Independance Day


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July 10th 2015
Published: July 11th 2015
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Pater and Leigh
04/07/2015



Whoo hoo the week end was here and our hearts are full of sadness, our dear dear friends Peter and Leigh Walker were on countdown to leave us.

It has felt like a life time since we had met them on the Mandurah Caravan Park, we had only just arrived in Western Australia and we hit it off straight away.

Let me tell you their story first as it’s a fascinating one!!

Peter and Leigh had lived in Glen Innis in New South Wales, for I think all their life, Leigh was a librarian and Peter had been a cow man for 31 years as a manager of a farm, they also have a 100 acres of their own, and with his horse Scout and dogs Mate and Dash he had worked the land and the cows loyally for all of his life, then one day they announced to their kids that they were leaving home as they were seeking adventure.

I would guess that their realisation that they needed adventure was a gradual one, as was ours and as you know we know how it feels to have that burning desire inside
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Peter and Leigh's truck Sherman
you that you want to shake your life up, step away from everything you know and put yourself in a completely different environment is not easy

Now distance in Australia is a ridiculous thing, their home is probably 6,000 Kilometres away from where I type this blog, Perth to Glen Innes by road is measured in weeks, not hours and their next step to follow almost the same route that we took when we left Canberra, and experiencing some of the best wonders of what Australia has to offer.

So the only way we could feel that we gave them a decent send off was dinner at ours.

Peter and Leigh had both given up their jobs a couple of weeks ago then took two weeks vacation in Bali, with their son and daughter-in-law and their first grand child, so Caroline and I had plenty of time to prepare.

When Caroline and I sat a house early last year in San Remo we had the most awesome butchers called Rumps so our plan was to get a nice joint for our dinner guests.

Saturday came, we were up bright and early as we wanted to be on the road by 7.00am, we only had about 50k's to drive to the butchers and we knew it would be worth it, there is no substitute for quality.

The morning was a little drizzly, we arrived in Meadow Springs early, early enough to get a coffee and have a little breakfast before the butchers opened, in fact we did all our grocery shopping at Coles before the butchers opened.

The best way to describe the butchers is "a Meat Emporium” it is an amazing place, that does so much fantastic produce, so we made our decision and went for a roll of pork

We had some other bits and pieces to do in Mandurah which was redirect our mail from our old PO Box number, and close the account, as soon as that was done, it was back in the truckon to the freeway and back to Wandi.

Peter and Leigh had moved back in, they would be with us until Friday the 10 July which would be their departure date, so they would use this time with us to get everything prepared for their next stage of their adventure.

We got back
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Caroline, as if you need me to tell you who it is
to the house and started preparations for tonight’s dinner, our guests would arrive at 6.00pm and dinner was at 7.00pm.

Peter, and I did all the veggies, his special request was dinner had to be with Spring Onion Mashed Potatoes as I am the mash master.

Andy and Karen arrived and we were soon sitting down to our dinner, it was great the Pork was magnificent and the crackling, first class.

As with all our evenings it was great fun, we have had so much fun exploring Western Australia and our immediate surrounds with these guys, we are all firm friends and we were sad the Peter and Leigh would be leaving.

They will probably take a month to travel back to New South Wales were they will welcome their second grandchild, spend some time with their family and then start the journey back to Western Australia.

Sunday, after our great dinner was a day around the house, we too would soon be homeless again, (well for a week anyway) as our house sit is coming to an end on the 26 July and we do not go to our next one until the first
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Sherman is the same type of truck as Jack
of August, so we are slowly getting prepared for our transition out.

It was back to work as usual on Monday, and when we got home dinner was underway, having Peter and Leigh here was like having your own house keeper, which was great, came home and dinner was on the go.

Well I wouldn’t dare blog about Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday as they were all the same, Caroline assisted Leigh with the loading of their Hema mapping, as we do all of our mapping on the iPad and Caroline understands it really well, me I am still just about proficient with our paper maps that we use for reference.

Looking at Peter and Leigh’s Journey back just filled us full of envy, as we had done it before in reverse and it truly is an amazing route, they will be going through central Australia, along the Great Central Road which is a mostly unsealed Australian Outback highway that runs 1126km from Laverton, Western Australia to Yulara, Northern Territory (near Uluru/Ayers Rock) which we absolutely love.

On route they will pass Giles Meteorological station where we went to see a weather balloon launch and we covered in Kangaroojack’s blog Six
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Ready to Roll, heading for Bruce rock
Oscar Foxtrot dated and published on the 3rd September 2013, go on give it another read, I think that is an amazing blog

So Friday 10 July was their target date to leave, I had booked the day off as we were having an upgraded suspension fitted to Jack and I needed to get him to Mandurah by 8.00am as it was being fitted at ARB.

We have just brought a second car, we decided to purchase Peter and Leigh’s car from them as it just seemed the right time to do it, it’s a Ford Focus and we thought that instead of running Jack all the time, who has got a 4½ Litre V8 engine it would be more cost effective if we ran the smaller town car and use Jack specifically for 4 wheel driving and for trips, equally if it doesn’t work out then we will just sell it (the Focus that is).

So Friday was a big day, Caroline went off to Cockburn Station in the Focus, which we have called Jill (as now we have Jack and Jill) and off I went to Mandurah in Jack, then I would get on the
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And then they were gone
train and come back to Cockburn Central and pick up the Focus as I had the spare key and I would go back to the house as I did not want to sit at ARB all day and wait for the truck to be done.

I jumped on the train which seemed in no time at all to arrive at Cockburn Station and as the doors opened passengers on the train get off first and who was there but Peter and Leigh, they were going in to Perth for job interviews for work which hopefully coincides with their arrival back in Western Australia later this year, so as I got off they got on.

I had a short walk to where Caroline had left the car a few hours earlier, we always manage to park in the same spot every day so locating the car was easy. I jumped in and drove back to the house.

I spent time writing most of this blog, after a bit of breakfast, then doing some pottering, Peter and Leigh got back at about 1.00pm and feeling very up beat as the interviews had gone well, they were busy getting ready for the final off and got their Landcruiser (Sherman) and their Kimberley Karavan out of the shed and hooked up

We of course had to have the obligatory photo’s and they finally pulled off the property at 1.50, their first stop tonight was going to be Bruce Rock, on route to Kalgoorlie then beyond, their trip will go through Western Australia, Northern Territory, South Australia, then Finally New South Wales, wow that is a journey.

I drove back to the train station in Jill at 2.50 drove to the station and parked it ready for Caroline to collect, almost in the same spot.

I jumped on the train and arrive in Mandurah station by 3.30, I decided to walk back to ARB because it was such a lovely afternoon, it was only about 4 kilometres and because Caroline and I are on our regular workweek hustle Fitbit challenge, I had opportunity to catch up on the number of steps for the week.

As I rounded the corner I arrived back at ARB and saw jack parked in the car park, I went in and paid for the work that we had.

After a long day I was nearly at home and just as I went over the brow of the hill I saw Caroline waiting to pull out of the junction near the house, amazing timing, we both arrived at home at 5pm wow what a busy week it had been, aaaaand relax!



Kj

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14th July 2015

Leaving Friends
As usual, great blog. Sorry to hear that your great friends are leaving you, although it sounds as if they might be back before the end of the year. Jack and Jill. You two certainly do wonders with your naming: i.e. kangaroojack. Love it. Take Care and ENJOY
16th July 2015

Indepndance Day
Hey Guys, Thanks for the great message as usual, take care and great to hear from you.

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