WESTWARD HO! We did this clever thing, not completely by accident, as we knew that northern hot-spots like Katherine, Kununurra and Broome turn hellish in the dry season - camping grounds chocker, shops overwhelmed, people turned away etc, as half of NSW, WA and most of Victoria flee their home states at the first signs of winter. The plan was to stay in Darwin till late in the season to avoid this Grey Nomad feeding frenzy, leaving just before the ‘build up’ and start of the wet season. So far it’s paid off - we’ve had waterfront camp sites, empty roads, [View Full Entry]

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Clunk...whoosh...rattle...bang...slap...this has been my soundtrack for the last month, along with a mechanical cacophony backing track from industrial washing machines, driers and sheet folders in the Darwin commercial laundry where we’ve been working. We’d planned to spend some time in the Top End capital to find jobs as well as avoid the cold and wet winters they get down south. There are plenty of jobs in Darwin - a city which seems to have completely avoided the GFC. It’s one of the fastest growing cities in the country and the most expensive to rent or buy propert [View Full Entry]

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If you have the e-stamina to get to the end of my blogs you’ll notice the later photos of this month’s look decidedly un-Australian. At happy hour one evening our friends mentioned cheap airfares as they were thinking of a trip to Thailand. Suddenly a map of SE Asia popped up in my head. Darwin is so close - only a 3 hour trip to Singapore instead of the discouraging 9 from NZ. And how cheap? Only $100 each way?? We’d kick ourselves if we didn’t go! Rhys had work organised but didn’t start for 2 weeks, so after a couple [View Full Entry]

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This month I showered with six frogs. They were nice little frogs, especially the bright green one on top of the toilet cistern, but it’s a little disconcerting when you have to get naked in front of them and take off your glasses so you can’t see when they’ve decided to leap across from one wall of the shower cubicle to the other. They were in different places when I’d completed my ablutions, so they managed to avoid my soapy body and I managed to avoid stepping on them while getting dry. I was willing to share my shower with the [View Full Entry]

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Broken Hill - god-forsaken-hole or artists’ paradise? Everyone told us, “Oh you have to stay at Broken Hill - there’s so much to do!” After having been here for a week I tend towards the ‘g-f-hole’. The constant drizzle might not have helped - we’re applying to the Federal Minister for the Environment to fund the rest of our trip, as everywhere we go it rains - we’ll go wherever needed to break the drought. Broken Hill was the richest silver, tin and lead mine in the world at the height of production in the 19thC and is very proud of [View Full Entry]

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From experiencing the hottest day in Melbourne’s history to the coldest April temperature in 60 years, we've had enough of Victoria’s crazy weather and are about to head north with all the other grey nomads who flee the southern states for temperatures kinder on their thinner blood. For three weeks we were relief managing the caravan park in Rutherglen. One of the new skills I developed was how to evict bogong moths http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bogong_moth from the ladies amenities. They are lovely moths, as moths go, but VERY BIG - about 10cm long. The night the April rai [View Full Entry]

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On the February weekend of the Black Saturday bush fires we left central Victoria for a trip back home. We’d congratulated ourselves for surviving 44.6 degrees and howling hot winds in Ballarat on the day that the mercury hit an all time record of 46 degrees in Melbourne. It was only watching TV news at Melbourne airport and coverage back home that we realised the extent of the disaster, claiming nearly 200 lives and destroying whole towns. For the three weeks we were away, fires threatened several places we had stayed at. One - Daylesford - was where we had planned [View Full Entry]

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At 9.30 am it was already too hot to go for a walk, but as it was our first day in Bendigo we walked around the botanical gardens and the path along Bendigo Creek - there must have been water in there somewhere but all we could see were reeds and weeds. By the time we got back to the car it was 40 degrees. Even my knees were sweating. Back at the camp we leapt out of the car and into the swimming pool - dear reader, this is how hot it is...I have been in a pool three days [View Full Entry]

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You’d be forgiven for thinking all caravan parks are the same: a flat area accommodating rows of identical tin sheds on wheels, slightly grotty ablution blocks, an even grottier camp kitchen and a motley collection of kids playground equipment. One of my favourite Monty Python quotes was “...as much imagination as a caravan park,” so while the thought of travelling around Australia had a lot of appeal, the prospect of a continual succession of caravan parks did not. However, Australia has taken the caravan park to another level, making it part of the cultural art form w [View Full Entry]

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This is a land of contrasts in more ways than one - we’ve gone from crispy dry 37 degrees to windy damp 7 degrees in the space of three weeks. Deviating from the Newell Highway on our way down to Melbourne, we are now in Canberra, ACT (Australian Capital Territory - a state within a state). I wanted to see the famed city designed by Walter Burley Griffin and we were virtually next door - only three hours drive away. We had already detoured to visit the wine region of Mudgee, where Rhys blew the budget and we spent twice [View Full Entry]

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