RSL.Warm enough for me to go swimming and the floatation helps my back, so I don't mind getting wet now and again.
After a few days, all business done, we head South and return to Treetops. Elise and her cousin Erica have organised a family reunion here and we have a great time. all in all 25 people were there, we self catered, some had powered sites and the rest used the bunkhouse type of accommodation  that is in the hall. A great weekend. We stayed on for a further couple of days and explored the Topaz possibilities of the area. We were given info about the area that we may be able to fossick for these stones, not too far away. so a day out proved fruitless, but our info did say "when the creeks are running."
Now onto the Caravan, Camping and Touring super show at Caulfield racecourse . High temps about 34C may have put some people off but that was not evident where we stood. Luckily the WUDU stand is on the 1st floor in the air conditioned area and we are glad it is. Have spoken to lots of people over our time so far there and back into it tomorrow. If you are around, come and say G'day to stand no.115..

This last week has been one of several kilometres. Firstly we left Waratah bay to be back in Moama for a meeting, a visit to the storage facility and catch up with family and friends. We had another overnight stay at lockington at the travellers rest before reaching Moama. This weekend is the annual Sourthern 80 ski boat race so we were really anxious about leaving before the streets once again became grid locked as they do on that weekend.Straight through Bendigo stopping for fuel for the vehicle and ourselves before making the trip through Castlemaine, Daylesford and Ballan to Geelong. Once through Geelong to Portarlington and Bellarine Bayside caravan park. Strange coming to Portarlington and our good friends, Terry and Marg. not being there. We do manage to catch up with them later.

Bellarine bayside controls about 24klms of beach front in the parks they look after. Stretches from portarlington to St.Leonards and parks vary in size, with the largest at their headquarters at PA.Friendly staff, helped us when we needed to re-locate because of a fence and a parked vehicle near our original site but this was no problem to them.Vans our size are in the minority here and we see groups of several members of the one family occupying about 3-4 sites for their annual seaside holidays. Several options are available for long term  (seasonal) site rentals.Some nice photos around the park and the town and a meal at the local Tandoori with friends was great. They invite us back the next day for lunch and the usual mussel feast is difficult to refuse and we look forward to that. Terry loves his cooking and does a great chilli mussels dish.
After two nights we move on to indented Head to stay in another of Bellarine bayside parks. A smaller park but quite friendly. We speak to people who have been coming to that spot for up to 50 years and we learn that there are three generations of the one family there as well. These parks are different from what we are used to. There are more long term camps here than transient campers. We very much categorise ourselves as being in the other group of travellers. Several people take a lot of notice as we negotiate the park for our site and see the big rig coming in. Today, we move again to St.leonards on the beach. Another Bellarine park and a little different again. Not a lot of cars at the camps as we come in and only a few people walking around. Thats ok, it is a working day after all and will see a change at the weekend. Southerly breeze is still around so, after taking some photos of the camp after original set up, we go off to Queenscliff for lunch and a wander around the shops. After lunch and a quick drive down to Barwon Heads for a look at Diver Dans cafe, now At The Heads cafe. Call back through Ocean Grove for a stroll up the shopping strip, a lovely thick shake at a cafe there and on home once again. tonight its a BBQ with Ivan, Margaret and family and tomorrow we are North bound once again. May be overnight at Inglewood, me thinks....

Had a couple of days at Inverloch big4 and caught up with my Mum and one brother. Had another look around now the de-sal work has finished and found many houses for sale. They vary of course, right across the board. Inverloch too, has several nice houses for sale and they also have matching price tags.Just love that coastline. from the first time you catch glimpses of that dramatic vista over the sandhills at Kilcunda and on further to cape patterson and finally to inverloch with the ever decreasing point smythe  on the other side of Andersons Inlet slowly but surely filling the inlet. It's hard to imagine that when my father was a boy, ships used to sail into Inverloch to the original jetty taking Outtrim coal out, from about where the Big4 park is now. He said there was a crane on the end of the jetty and kids would climb it to dive into the deep water there.

On through Meeniyan, Fish Creek to Waratah Bay where the caravan park is located in Freycinet street.We have been going there for many years but we only took a cabin. we had a favourite that you could actually see the condition of the sea from our bed.The crimson Rosellas come to greet you and bags of parrot food can be bought from the small shop.Hand feeding can be done with confidence as the birds are cheeky enough to allow this.Fishing has always enticed me at Waratah and with only 23 steps from the top of the steps to the beach, why would I resist. This time though, fishing was not the drawcard. We went for R & R and that's exactly what we got. Nice to re=kindle the relationships once again with park managers and just chew the fat about the area, industry and future.

We asked my brother in law and wife to come over as they had just purchased a new van. They were planning a shake down trip with friends to Lochsport but all decided that Waratah was a better option. We had a good catch up there as well.
People behind us, German visitors joined us for happy hour and were very interesting to talk to.

Kay and Elke were fascinated to see the Koalas just behind our camp and still within the park.

What a great couple of weeks we have had. Moving quietly through the central goldfields of Victoria after the Portarlington mussel fest, we settled in Maryborough. Had a pleasant stay overnight en-route at Clunes, the booktown.. We have always liked Clunes. Our first venture there was on Anzac day about 1990 and it was a whole lot different then. A piper and tinrattler for the local RSL went from pub to pub ,piping and collecting and you could park anywhere in the main street on THAT Anzac day. Plenty of vacant shops in all states of disrepair and a couple of bric-a-brac shops and not a lot of anything else. Clunes has had a re-vitalisation. Lovely bakery, book shops galore, news, hairdressers a few gift shops have given a re birth to this old goldfields town. Well worth the journey from anywhere to Clunes.

Maryborough seems to be dominated by some lovely elevated architecture. Try and find anything higher than the old schoolhouse, the site of a new retirement village now, or spend some time browsing the antiques at the magnificent railway station before having a snack or perhaps even lunch at the lovely cafe there. A little further on from the railway station is the old mill, now turned into a sewing machine museum, yes ,thats right.  This corrugated clad 4 storey mill once crushed local grain and now houses a great collection of sewing machines and an impressive array of bric-a-brac.
The local highland society have a great club on the main street and serves a mean lunch. The town is also the gold seeker centre for victoria so any tips, or equipment to find that elusive nugget may be found at Coiltek out along the Bendigo road.Quite hot while we stayed in the Maryborough caravan park. We met a few locals and a few visiting fossickers out to find that elusive nugget.
Moving on we went to Inglewood, another old gold town with an amazing history. The great fire of 1862 destroyed most of the main street of Inglewood, so most of the buildings date from then.

Mussel festival at Portarlington was enormous. There will be more written about this great event later so stay tuned. Suffice to say that we had a really great time with our long time friends as well and you can probably guess what was on the menu. WOW..

It hasn't been a strenuous time since then. One night at that historic gold town come book fest town of Clunes and now at Maryborough, another historic gold town. Is there a link somewhere? Yes there is and it is the allure of that rarest of valuable commodities and we are gonna have another go at it. already spoken to a guy in the park who prospects professionally Anyway, a bit too hot these days to venture too far into the bush. The beasties are out at this time of year as well and I'm not getting involved with them. we may stay a week, we may only stay another couple of days before moving on to another historic gold town, there I go again...........