Blogs from Toowoomba, Queensland, Australia, Oceania - page 2

Sorry to our loyal blog viewers. I have been very slack adding further blogs as retirement has been very hectic to say the least. Once we got to Alstonville it was almost Xmas and we spent a week just getting around and visiting all my family that we haven't seen for some time. Once Xmas was over, we moved the van to Mullumbimby where my sister lives and spent another week doing some renovations on her house. I.e. We enclosed her back patio/sun deck with glass louvers, a large glass window and a glass panelled door plus a set of stairs so she had easy access to the garden/tool shed. It all looks fantastic and it will be a great spot to spend the cold winter mornings as it has a North East aspect. All the ... read more

Warm and sunny Queensland????After leaving Lismore we spent 2 nights in Ipswich. We thought we would be out in the country but Ipswich is really just a part of Brisbane! We thought we knew some obsessed geocachers but we were in for a surprise. We had only just begun our day’s hunting when a car pulled up alongside us and we were asked “What are you doing?" It's always a good idea to have an alibi in these situations, but it doesn't take us long to identify fellow players. They helped us locate the cache that had so far eluded us. The Drovers are a couple from Western Australia who have logged over 4000 caches. They seem to attend every geocache event that is organized in Australia. Their car is a “trackable”. See www.geocaching.com for more ... read more

I’ve been in Australia for just over four months now. Time has flown by since I last updated this blog, and it has taken me some time to get used to being in a different hemisphere. After disembarking cargo ship MV Bahia on 27thAugust, I spent a week in glorious Sydney, where I wandered around in the Botanical Gardens and in vintage shops, sang kirtan at Govinda’s, and saw ‘La Boheme’ at the famous Opera House. Sydney is beautiful and vibrant, and was a nice place to get used to being in civilization again after a month at sea. Finally, on 2nd September, I hopped on a train to Brisbane, Queensland, to meet Sameer, my reason for coming to Australia (see previous blog for background). After a loooong journey along Australia’s coastline, I arrived at Brisbane ... read more

We decided to spend another night in Leyburn before heading to Kim & Garry’s farm. Thankfully Noah slept long enough for me to finish my final uni assignment and get it submitted. Woo, now only exams to worry about and then a few months off! It was a lovely day, nice blue sky, the wind had disappeared and there was lots of clear space for Noah to enjoy. Ryan decided to pull the generator out and start running it in, which meant 240v power… yay! I figured power + clean water = washing. I pulled out my twin tub machine and put on the first ever load. Ryan figured out how to put the clothesline up and before I knew it I had 4 loads done and drying. I think it does a better spin cycle ... read more

The day of the new adventure. This morning involved lots of last minute packing, cleaning up of the in-laws house (so they didn’t return to mess from their holiday) and that ever present question… what did we forget? After deciding we had everything (how foolish were we) and that it was time to leave, Ryan drove out onto the road and attached the weight distribution bars… aren’t they an amazing thing… hopefully I can upload pictures to show the difference they make. We were on the road around 10am and heading for Toowoomba. Yep, we were travelling a huge distance from Brisbane. The one caravan park in TBar that accepts dogs was fully booked, so it looked like our first night was going to involve free camping. A quick pit stop for lunch at Sundowner Pies ... read more