East Coast Crawl

We followed Colleen’s stellar instructions and gave her a call once we got to the house. She met us in her ute and gave us a personal escort to our huge campsite, a stones throw from the main fishing area – a tidal creek where you can catch shovel nose shark, flathead, jacks and of course mud crabs. She gave us the low down on the crab pot, the local bandicoot (not a bilby as the reviews would say), the green tree snake that lives in the tree on our campsite, and a few other tips and tricks. We had neighbours in the next campsite, but the place is so spacious we can’t see them. Our campsite is about a quarter acre of cleared space with a pretty elaborate fire place, surrounded by natural bushland. It’s awesome.

Leon did all the driving today so he was suitably exhausted. We set up, built a fire, had left overs for dinner and chilled out by the fire, settling into the restful next three nights ahead.

In the morning we enjoyed a slow and relaxed breakfast, ventured down to the creek for a fish, walked back to camp for lunch before some more fishing. Fishing was relaxing. Maybe too relaxing as there were only a few small estuary fish caught. However, they were on lures, so that’s something. 

Today Joey sat on my lap and steered the troopy around the campground. I can’t believe just how much he enjoyed it. He was busting with joy. 

Tonight was all about Origin. We had an easy sausage on bread for dinner followed by celebratory charcuterie board. 

What. A. Game. My goodness. I learned I must have been a little too animated when Joey told me he wasn’t enjoying the unpredictability of my behaviour. DCE… I continue to think he’s an absolute champion. And whoever is the next Blues coach needs to have a serious think about whether on field talent is the only thing that secures you a spot. General respect and human decency needs to be higher on the list of priorities. I can’t help but think there’s players on the NSW team who are embarrassed by those who flank them. Can’t do much for collegiality.

Leon (can’t fault his commitment), went for a late night fish. 

We spent Thursday having a bit of an explore of Bowen. I’m enjoying the slow mornings, so we had another of those, before heading out of Ben Lomand Station and back north to Bowen.

We began with a trip to Flagstaff Hill. We drove to the top of the hill and jumped out to enjoy the view. You can see the northern Whitsunday Islands, the township, the marina and jetty, and a bunch of beautiful beaches. Beach access was closed and there were a heap of defence force personnel, vehicles on the beach, ships just off the sore, tanks being loaded onto ships. It was all happening and super cool. A quick google and I learned it was Talisman Sabre 23, the tenth and largest iteration of a complex defence exercise involving more than than 30,000 military personnel. You can read more about it here: https://www.whitsundayrc.qld.gov.au/news/article/221/exercise-talisman-sabre-taking-place-from-june-to-august-in-bowen. It was pretty cool to witness some of this. We now also know why the airport looked similar to a refugee camp, hundreds of rows of tiny tents.

It’s a very interesting part of the country. The beaches, the islands, the mountains. It’s as though you can see how and where the islands would have been part of the mainland but the water either rose or carved away passages between the mountains leaving them detached and stranded in the ocean.

After watching the defence vehicles and personnel do their thing for a while, we drive back down the hill and headed to the foreshore. We considered walking the 700m jetty, but the kids were having a great time playing in the parklands and their play grounds. After some time spent here we drove to Horseshoe Bay. It’s an idyllic and somewhat secluded bay enclosed by interesting rock formations just waiting to be explored and climbed.

We scampered around the the rocks, climbing to see where we could get the best view from, collecting pumice stone, watching the Chinook helicopters take off and lands from the ships offshore. Afterwards Joey went for a swim and played in the water with the body board, catching small waves or using it as a skimboard. Theodore had a brief swim and Malachi sat with Leon at the picnic tables. It was a bit too cold and breezy for me to swim.

We stopped at the Big Mango and got five serves of mango sorbet to enjoy after dinner, and headed back to camp.

We all ventured down for another fish, that delivered a few more small fish. It also delivered a significant serve of midges. They’ve been a problem since we arrived. Since Kakadu they’ve been bothering me actually. I’ve bought aeroguard, bushman’s with 20% deet and sunscreen, and busman’s with 40% deet… and I am still getting bitten. I may just go insane. From about 4pm I douse myself in repellent and wear full length pants and sleeves, and I am still getting bitten! And I wake myself up in the night because I am scratching to violently that I’ve caused the bites to bleed. I have antihistamine a go, but that also didn’t really seem to help. I like this place, but I cannot stand being in a place with midges any longer.

