Barwon Bliss

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November 27th 2015

Published: November 27th 2015

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thisisthelife

Recognise this? Probably not; really!

If we told you it is "Diver Dan's Boathouse" would you know what we were talking about? It's one of the locations for the ABC TV series "Seachange".

This news is more than a month old already, so let’s get us all up to date.

Haven't heard of Barwon Heads? How about "Pearl Bay"? Pearl Bay is the fictitious location for the ABC TV series "SeaChange". It is a lovely little seaside holiday destination not far from Geelong. While recovering from Peter's oral surgery (tooth removal), we spent our time here bike riding, geocaching and "threatening" to go fishing! The weather was stunning the day we arrived, but after that it was just ordinary. We also explored the Bellarine Peninsular and ventured as far west as the famous Bells Beach.

On departure from Barwon Heads we headed back to the farm.... near Horsham just for a couple of days. Lockie and Tracey's friends were having a clearing sale on their property the day after we arrived so it was an interesting morning watching all of that. Fortunately, this sale was for happy reasons. The owners have sold the farm and relocating for semi retirement in Darwin. So many clearing sales are due to the farmers being forced off their properties because of the debts they incur under horrid drought cycles.

Next stop was Gawler SA to

The famous Bells Beach

The surfing culture dominates everything in this region.

finalise arrangements for a relief management gig at the caravan park. Being only 20 minutes from the “grandies” meant visiting them for violin "concerts" and going to swimming lessons with them. My, how they are growing! Meeting our newest family member, Bethany, was a delight. Gawler didn't want us to start for another 2 weeks so we decided to go to explore the Yorke Peninsular. We visited Ardrossan, Port Vincent, Marion Bay, the Innes National Park, and Point Turton. The fishing and crabbing from the jetties and beaches is quite productive (at times), so at Point Turton, Peter rigged up 2 fishing rods, one with a newly purchased Squid jag! All reports around the caravan park and along the jetty were that nothing much was being caught, so, the rods were packed away again! Oh well, at least they saw the light of day and the gear was sorted and tidied up.

We had received news that Georgina's grandmother had passed away and we offered to go back to Adelaide to stay with the kids to allow Georgie to fly back for the funeral. For the first time, we parked our van in their driveway. Were they excited???? We

The old flour mill at Portarlington

If not for geocaching we would not have found this wonderfully restored building. Unfortunately it wasn't open the day we were there.

stayed there 3 nights and took them to violin and cello lessons, and to a great adventure playground. We wanted to wear them out during the day so we could get them to bed early each night. We were exhausted, but very pleased with how we managed.

It was still not time to start work at Gawler yet so we wanted to get away for a bit of R & R. We had been told of a freedom camp at a place curiously called "Worlds End" so we went searching. It was a great spot with a bushwalk up to Burra Creek Gorge. There was no phone reception so it wasn't until our journey back to Gawler (via Barossa Valley Farmers Market, of course) that we found out that the Managers at Gawler had been trying to contact us. Plans had to be changed, as they didn't want us yet. They offered us a free site due to the inconvenience. We already had organised to see the kids on Sunday so we kept going.

We got 2 days’ work and then a mutual decision was made that we would call it quits for now and maybe February might

Point Lonsdale Lighthouse

Endless photo opportunities, geocaching and beachcombing

be a better option. A few days later we had done our Christmas shopping for the Adelaide branch of the family, and we said our goodbyes.

We were lucky enough to organise a rendezvous with friends who were travelling back from Western Australia. We spent 2 nights with them at 2 different locations. They were able to introduce us to Dennis the butcher at Jamestown who has some of the best meat in the country, and has the best sense of humour. He had the 4 of us laughing and joking with him the whole time we were there.

As we finalise this edition of the blog, we are enroute back to the Central Coast to prepare for our Christmas trip to Lismore. We’re hoping to catch up with friends and family before heading back to Werribee South for our mid-January assignment.

More photos below.

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