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Published: March 29th 2010
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Day 326 - Canberra to Orange
Our time in Canberra and in the company of Kangaroojack, Caroline & Andy, has sadly come to an end. It’s been great to catch up with them again and we hope our paths will cross in the not too distant future, maybe in Australia, maybe in the UK - who knows! Thanks for sharing your pitch with us guys, it worked out just perfectly and the company as ever has been good fun with plenty of chatter and not a dull moment in sight!
As they trundle off to work, we took our time packing up before eventually clearing off. There was no rush and a bit more time was spent catching up on the blogs and tidying up the caravan. Physically getting the caravan off the pitch turned out to be easier than either of us had imagined. I was expecting a bit of drama as ‘we’ (the royal ‘we’) had put a dent in the number plate two days ago reversing the car up the kerb a tad too close to the tow bar! It was just a slight mis-understanding in the use of hand signals rather than the vocal use
of the word STOP. Anyway, the car had to be re-jigged again this morning but luckily the communication was all good and the excellent driving skills of Mr Howells saw to it that we missed the water tap, electric post and camper trailer which were all in our way!
Whilst knocking the tent pegs from the awning back in with a piece of wood a chap came over to offer us a hammer, actually an axe but it worked like a hammer would! We’d seen him coming into camp yesterday with his caravan on the back of a wrecker so asked if everything was getting sorted. He told us that the car had been playing up since new but yesterday the anti-skid mechanism jammed on and the engine intermittently cut in and out. He’d decided to limp it to the dealership in town but on the way his wife started to have heart palpitations. She was rushed to hospital and to their credit the car dealer took over the recovery of the caravan to here (Canberra Motor Village) but the car is now in the service department with a mystery problem. Made our number plate incident pale into insignificance I can tell you! We’re glad to hear his wife is now out of hospital & back at the caravan, she came to talk to us during the later part of the conversation. The high tech car is up for sale when they get it back though. It’s put him off completely and he’s determined to replace it with something manual that doesn’t have a computer to bugger it up! We tell him we’re very sorry but our simple little Terrano isn’t for sale! We wish them a safe journey back to Sydney when the time comes and get on the road ourselves.
Our destination today is Orange and the home of travelling friends Tony & Jane (who we first met in August atop Uluru), a journey of 4 hours that takes us through lush countryside and the towns of Yass, Boorowa and Cargo. There was plenty of time for blogging and a quick read of a magazine given to us by Caroline - obviously Darryl was driving while this was going on. That’s where we found out the awful truth about double dipping and that it’s not ok! Zoe (Reeves) had been right all along to chastise Darryl when she caught him double dipping in Margaret River on our tasting day!! The article is dispelling all sorts of Old Wives Tales and it even knocks out the ‘5 second rule’ when you drop food on the floor! Oh my word, our whole belief system is crumbling!
We arrive at the home of the Barwicks to find Tony hard at work in the garden while Jane is hard at work, literally! With our caravan parked at the top of their driveway, we shoot into town for some supplies so we can at least make a contribution to the meals over the next few days. Orange is a much bigger town than we’d imagined, it’s probably classed as a city in fairness. Woolies is rammed to bursting point and at least one poor Mum was having to deal with the devil of all tantrums from her son while waiting in a six person deep queue at the checkouts. Bless her, she had her work cut out there!
With supplies purchased that will hopefully keep us going for the next week or so we headed back to the house. Darryl joined Tony in the back garden to see if he needed a hand with anything and I busied myself in the caravan.
It was still quite early when Jane finished work and it was great to catch up with both of them in their lovely home. Tony had already given us the grand tour, it’s beautiful and we love the seed pod and shell displays which we’ve seen collected on the trips!
Dinner has already been organised which is rather lovely of them and we very much enjoyed tucking into a tasty Spaghetti Bolognese this evening. What a treat.
Despite the tempting offer of a room in the house we’ve chosen to stay in the caravan on the driveway. We’ve not got many more nights in it now so we’re relishing the ones we have got before we return to the confines of bricks & mortar.
Dar and Sar
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Sharing the Journey
Alec & Cindy Sharp
I agree with Zoe
I agree with Zoe ..... it's never ok to double dip!!!!