Friday and it’s another moving day. We were driving out by 9:30 and heading south, Yeppoon bound. We had about 5-6 hours of driving to do and we smashed it out with a quick stop for lunch along the way arriving at Kinka Beach by 3:30. Everyone at the caravan park was notably friendly, it was an easy set up, and before we knew it the kids were enjoying the jumping pillow and other cool van park attractions.

I cooked dinner and chatted to Mum while the boys explored. When they came home for dinner, for the second night in a row Malachi didn’t want to eat. He is in one of his moods again. The typical teenage attitude seeping in of the worlds against me and everything is unfair and harder for me than anyone else. After dinner, when the little two and Leon and I were relaxing in the camper or going to bed, he spent a considerable amount of time outside on his own. These moods and feelings seem to be coming and going more frequently recently. 

We had a cruisey morning, the kids playing with other kids in the park at the jumping pillow and in the pool/water park. Leon and I managed to catch up on some washing as well as relax. For the afternoon we went into town for a bit of a look around and to do the groceries. It was a bit too cold to hang out on a beach, so we went to a park and the kids had an awesome time climbing the spider web. There was a skate park there so Leon and Malachi got in a bit of a ride and Joey and Teddy joined in for a roll around in the final minutes of our stay. Then we headed to do groceries, and it was a great surprise to run into Cass (who lives in Yeppoon) in Woolworths. As I can do I got talking with Cass and catching up and having a great time, probably holding up the deli line for far too long. We finished the groceries and headed home for dinner and bed.

Sunday morning was another cruisey one with some more washing. Leon took the boys to the pool so I could have some time to write. Other than these updates, my writing time has been significantly less than expected on this trip. He later took Malachi and Teddy back to the park and Joey played while I continued to write.

The kids are very good at checking in and seeing if what they’re up to is okay with us and that they’re never to hard I find. As long as I’m confident that they’re good at this I don’t mind if they scooter around the caravan park and jump on the jumping pillow with their new friends. As long as they’re not in the pool, I’m happy if they just swing by camp every 20minutes. Joey came back to camp this one time, asking me if he could sit with someone who was hand-making key rings. I started asking all the questions about how old this person is, are they inside a camper/caravan or in a public space etc etc and Joey tilts his head to the side, half smiles half rolls his eyes and says, ‘Mum, he’s a kid. About my age. He’s a nice kid. He seems responsible. He’s at the playground, and he doesn’t swear’. I told him that seemed like a solid risk assessment.

As I was walking back to camp from the bathroom who should I see standing at the end of the road but Teneale! Joey was on the edge of the road waving and jumping up and down like a crazy person. I was so happy to see her, give her a hug, and be hugged. Thankfully Teneale knows you don’t pull out of one of these hugs early and it was just why I needed. We would have the afternoon, evening and tomorrow morning together before our family left to head further south. 

I had a great time catching up with Teneale and Joey played with their kids. When Leon and the other two got home Leon went to watch the broncos and stayed socialising. I ducked home to cook dinner and feed the family, and once the football was over and everyone was fed we returned to the Harker/Wilkie camp to enjoy a few drinks, some after dinner treats and fun with glow sticks. Having Teneale’s parents there gave the kids a bit of the Nanna/Pop love they’ve been missing, Kayleen even made Malachi a caramel latte as he sat with the adults more than played with the kids. They continued the fun by sharing their pancake breakfast with the Geissler boys and taking them to the bike track while Leon and I packed up the trailer. My sisters have some work to do as I think it was Teddy who told Teneale she was his favourite Aunty as we were leaving!

We have farewell hugs and waved goodbye as we began the very doable four and a half hour drive to Kinkuna beach to the south of Bundy.

Unsurprisingly, the closer we get to home the more familiar the landscape. Much of the drive was macadamias to the left, sugarcane to the right. Just beautiful. My favourite part of this drive though was that Jackson called. Unprovoked, without needing or wanting anything other than a chat. I’ve been really proud of him while we’ve been gone. He’s got a new job, he’s saving money, he seems to be doing a good job or looking after the house. He calls just to catch up and share all the things he’s achieved and is proud of, and he tells me he loves me. I couldn’t answer this particular call because of intermittent reception, but regardless, the fact that he called was the highlight of the drive.

