On our own

The reality of camping with a dog set in today. Marion Bay is on the edge of the Innes National Park, which has a total ban on dogs entering. So when the group of 9 families with their collection of 26 kids decided today would be spent exploring the coastline, it became very apparent that someone had to stay behind with Taz. As Tracy drove away with the kids, I quickly realised that someone was me. 

I spent the first hour walking him up the beach trying to get him used to water more than an inch deep, but he wouldn’t go near it.  I did find a spot under the jetty where he nearly got his legs wet, but the rolling waves were just too much for him. 

When we got back, I had lunch and was sitting lifeless in my camping chair, when Taz suddenly got interested in something behind me. Turns out a 1.5m brown snake decided to slip past the rear feet of my chair as if he owned the park. (Right at that moment, he did, by the way). 

I flew out of my chair, changed my undies and followed it to make sure it went into someone else’s van so that I could sleep tonight. I watched it slip under the neighbours annex and after poking my head in and seeing all the bedding and mattresse, I raised the alarm with them. When it finally decided to poke its head out again, we managed to steer it away from all vans and into the bushland between us and the beach. 

That was my signal to settle in for the afternoon with a strong drink. I now had the second biggest fright of the day when I couldn’t find my bottle of Bacardi. After 10 or so frantic panic-stricken minutes, I came to the conclusion that it was in the boot of the car with Tracy and the kids (hopefully the kids don’t find it first). So guess who not only syed back at camp, but also had a dry afternoon.?

More walks wothTaz on the beach and talking to Marty who had come back early thanks to a faulty car alternator passed the afternoon away until the family arrived looking very pleased with themselves and having good memories from the day. 

The Weber was fired up for tea, then we all gathered for the communal drinks and “talk shit” sessions until we couldn’t stay up any longer. 

I managed to get a few more photos of a very tired Taz who was loving the additional attention. 

It seems we are going fishing at 6am in the morning. That’s the plan anyway (is it wrong I am secretly hoping Dylan will sleep in?)

Joining the gang

Despite all my best intentions, we didn’t quite leave as early as planned. I was going to wake myself up at 6:15 and be on the road by 7:30. Kayla comes into the bedroom at 7:20 and calmly wakes us up asking if we were still going on holiday. Whoops. 

We were finally all done and on our way at 8:45. Not bad really 

Taz was relegated to his bed in the boot of the car and was not allowed to climb over us all thinking he owns the place. That was the plan anyway. Once again, he proved that even the best laid plans are made to be broken and soon made his way to his favourite observation post between the two of us sitting up on the centre console. Tracy tried her hardest to ignore him and read her book, but he eventually made his way onto her lap for the last hour of the trip to Marion Bay. 

We got to the park at about 1pm and were greeted by a good spread of other families who we were joining for the week and what seemed an entire gaggle of kids. After setting up the van and telling Dylan no to his 15 requests to go fishing, we joined the group for a walk to the beach and to let the kids have some time in the very kid friendly surf. 

This was very different from the water in the bay directly in front of the park where it was about 30cm deep at the most and probably a temperature of 30 degrees. 

Just before 5, we made our way back to camp and had a late beer o’clock gathering, before becoming responsible parents again and cooking some tea for the kids. 

It was at about this time again that Dylan started pestering me to go fishing again. I reluctantly agreed, regardless of the thunder and distant lightning and ever increasing wind. Against my better judgement, I got to the jetty with Tyler and Dylan eager to catch anything, however with the wind gaining enough strength to blows the freckles off Dylan’s face, and the impressive lightning show threatening to turn  all 3 of us into a charcoaled chowder, we called it quits and headed back, put the kids to bed then wandered over to the group for another social bevvy or two before calling it a night. 

Not sure I am looking forward to a week of 25 kids running crazy throughout the vans, but I think they are. 

Not working today.

It’s Monday today.
I am not working.
The end.

Seriously though, it seems like forever since we were last in the caravan. Counting back, it was 19 Monday’s ago, or just over 4 months. That seems like 3 months too long to not have some days off work and have a weekend way in the van.
The weather was forecast for cool, cloudy but generally ok, so we headed off for a walk into town to just look around and stop me from opening a bottle of wine before lunch.....
the kids took the opportunity to just be kids for a while and stopped to play whenever they could. Swings, trees, bridges.... anything that could be climbed on, was climbed on. And that meant photos.

