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At home in the Tolmie Tavern
Zoe, Mark, Beth, Sarah, Simone, Ken, Darryl and Jake Day 350 - Bridge Creek to Box Hill
To our credit, despite feeling the after effects of the night before we were up and about as soon as we sensed children were within 20ft of the caravan! They’d had a great night with Jake looking after them but were now full of the joys of spring - literally!
There’s nothing like a yummy breakfast to sweep away the cobwebs and that’s exactly what sorted us out this morning. There’s no time to waste though, we plan to head back to Box Hill later this afternoon so in record time we tidy the caravan and get it ready for the final journey (for this trip!) down into the city.
At some point this morning Mark presented us with a small travel book on London and then proceeded to test our knowledge of the capital city for the country we call ‘home’. It did not go well!! We struggled to identify the landmarks and couldn’t recognise the difference between Marble and Admiralty Arch! After all our raised eyebrows at Australians that have never been outside of their own state it seems we have some work to do ourselves on our
return to England!
For the moment though we are indulging ourselves in Australia 100% and today we’re going to seek out a few more of the Ned Kelly landmarks. But first we’re going for lunch at a pub, an activity we haven’t done for a very, very long time!
In fairness we were going to lunch after a trip to Powers Lookout and the Kelly Tree but Beth felt a bit off colour at the very back of the Landcruiser and we pulled over directly opposite the Tolmie Tavern so it seemed a good plan to bring the lunch break forward. It was a good job we did, within 10 minutes of being inside the heavens opened and down came about 4 inches of water. We would have been drenched to the skin but instead we were enjoying several games of pool, a game of ‘round the world’ on the dart board and the biggest, tallest, impossible to get your mouth around burger we’ve ever seen!
Mark & Simone very nearly bought a house in Tolmie when they were looking to move up from the Peninsula 20 years or so ago. They were gazumped on one particular
property but maybe things worked out for the best because Tolmie is that much further out of town and lets face it, where they are in Bridge Creek they’ve got the best neighbours in the world what with beautiful Julie and the Scott family.
What was going to be a quick lunch turned in to an afternoon of family fun! The kids loved playing pool and darts plus we had a game of hangman for Beth and danced around to music from the jukebox. To be honest we were all just putting off the inevitable, us having to say goodbye for nearly 2 weeks.
We dragged ourselves away late afternoon and although we made it to the Kelly Tree at Stringybark Creek we didn’t make it to Powers Lookout or to visit Jeff & Jane who we met last night at the movie premiere.
The Kelly Tree uncovered some interesting information which the kids hadn’t been aware of before, this tree isn’t the actual ‘Kelly Tree’ at all. Ken & Zoe were not impressed! There we were staring up at a very impressive tree but all the while wondering what had become of the original. The original
marked the site of the shootout between members of the Kelly gang and Victoria police officers. Three policemen were killed, which sealed the fate of Ned Kelly and his associates if they should ever be caught to face trial. The exact location has faded in memory over time, with each passing generation some detail is lost but what is known for sure is that the original Kelly Tree site was about 300 hundred meters away from where we’re standing. The new tree has an iconic armour motif on the outside of the trunk but as the years pass the motif is being swallowed up and one day it will no longer be visible. There is nothing left of the original Kelly Tree these days, it was recorded in 1908 that it was cut down by employees of a sawmill company as some special timber was required. With all the visitors that make the effort to follow the Kelly trail around the area that’s got to be a bitter pill for historians to swallow.
We left the Kelly story there and travelled back to Bridge Creek with the Reeves. We waved goodbye to them for the penultimate time then towed
the caravan back to Box Hill to find fish & chips to pinch from the Adams! It was dark by the time we arrived and we met Anna half way down the road on her evening walk. The girls were pleased to see us though and the dogs jumped and yapped too!
Everyone’s holidays are over now, (except ours of course!) the girls go back to school tomorrow, Anna goes back to work and Grant’s scored the night shift starting tonight. We’re even starting the transfer back to normality by sleeping in the house so it’s easier for us to clear out the caravan over the coming week. Get ready to sit on the edge of your seats for lots of photos of us cleaning! Well that will certainly be an adventure, it’s not something we’ve done a great deal of over the past 12 months!!
Dar and Sar
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