Monday 08/06/09
Decided on doing a big drive today. Got away on time but disaster struck as we were leaving the camping ground. The camp had a gate across its entrance and we had to pay a $10.00 deposit for a key. So as we were leaving we used the key and went through the gate and went to park the van in the visitors park while we collected our deposit back. I decided to park in the shade, a bad decision!!!!! As I pulled in , very slowly I might add, there was a huge crunching sound and the van came to a sudden halt. I had jammed the van under a bough of the tree, that was going to provide our shade. Even though the bough had been cut back I still managed to jam our satellite dish between it and the van. The result, a damaged roof and no satellite dish so no TV. Unfortunately I do not think we are insured for that sort of accident.
After that exciting start the rest of the trip was long and boring. There is virtually nothing to see other than great open expanses between the major towns. I have learnt very quickly to keep the van filled with diesel as it can be up to 200 kms between service stations. We travelled the 650 kms to Rockhampton arriving there about 4.30 pm after being on the road for 8 hours.
Thinking we were quite clever we punched in the name of a Camp site into the GPS and followed its directions. Foolish us after 20 minutes we ended up in the middle of nowhere and not a camp site in sight. So we had to start over and ended up virtually back where we started. This meant we went through a police checkpoint twice. The cop recognised us and let us go through but looked a bit dubious when we claimed our GPS got us lost. Yeah right!!
The saga continued when the second place we loaded in was just a big empty space. In the end we just booked in a place we saw earlier. It was now 5.15 pm, it was getting dark and we were tired and grumpy and to make matters worse we had no alcohol. Watched the Wimbledon DVD.
Tuesday 09/06/09
Up early and on the road by 8.00 am. Once again we thought we would do a big drive and so we could stay put all day Wednesday. The drive was good. We were both amazed at the vastness of the countryside. We had one bit of straight road which was at least 12 kms long. From Rockhampton it was nearly 180 kms before we found a place to eat. We had a brief stop in Mackay, shopping before heading off to Bowen.
Arrived about 3.30 pm and our GPS was right on today as we found our camp first time without drama or wrong turns.
Our GPS is quite an interesting tool. You punch in where you want to go and then a very calm female voice starts giving you directions. “drive 700 m to round about. Take second exit” etc. If you take a wrong turn it just quietly says “recalculating” and gives out new directions. If you don’t follow these new directions eventually it just shuts down and wont speak. Typical woman eh? Don’t do what she tells you to do and she just shuts up and sulks!!!! (Except for Lorraine of course.)
Looking forward to a day without travel.
Decided on doing a big drive today. Got away on time but disaster struck as we were leaving the camping ground. The camp had a gate across its entrance and we had to pay a $10.00 deposit for a key. So as we were leaving we used the key and went through the gate and went to park the van in the visitors park while we collected our deposit back. I decided to park in the shade, a bad decision!!!!! As I pulled in , very slowly I might add, there was a huge crunching sound and the van came to a sudden halt. I had jammed the van under a bough of the tree, that was going to provide our shade. Even though the bough had been cut back I still managed to jam our satellite dish between it and the van. The result, a damaged roof and no satellite dish so no TV. Unfortunately I do not think we are insured for that sort of accident.
After that exciting start the rest of the trip was long and boring. There is virtually nothing to see other than great open expanses between the major towns. I have learnt very quickly to keep the van filled with diesel as it can be up to 200 kms between service stations. We travelled the 650 kms to Rockhampton arriving there about 4.30 pm after being on the road for 8 hours.
Thinking we were quite clever we punched in the name of a Camp site into the GPS and followed its directions. Foolish us after 20 minutes we ended up in the middle of nowhere and not a camp site in sight. So we had to start over and ended up virtually back where we started. This meant we went through a police checkpoint twice. The cop recognised us and let us go through but looked a bit dubious when we claimed our GPS got us lost. Yeah right!!
The saga continued when the second place we loaded in was just a big empty space. In the end we just booked in a place we saw earlier. It was now 5.15 pm, it was getting dark and we were tired and grumpy and to make matters worse we had no alcohol. Watched the Wimbledon DVD.
Tuesday 09/06/09
Up early and on the road by 8.00 am. Once again we thought we would do a big drive and so we could stay put all day Wednesday. The drive was good. We were both amazed at the vastness of the countryside. We had one bit of straight road which was at least 12 kms long. From Rockhampton it was nearly 180 kms before we found a place to eat. We had a brief stop in Mackay, shopping before heading off to Bowen.
Arrived about 3.30 pm and our GPS was right on today as we found our camp first time without drama or wrong turns.
Our GPS is quite an interesting tool. You punch in where you want to go and then a very calm female voice starts giving you directions. “drive 700 m to round about. Take second exit” etc. If you take a wrong turn it just quietly says “recalculating” and gives out new directions. If you don’t follow these new directions eventually it just shuts down and wont speak. Typical woman eh? Don’t do what she tells you to do and she just shuts up and sulks!!!! (Except for Lorraine of course.)
Looking forward to a day without travel.
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