Despite the forecast of only 18 degrees, the kids ran off to the pool and stayed there for the next 3 hours while I exercised. Exercised my right to sit and drink and sleep and eat and drink and rest.
Tomorrow we say goodbye to another short but fun holiday. Time to start planning the next one.

Bathurst in Nuriootpa

I decided that today was going to be about me and my desire to sit on my A and watch Bathurst. I am not overly a car racing fan and I couldn’t tell you the names of any of the drivers or who drives what make/model or numbered car. But it doesn’t matter. At 10:45 I get to sit in the sun with a beer in my hand and watch the TV for the entire day. Not sure if I missed something, but this race was actually pretty boring, probably because of the extra care the drivers were taking due to the wet weather. I decided to turn it off for lunch, going to the pool with the kids for a while and coming back for the last hour or two of the race. That turned out to be a good decision as the final 20 laps was great to watch. (Not that I could tell you who won...)
Tea was a roast butterflied chook on the Weber, along with some carefully blackened vegetables that had to be masterfully sliced out of the foil and placed strategically on the kids plates to hide their true colours.
It was a big day of nothing, and I was exhausted from it. It didn’t stop me however, from sitting up all night and watching tv till midnight. Tomorrow is Monday and I get to sleep in and do nothing all - I can’t wait.

Wine day

We were hanging out for today as it gives us a real excuse to drink wine before lunch time. 1st stop was Saltram and some samples of their magnificent wines including one of my favourites - Pepperjack.

With a couple of bottles under my arm, and the clock ticking towards 11am, we headed down the road to the Farmers Market. Turns out the guys from Steiny’s Mettwurst were here so that saved me another trip that was only going to delay cracking open one of the fine bottles of wine I had just purchased. We also stumbled across our local cheese maker from Hahndorf- Udder Delights. Naturally, that meant I had to get a couple of Double Brie to go with my mettwurst and fine wine later this afternoon.
Next stop was another of my favourites - Grant Burge. The main reason I like this place is for their bulk port which magically gets purchased whenever I am up this way,  thanks to what can only be evaporation out of my barrel at home. There is a good chance that not all of it will make it home and into the barrel,

We stopped off at Mieglers Hill lookout on the way back which was a great view of the Barossa Valley and the perfect spot for some photos of us all


The rest of the day was spent sampling a handful of the wines and nibbles, mixed with some watching of Race 1 at Bathurst.
We got the fire cranking tonight (well, the mozzie candle...), but still not enough to provide the heat and smoke in our eyes and clothes that a real fire 🔥 produces. After knocking off a substantial amount of home made Baileys, it was time for bed to dream about another day of nothing ahead.

10,000 steps and The Blue Line

Apparently some people like going for walks and other silly things to keep them healthy and active. Personally I try to avoid it as I keep seeing people get hurt when exercising and I don’t want to get hurt. 
It appeared, however, that if I stood my ground I was going to be stuck on my own for the next two hours (which actually sounded very appealing but the look from Tracy was suggesting a family walk would be a better choice for our relationship.

It was only 9am and probably a tad too early to have a glass of wine, so I eagerly put on my runners and set off with everyone. The wives had been given a pamphlet outlining a 10,000 step walk around Nuriootpa that would showcase some of the backstreets and older historic homes, so off we went. Dylan decided he would be the holder of the map and lead us, following the big blue line on the map. I was naive enough to think this was a good idea and secretly hoping he would take a wrong turn, get frustrated, give up and head back to the caravan park. A fair enough assumption for a 10 year old I thought. I should have known better than to assume anything with Dylan. There was a blue line on the map that needed to be followed, and regardless of how many blisters or available shortcuts, we were following that blue line goddammit. There were 5 kids followed by 4 adults traipsing through the streets of Nuri, where I learnt that this town had houses on streets, just like any other town I had ever passed through. Not quite the historic walk I had been coaxed into doing. We had got about half way through when Liv, Daniel Tracy, Teddy and Kayla decided they couldn’t do any more, and they headed for the van. That left me supervising Dylan, Tyler and Darcy (albeit from 300 steps behind them). Despite my efforts to get Dylan to take a detour or two, we had to stop and make sure we were still on track with the blue line every ten minutes. Tyler and Darcy took the easy option when we hit the Main Street, heading for the park, but not Dylan..... the blue line said we needed to turn right, so right turn we did. I nearly got him to cross the main road at the end, but there was no way since the map indicated we had to take a path that went under the road (the blue line went missing under the road, so therefore that is where we had to go.). We could see the van park straight ahead, and my legs were speeding up sensing a seat with a cold  bourbon 🥃 calling my name.  But noooooo. The blue line said we had to go around another block, so that is where we went. Finally- we popped out at the bush land across from the van park and the blue line said we had made it. At this point Dylan ran ahead, leaving me and Taz to ourselves, ignoring the fact I was the only one out of 9 people that stuck it out and suffered through the entire walk with him. I hobbled back and slumped into a chair with a cold drink, immediately feeling every muscle starting to seize up.
We cooked some Yiros meat on the Weber before settling around “the fire” which was a mozzie candle that Liv had stashed away, laughing about Dylan and his blue line.

