Wild Oats

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Awaking slightly later this morning, as we were late to bed last night. 6.00 am Andy made us both a cup of tea, anticipating 7.00 when the pool was open and we could go for an early morning swim i.e. without any children around so that you could actually swim the length of the pool.

We met the site caretaker yesterday, he was English, came from Lode Lane in Solihull, then moved to Bournemouth before coming to Australia, him and his wife have been here for 8 years. Jim explained that he would be cleaning the swimming pool before it opened, also explaining that he take a job for a while in one place and then moves on to another part of Australia.

Feeling refreshed and ready for the day we head back to pack our tent and get back on the road. Again we have things to do, like go to the bank and the Auto Accessories store.

We should have been popping into Australia Zoo to have a meeting with Nick in Education about our experiences at the Zoo; we wanted to give them some feedback. Unfortunately Nick had to go out and we were unable to meet with him, until Sunday so that gave us some spare time.

We had already arranged that we would go to Karen and Derek’s, however that meant that we had to head there early, but that also gave us a chance to unload some of our gear sort some things out and have a general tidy up.

Karen’s sister Andrea is over for Christmas, she arrived yesterday and is trying to combat her jet lag. Karen and Andrea are both out shopping.

After a tidy up, we find ourselves in the swimming pool. The temperature is warm, somewhere around 30 degrees. It feels lovely and we sat in it for ages. Andy did manage to find the hammock though and sneaked off for a rest in the shade!

We took the dogs, Moffie and Charlie for a walk. We are doggy sitting both of these over the New Year. Derek barbecued, we ate chatted and drank some wine.

I bought some wine called “Wild Oats”, this is the winery that is owned by Robert Oately who incidentally bought Hamilton Island in the Whitsunday’s after selling his big winery business elsewhere in Australia. The wine is beautiful; it is so smooth and has such a delicate flavour, however in the realms of research I do have to take it upon myself to get some more and to keep trying until I find the “perfect wine”. Robert Oatley has a yacht called "Wild Oats", with this he has won the Sydney Hobart race several times.

Exhausted, we all had an early night.

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