As we entered Burrum Coast National Park and the road become sand, we stopped to let the tyres down. We’ve read some reviews that say the tracks in are pretty soft. With the pressures pretty low we got to it. They were fun tracks, lots of small rolling hills, some big dips and significant washout from past rain, and lots of very soft sand. We’re a heavy rig so soft sand is a challenge, but we made it through some pretty tough spots and knew we were only a couple of hundred meters from the campsites when he hit the softest of sands and the tyres dug in. Three months on the road, never bogged, a thousand kilometres from home in familiar territory as it’s similar to how Mulgumpin (Moreton Island) can be at times. Leon and I were onto pretty quick, shovel out and maxtrax ready (we’ve never needed them). The sand was so soft that the shovel almost didn’t work. The sand would just fall back in. After one attempt and not making much progress, a man and his three teenage sons pulled up behind us. They were genuinely helpful and not your typical gung-ho cowboys which was much appreciated. They didn’t actually do much except some shovelling, but we were happy to have them around rather than wishing they’d just rack off. In the end we lowered the tyres all the way to 12psi and still needed the maxtrax, but once we were out we were good, and we thanked and farewelled the boys who were happy to have some excitement.

After some deliberation we chose a site closer than we’d usually like to other campers, but we checked with them first and they were happy to have us as neighbours. They too had three kids. 

We set up camp, had some dinner and walked over to enjoy the fire with our fellow campers, Rachael and Brandon and their kids, before heading to bed.

When I woke up I was colder than expected. The weather yesterday was glorious and I was grateful that we are yet to reach the miserable weather I’ve been hearing about from home. I had a sleep in and didn’t get up til 8, but Joey captured the beautiful sunrise over the ocean. Despite it being fresh, the sun was still shining, the ocean was a deep blue shimmering in the sun, and I was happy to have east coast sand between my toes. 

As the day progressed, though the sun stayed out, the ocean became more active and the wind leaped up the dunes and infiltrated camp; the chill finding any gap in my clothing to bite my skin. The boys spent much of the afternoon in the camper and Leon repositioned the car as a wind break. Despite the wind and the less than ideal temperature, I very much enjoyed the lazy day of doing very little other than a few life admin tasks preparing for our return to normality.

The wind subsided as the sun set, and wisps of pink cloud danced in the sky above the ocean, and the family enjoyed dinner around the table outside listening to the waves rhythmically crashing on the sand. I went to bed grateful for the calm, the rest, and the empty to do list. Soaking up as much of it as I can before returning to work, committing myself to hanging on to some of it. To ensure continued balance and wellbeing, the ultimate goal of this trip, is achieved. 

Not able to go back to sleep after the boys were up at 5am to wee, I donned my puffer jacket and went out to watch the sunrise; braving the the chilly ten degrees! It was a beautiful sunrise, and I enjoyed inhaling nature all by myself for over an hour before snuggling back into bed as everyone else was still asleep.

It was another lazy day of catching up on writing about the trip, watching the boys fish, some time kicking the footy on the beach and just sitting and watching the tiny waves crawl up the shore. I also delighted in pouring myself a gin by 4pm. I spent a fair bit of time just chatting with Rachael and getting to know her a little better which was nice. They’ve decided to leave today, a day earlier than planned, as they’ve had a water leak and they are fresh out. While we offered to share ours, in addition, neither Rachael or Brandon are feeling well, and their youngest child Eli also hasn’t coped with the dropped temperature and the wind.

We waved them off in the early afternoon and our kids worked hard to set up a rope swing, inspired by the RJs and a ready placed rope… albeit too high to reach and no timber attached. They persevered but in the end Leon needed to help them finish it off. Afterwards however; they had a great time launching off the sand dunes and swinging out over the beach. I cooked dinner early as I didn’t know what the wind was going to do, and would just heat it up when we were ready to eat. 

Leon and I sat and enjoyed a few drinks and a chat while the kids played until dinner. It was a bit of an emotional time as this really marks the final night of our trip. The end of an era! Our next and final stop is Sandstone Point Holiday Resort. A last effort to ensure I arrive home rested and ready to return to work and all other aspects of day-to-day reality. We won’t be exploring or experiencing a new part of our country. It’s familiar territory very close to home. We will be lazing around enjoying having loads for the kids to engage in, sipping cocktails at our camp as the swim up bar will likely be too cold. I’m slowly coming to terms with the fact that reality is something I have to return to, and while I’m glad to have a few nights in a ‘resort’ I am sad about this trip of a lifetime coming to an end.

After dinner we sat around the fire, listened to some music and roasted some marshmellows before putting the kids to bed and savouring the last moment of our time Out The Back.