South of Sydney

---

30 June 2002
In the last six months I have been on trips away from Melbourne on many occassions. On this trip I have no plans in keeping in touch with my girlfriend, not my phone anyway. Why? Because she is coming with me.
The Hume Freeway was the planned direction to the coast south of Sydney. We stopped only once and that was in Gundagi where we had lunch in a restaurant that she had read about in a food magazine. We were a bit disapointed with with the meal. After a nine hour journey we arrived in Bomaderra. Settled into our motel unit then drove down to the local bowling club for a meal.

1 July 2002
I had a morning session, it went well and the staff were good. I managed to finish the session around mid-day.
Picked my girlfriend up from the motel and the two of us went for a drive. The last time I was in this area I noticed some girls looking for oysters. My partner heard about this and had to find some for herself. She changed into her Hunter/Gather mood and started searching. I wondered off with my camera, every now and again I could see her, hammer and chisel in hand she was either chipping or eating but always with a smile on her face. That evening we went for a meal at a local Bistro and had a nice meal.

2 July 2002
After a morning session at the same location we drove down to Batemans Bay where we booked into another Best Western Motel then found a bowling club nearby and had an evening meal.

3 July 2002
Sixteen kilometres from the motel is an area called Meloneys Beach, just across from the sea is the Kindergarten and today was the first of two days at this great centre. Not many children, for morning tea I took a cup of coffee across to the beach and watched the waves lap at the shore of this sheltered bay. Once the coffee was finished I went back to the centre and finished the session soon after.
My partner was waiting at the motel and in the afternoon went for a drive up the coast to look for Dolphins. We walked along the beach then saw a pod of Dolphins just a short distance from where we were standing. On another beach we saw Kangaroos on the grass next to the sea which was quite a sight. Back in town we decided to buy some oysters for ourselves.

4 July 2002
My girlfriend drove me to work this morning and kept herself busy while I worked in the Kindergarten. She picked me up again about mid-day then for the three hours we took a walk along the beach taking in the sights and appreciating the good weather. Something I don't do too often is visit resorts but we found one on our drive and spent a pleasent couple of hours beside the pool having a beer and feeling very good about the experience.
I had to return to the centre to take some family photos about 3.30 in the afternoon and when that was finished we started out drive down to Tuross Heads which is further down the Princess Highway.

5-6 July 2002
Forty children today and a very busy morning it was. I managed to expose seventeen rolls of film. Tuross Heads is surrounded by water, lakes and open sea. We didn't spend time exporing the area because we wanted to make Merimbula before sunset.
High on a hill just outside of the main part of town we booked into some cabins. We had a very nice meal in a restaurant in town. I was glad we were going to leave the homeward journey to Melbourne until the morning.

---