It was quite cold with the breeze picking up ahead of the predicted overnight showers and after today’s marathon efforts, I was buggered and crashed early. Looking forward to the winery visits tomorrow.

Nuriootpa

We had a dillemma of heading inland to Melrose, or staying semi-local and going to The Barossa for our first post-winter trip. After analysing the amount of aches and pains we both suffer in a daily basis just walking to and from the car, we decided that hiking up an 8km mountain side probably wasn’t the best choice if we wanted to be able to walk at all next week.
So Nuriootpa it was. Thanks to Kayla’s Cheerleading commitments we couldn’t go over the Labour day long weekend, so we have both taken Friday, Monday and Tuesday off work for a bit of R&R.
Despite all best intentions to leave home at 5, by the time Tracy got home from work and the kids managed to get themselves organised and I finished my day of tidying up last minute work stuff, we were running typically late. Thankfully it is daylight savings now and still light(ish) at 8pm, so setting up was a breeze.
The Mardle’s arrived (minus Daniel) shortly after us to discover we had set up the van on the wrong site facing the wrong way meaning their van would either have to be at the back of us, or they will need to innocently set up on the wrong site so we could share some communal grass.  Despite our best efforts, they chose the latter meaning we would have to socialise with them for the next 5 days😜
Liv did a great job of parking and setting up the van, only to find their extension cord wouldn’t reach the power outlet. Daniel (the master of erections) had just arrived, and, as Liv predicted, promptly changed the location to be even closer to us.
It was surprisingly cold as we sat around having a drink or 3 in the true tradition of caravanning. The weather looks like it is going to be great for the next 5 days except for a possible shower on Monday. The park is fairly empty as well except for a dozen or so Grey Nomads and one other family with a couple of kids. Just the way Grumpy Barry likes it.

Goolwa - exploring and visiting

It was cold enough to freeze mid stream last night, which unfortunately was a regular occurrence thanks to a Wine O'clock session that extended into the night. Thankfully our bed was warm due to the two extremely hot bods that were under the doona for the majority of the night. 

The kids granted us our camping dream of sleeping in, by taking off to the jumping pillow with their new found camping friends. 

We finally emerged around 10am and cooked up the mandatory Weber breakfast before heading into the very picturesque Goolwa for some sightseeing. 

The afternoon was spent visiting friends in and around Victor, before getting back in the near dark and freezing cold evening. 

A simple dinner of meat pies and sausage rolls in the Weber finished our last night in the cold, but perfectly perfect weather winter weekend. 

See you another time Goolwa. 

Goolwa - cold but perfect weather

After putting up with Taz jumping on our bed a dozen times since 5:30 am, I finally pretended to wake up for the first time just after 8 and faced the world. 

The sun was out, the drizzle had passed and it was the perfect morning for a Weber breakfast of bacon and eggs. 

We couldn't resist the temptation any longer, so we got in the car and searched the neighbourhood for a Woolworths which has turned into a mandatory must visit attraction on our holidays. After getting some essential supplies as well as some non-essential snacks that I couldn't walk past, we headed back to camp where we were soon met by the Hardy's for a day visit. 

The energy our two dogs had was 3 times the rest of us combined, so we all bundled in the cars and headed off to the Murray Mouth to let the crazy animals run riot and tire themselves out. 

