Christmas was spent with our Families on the Central Coast, There were some Traumatic times in the Farmer household but things are starting to work out for the best (I think?)
The rest of the crew is doin just fine,
San and I spent 10 weeks again at the Walu Caravan Park - Budgewoi, where we met up with old friends & made some new ones.
Paul and John local residents here took me prawning on a number of occasions, I was thankful for the good catch of prawns that they gave me, I only went fishing with my mate Steve, the one time, he seems to have some deep issue's going on?.
Tragedy struck one night just after the new year, I was awakened to the screams of a woman, a resident of the park, her caravan was on fire. I will never forget those screams they were blood curdling, I rang the fire brigade, after 10 minutes they had not arrived so I rang again only to be told that they were volunteers and had to get to the station, dress & load up then drive down to the park only 5 minutes away, by this time the van was well alight and it looked like that other vans we to go up also, when the Fireys finally arrived it was put out very quickly, her van had burnt to the ground, although she was lucky to escape the fire her 2 dogs were not so lucky, they both perished, she has lost all of her belongings and only escaped with the underwear that she had on. The fire was believed to have started by a candle that was left on after she had fallen asleep.
2/2/08 Moved onto Swansea for about 6 Weeks, where we met with Lyn & Barry and there friends Merv & Gaye, and also caught up with our good mates Joan & Stan, Reg & Roz, Allan & Cheryl, Artie & Laurel, we had some very good happy hours over the coming weeks. Caught some very good catches of fish with Barry & Stan in their Boats. Flathead, Bream, Whiting & some Squid. The rabbits have been breading like crazy here at Swansea and Stan has been trying all kinds of ways of catching them, but to no avail, better luck next time.
After our stay at Swansea we collected Stan and Joan at their home and left for Joe Ippolito's farm at Laheys Creek, to spent Easter with most of the Farmer & Ippa crew.
Bruno has slashed an excellent site for our caravans, the grass had grown 2-3 ft with all the rain up this way, we have never seen it so green.
It was great to see Shane & Mitchell finally make it up here this year. Mitchell and Ben had a great time on the motor bikes as did Corey and Madison on their new Quad Bike.
(1) Mitchell & Ben (2) Shane.
(3) Some of Joe's Cattle (4) Joan and I enjoying an early Morning Cuppa.
As you can see plenty of grass for the cows and lots of firewood for the campfire.
I was also lucky to catch a lot of yabbies in the dams on the property.
After 11 days it was time to move on again. It will be a short trip as I have to return to Warners Bay to see a Doctor and then to Belmont Hospital as the have found some blood in my medical tests, and then hopefully we will travel on as soon as things are O.K.
26/03. We have said goodbye to the Bainbridge's and are now on our Way to Mendoran with our good friends Joan and Stan. after an over night stop we have traveled through Gilgandra and Naromine, Where Sandra & Joan did some Op Shopping (again), if only Stan was a drinker we could of at least gone to a Pub, we then dragged the girls from the Bloody Op Shop and drove onto Tomingley for an overnight stay.
30/03. After a Good night sleep and a great campfire Breakfast, we drove onto Peak Hill for more damn Op Shopping, a good look around and then to have a good look at an old Open Cut Gold mine. The weather is now getting a lot colder
Over the Last few days we have visited the town's of Peak Hill & Parkes which has a number of fine attractions and every year in early March Parkes have an Elvis Festival which is very popular. Unlucky for us we missed it by about 3 weeks.
Sandra & Joan are just about worn out today, as they have spent almost a whole day Washing an enormous amount of clothes that we could not wash on the road.
3/04. Today we drove into the towns of Forbes, Eugowra and then spent the night in the Gooloogong caravan park which is a free park with only 4 powered sites, Stan & I Piggy Backed a power point for our electricity. This is a small but interesting town with some fine old buildings, we don't mind spending a few Dollars here to compensate for the free accommodation, more small town's should follow Gooloogong's fine example.
4/4. Moved into Cowra today, Sandra and I have waited a long time to visit here but the wait was well worth it.
We had lunch in the local Macca's with Joan & Stan and they went on to Darby's Falls leaving us to explore Cowra.
The Japanese Gardens are a must for Visitors, we spent about 3 hours here and will come back in the Spring when the flowers, plants and trees will be in full bloom.
We are now on a tight schedule as I have to be back at Belmont for the Doctors appointment. The same afternoon we drove to Darby's Falls, but I missed the turn off and had to drive about 12 km's before I could turn the rig around, Stan said you bloody ratbag, drive a bit slower and you wont miss anything, its O.K. for him I was hanging for a Beer or two.
Darby's Falls is about 31 km from Cowra on a loop road, it is one of those gems that you come across every now and then, there is only enough room for 4-5 campers here - we had it almost to our self's. There are trout in the river and a 5 catch limit per day and also a $500 fine for illegal fishing & a whopping $50,000 fine for illegally taking water out of the river. It is so peaceful here nobody to bother you, if I had the time I could stay here for a week or more.
Two Days were not enough but we had to push on. The road out to the Mid Weston Highway takes us over the Wyangala Dam Spillway, the Drought has not eased and the water level is very low. About 500 meters along this road an enormous Kangaroo jumped from the scrub right in front of us if I was not towing the van I may have hit it, bugger me - around the next bend there was another one sitting in the middle of the road, a blast from the horn and it shot through ! lucky for him.
Drove through Woodstock a small place with only a Pub, some shops and houses and back to the highway which is 32 km from Darby's Falls.
Carcoar was our next destination a little town of days of old. Carcoar on the Belubula River was first surveyed in 1838, was the first rural town beyond Bathurst and appeared destined to become a large administrative centre. But Progress passed it by, leaving it an historic village seemingly untouched by time for future generations to come.
Leaving Carcoar we headed East for Blayney and some lunch with Stone & Jan, this is a reasonable size town but being Sunday like so many towns in the bush there was not much opened to look at.
I said to Stan I would use the GPS to get to Orange & he said that he would follow me , the darn thing took us around in circles for about 20 minutes, Stan said bugger this I am off to find my own way. No sense of adventure has my ole mate Stan ( lol).
We caught up to them about 30 Minutes later, we both took it easy into Orange.
This is a very Large town, one of the biggest we have seen out in the bush. you can buy just about anything here, I was lucky to purchase a 100 amp Hour Deep Cycle Battery for $200, this will enable us to stay off road for a few more extra nights.
San did more washing and then went for a swim not me it's to Cold, Stan & I watched the footy on TV. After a good nights sleep we left for Wellington, Gulgong and drove to Muswellbrook as I was now out of Auto Gas, We then went to Lake Liddell for a night's rest and its raining again.
Next morning we said goodbye to Stan & Joan and left for the Central Coast.
29/07/08. Well its time to get the old finger out and start blogging again. July is almost over and we are still down here on the Central Coast in winter, the first winter we have spent in almost 4 years in N.S.W. I have been into Belmont hospital, had my check up and it seems that all is OK. Sandra has her carpel tunnel back and is to see a specialist at Toronto on Wednesday. In may we purchased a new Toyota Hilux Auto V6 single cab Ute with a canopy, it goes very well, in the next couple of weeks we are having it put on Auto Gas, as the price of petrol has now reached $1.73 a litre, after the gas fit out we may then head out on the road again until December?.
01/01/2009. Once again things did not go to plan, after waiting for 5 months to get the Auto Gas installed on our Ute it was too close to Christmas to go traveling, so we have stayed here on the Central coast and will be until the end of January, and then with a whole lot of Luck we hope to take off on a Big trip.
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