Get Off my Land

---

DAY 492


You know when you get up, go to work, it’s just a normal day, like today, only to find that when you get home some b*gg*r has parked their caravan on your gravely bit, how rude!

Anyway, just to round up our week, Tuesday was our first day back at work after our long weekend in Bateman’s Bay with our lovely friends Lee and Marilyn Harris from Bathurst and what a great time we had.

As usual I took Caroline in to work and headed off to my job in Mitchell and all seemed good with the world. Tuesday to Thursday went in the blink of any eye, which included our ever popular Cheap Tuesday Pizza evening.

We were excited to find out that our fellow travellers and kindred sprits Darryl and Sarah (AKA The Wallaby Wanderers) were heading to Canberra and were coming to see us.

Excitement gripped us as the last time we saw Darryl and Sarah was blog day 280 13th August 2009, Blog entry “Waiting for a train” and they are such good fun. Darryl and Sarah have been staying with friends in Mansfield, Victoria and would be with us on Friday so we had plans to make.

Having such a busy week it just flew by and in a blink of an eye I was collecting Caroline on Friday evening from the centre of Canberra where she works then off to Canberra Motor Lodge where they were staying.

This is where the day started to take a weird twist, we arrive back at site and drive down the road toward our pitch only to find a caravan parked on the gravely bit, well, on closer inspection the truth is revealed, we know the culprits, the familiar vehicle that goes by the name of “Pie” and out stepping from the caravan in tow are the Wallaby Wanderers.

If you have been following our adventures you will know that the Wallaby Wanderers are from England, they started to follow our adventures before they came out to start their own. We finally met last August in Atherton Tablelands and we travelled briefly together to Mount Surprise where we spent time in the dirt in search of Topaz! Well some 40,000 kilometres (their mileage) later we find them in Canberra.

Now coming back to the gravely bit the original plan was for Darryl and Sarah to sleep in our swag next to the trailer, caravan parked elsewhere on site, the campsite is packed solid (actually fully booked for the next 8 weeks). On arrival they were told that if they could fit their caravan on our gravely bit then that’s where they could park.

Originally when Sarah phoned they said they were fully booked and if they wanted to stay on our pitch it would be $17.00 each per person per night, which they thought was ridiculous, however Caroline spoke to them, managing to get the only helpful girl who confirmed that the wallaby Wanderers could stay and it was $7.00 per person per night, Mmmm.

It looked like we had been invaded; it looked like the music festival at Glastonbury, without the mud!

Darryl and Sarah had Shoe horned the 4 wheel drive truck and Caravan on to the little bit of ground that we had but we were more than happy for anything that they wanted as we hadn’t seen our friends for so long. We all had a chuckle to ourselves as they said some of the other campers watched them while they squeezed their van onto our site, we wondered what they were thinking when all this was taking place.

After much kissing and hugging, we managed to sit down chatting constantly to cram so much travel in to such little time. It was our wish to give Darryl and Sarah a interesting weekend so our plan was to go out and have a curry in Canberra at the Jewel of India.

Well trying to order food was a nightmare as we were just continued to constantly talk about all of our adventures. Darryl and Sarah have also been all the way around Australia going anti clockwise and have covered an amazing 52,000k’s in their year, and have crammed so much in to their trip, just reading their blog’s wore us out.

Their trip sadly ends on the 26th April when they have to fly home, they are exploring every avenue they can to be able to come to Australia to live, but they have to go back for the moment or the Australian authorities may be difficult if they didn’t do everything by the book.

Well what a fantastic evening we had, the meal was absolutely awesome we were pleased that Darryl, Sarah and ourselves had such a good time and the first time that the Wallaby Wanderers had a restaurant curry since being in Australia.

It seems ridiculous to us that Australia makes it hard for such dedicated people, they have so much to offer this nation that we hope they their quest is successful.

After dinner we head up to Mount Ainslie and look at the stunning night time view of Canberra, after getting a few photos we head back to the Canberra Motor Village and all carry on being such travel bores as we have so much to talk about.

Well as we were up early and it had been a work day we were tired and thus crashed and burned just after 10.00pm, it had been such a busy and exciting event seeing our friends and tomorrow would be lots more fun and catching up.

So, until then bloggers.

---

Photos

Jewel of India
A brilliant meal

Kenworth
No 5th Wheel, is this a toy or is Chris Ewbank her in Canberra

Comments

[John and Sylvia]

Glad you guys have met up again.
It has been exhausting to keep up with both of your blogs. I don't know how you can be so dedicated to keeping it updated daily. Mine always seems to peter out as I get involved in the travelling and then it gets too difficult to catch up. Might be in Canberra myself in a few weeks. If you're still around and it's convenient, I'll come and say hello. John.

[kangaroojack]

Canberra
Hi John, Thanks for the message, would be great to see you, I 'm sure we will some how as we are so close. Our best regards to you and Sylvia. The Blog has had to slow down a bit as we are working, but it is still trickling along. Andy & Caroline