As much as I wished them to exhaust themselves, it was a hopeless case, but it was a nice break on a perfect weather day. 

The realisation that it was Wine O'clock sent us scampering back to camp where we got stuck into a bottle or 2 of wine with some cheese and crackers. 

I also prepped up the Weber and a whole chook with some veggies for tonight's tea - finally cooked a roast to perfection with nothing burnt and nothing raw. 

Thanks to the freezing weather, we spent the night indoors again, with heaters blaring, thanks to the free electricity we get when in caravan parks 😜

Flicked through the TV channels for the next hour or so, trying hard to not watch the dismal performance The Power were displaying against Essendon. It is half time right now.... not sure I can watch any more. 

Goolwa - somewhere new.

Despite Winter being upon us and the freezing cold mornings now a standard welcoming me to the day, we chose to head off for the Queens Birthday weekend to a new local (ish) spot.
The last few mornings at home whilst waiting for the weekend have either been freezing cold or foggy before turning into glorious sunny days.


We left late Friday night, set up in dark damp drizzle, before settling into an indoor session of board games with the heater warming us up, oblivious to the freezing weather outside.

What was always intended to be an early night, ended up watching the Argentina/Brazil soccer game followed by some weird English home renovation show that didn't finish until after 11pm.

Frustratingly frustrating

The most common word in this series of blogs has been "Dylan". That is simply because he has the uncanny ability to frustrate the *^%+ out of anyone (me especially) , with his constant need to do something different to what he is currently doing. And this trip, that something has to be based around fishing. I had to force him to come and do some kayak time with us this morning, considering the amount of time that Tyler has spent sitting around whilst Dylan has had his fishing line in the water somewhere. It certainly doesn't help when "Uncle" Peter says he can take a squid jig and rod with us to drag behind the kayak, or use whilst Tyler is paddling. After threatening Dylan with no more fishing if he couldn't take the time to "have some fun" with his family, he ended up actually enjoying an hour or so in the shallow water at a place called Hickeys, just up between Coobowie and Pt Giles. 

 

It soon became apparent that his eagerness to go first on the kayak was simply to be able to go crabbing with Peter whilst Tyler and I spent some good time paddling in the shallows. I gave up getting cross about it, and let him do whatever he needed to do stop annoying me. He wins. 

We headed back to camp just before lunch time, got the boat sorted, and headed out in what seemed to be pretty messy conditions. 

It wasn't long before we discovered a massive school of Slimey Mackeral and small trevally, and the boys spent the next few hours catching enough bait for the next few trips (the Mackerel are great bait and crap eating, the Trevally are too small to bother with). In between it all, Dylan hooked onto a Sting Ray that broke his line, soon followed by myself hooking onto an even bigger Ray that eventually broke off, soon followed by Peter hooking onto a Ray that quickly broke off.  Then Dylan had success finally with a Skate that he caught all on his own. 

There was some pretty nasty weather off in the distance, however we were fortunate enough that it all passed below us and headed off to Adelaide. We got a couple of squid whilst looking for new ideas and eventually moved to some shallower area in the hope of some King George Whiting as dusk settled in and the storm clouds, along with the odd thunder clap and lightning strike, rolled on past. 

We managed to get half a dozen decent Whiting just prior to the rain starting, the wind picking up, and just becoming uncomfortable and very dark. 

Heading in with 2 very exhausted, and very happy boys after a great day in the boat, despite Dylan's need to constantly change from a bottom rig to a top rig to a snapper rig to a "anything but what I am using" rig. They both outfished me today, and I am ok with that. They are happy and have some amazing memories to share with their mates. 

Fishing is life

I was completely delusional thinking that Dylan's insatiable appetite for fishing may have waned overnight. From the moment I woke up, he was asking about when and where we could be going. I did my best impersonation of being deaf and not hearing him, however I finally gave him the ultimatum of not asking again or not going all day. Finally, I had 30 minutes of peace and we got ourselves some breakfast. 

John Bridgman had promised us a trip out in the boat this morning, and by 10am, we were all in the boat heading out to whet Dylan's eagerness and see his amazing smile again

We stopped to try and get a few squid for both bait and a feed, however John got got the lure snagged whilst showing Dylan how to use the rod whilst drifting. And lost the lot. This isn't normally a big issue, however it was at this moment we discovered that the tackle box with the extra lures and all other tackle was still sitting back at camp!  Luckily there was a few ready made whiting rigs tucked away, so these became our rigs for the day with a hope that we didn't lose any more. 

The whiting were nowhere to be found, so we carefully crossed the reef opening (about 1m of water) and then found the big ledge that was known for some good snapper and whiting. 

Within a minute of dropping the line, Tyler had pulled in a rock cod, closely followed by Dylan bringing in a stinker of a leather jacket. The leatheries were thick and stealing bait almost as instantly as it hit the sea floor, but we managed to get a good mix of Sweep, Cod, Trevally, Leather Jackets and a nice 42cm Snapper (caught by Yours Truly). Dylan was now getting quite angry and upset due to the fact he hadn't caught another fish despite the hundreds of bites and constant re-baiting, whilst watching Tyler pull in fish after fish. 

Tyler was not feeling well in this deeper water with the slow and steady swell, so I did the good parent deed and called time, much to Dylan's mixed emotions of horror and disgust. Tyler had been great, by dealing with it for nearly an hour, not wanting to ruin everyone's fun, but sea sickness is horrible and there was no way I was going to let him suffer with that feeling. 

I spent the next hour fending off Dylan's request to go fishing somewhere else for the afternoon and cleaned and filleted the fish, as well as cleaned up the boat. I was knackered by the time I had finished and made the decision easier by having a 3rd beer which he knows is too many to drive. With the boat cleaned, the fish cleaned and some eaten for tea, another drink or 2, the boys making friends in the playground, all thought of fishing again had slipped away into the darkness. Phew 

Peter arrived about 7, after finally getting home from work. Due to the tides, we have planned to take the kayak out in the morning and go out for a quick fish in the afternoon in the boat on the rising tide. Hopefully the wind plays friendly. 

Not quite as planned

I managed to sleep until just after 8 this morning, thanks to the boys playing quietly on their iPads. Another great sunny day greeted us, with the most important feature - no wind. (Unlike me after sitting up late, eating and drinking last night). 

I cooked up the usual hot breakfast, whilst deflecting Dylan's constant requests about going fishing again. 

The big news this morning was that Peter didn't get flown home last night, thanks to the heavy rains in the far NW of SA soaking the private runway, and therefore no planes in or out. At this stage, the earliest he will get home is Sunday 😳😧. And to top it off, it meant he had to keep working as there was no fly in crew arriving either!  Grumpy Peter needs a Scotch. 

I took the boys to a beach called Kemp's Bay at the bottom of the Yorke Peninsula where we threw out some lines in the hope of getting some Salmon or a stray Flathead. 1st cast scared the life out of a sun baking fish that skipped across the top of the water, frightened so much that he took all his mates with him. Over the next 2 hours, Dylan caught a few very tiny Tommy Ruff, and I missed one decent bite from something much larger, and once again came home without a feed, but with some good memories. As we were speeding down the dirt road, a brown snake slithered across the road in front of us without a care, knowing full well that we were more scared of him than the other way around. We watched him sit there for a moment, before he he slowly disappeared into nowhere leaving us baffled as to where he went. Our very non-snake friendly outfit of shorts and thongs guaranteed him that we weren't going to start looking for him, so it was back to the van for a late lunch. 

Of course the moment the food appeared to have been eaten, Dylan was bouncing off the walls wondering where we were going fishing next. Reluctantly I agreed to go to Edithburgh jetty, with a squid line, a tommy line and a bottom rig. There were hundreds of small fish around but not eating anything except everyone's burley, and only about 3 squid caught between the 30 or so other hopeful fishers out here. After announcing for the 5th time that we were leaving, and Dylan responding with "No", or "Why", or "One last cast", we were packing up when Dylan actually pulled in a smallish cuttlefish. At this stage of the day, I couldn't be bothered so it got thrown back and we were gone. 

Finally, I got some me time and a much needed drink. Despite Dylan's unstoppable desire to fish 24/7, and Tyler's boredom when a fish isn't caught within 5 minutes, it has been fun and good to spend time with the boys, doing boy stuff, and talking boy s^*+. 

As expected, they were exhausted tonight ( but not enough to not sit and watch a movie on TV till 9:15), but were asleep 2 minutes once it had ended.