Weeks 3 & 4 - On the Road

Week 3. Back from the Walsh's, staying at Lisa and Fiz's again - they're being very patient while we get our set up organised! And Harry (14 yr old cousin) has been fantastic with the boys, they're going to really miss him as we head off. Have been held back waiting for the cargo net - the shop we bought it from was way cheaper but they neglected to tell us it was under handover from one owner to another and seems our purchase was being haggled over, but it all came right in the end (4 days late) and we could set up the back of the 4WD with drawers and fridge slide etc. We booked a campsite in Yandina (about 20km inland from Maroochydore) for Saturday and were finally off. Initial set up was pretty easy but we're still searching to find a 'best practice' for where everything will go to keep the camper traileras spacious as it should be. (read so Kirsten doesn't go mad).

Week 4. Off to Yandina on Saturday afternoon, about 2 hours north of Brisbane, leaving us just enough time to do most of the set up before darkness closed in. We spent 5 nights at Yandina which gave us enough time to come to grips with the camper, visit the surrounding touristy places and hand-pick a good campsite at the beach for our next stop. We spent a day at the Eumundi Markets - awesome, bit like Martinborough Markets but they hold these every Wednesday and Saturday, I think it's what keeps the town going (town has a gorgeous villagey atmosphere and a pop. of 1800 I think). The boys hated it of course so we had to keep them sweet by buying a foam sword each, and letting them spend time on the bouncy castle.

We also spent an afternoon at Bli Bli Castle which Ruben (being a Knight himself, or a Prince - I can't keep up) thought was fantastic, we also enjoyed viewing the real armour, swords and other weapons of localised destruction from centuries ago. The boys enjoyed the dungeon the best, had a 'man' hanging in chains and a torture device that I think was supposed to stretch people. Next stop was the Ginger Factory (southern hemispheres largest you know) which was just down the road from our campground and a nice place to visit although geared to rid the tourist of every cent it could.

Thursday we packed up and moved to Cotton Tree (a beach caravan park in Maroochydore), gorgeous campground - very close to shops, riverside and beach so we plan to just relax here for a few days and try out our dinghy etc. 28 degrees today (Friday, week 4), ridiculous weather for early June but after the rains we're not complaining. Water temp at the beach 21 - 22 degrees, even I could get into that.

River mouth at Maroochydore. Great surf beach, bit rough for littlies though - the shark net puts me off a bit too.

River beach just outside our campground. Poor boat came in before the floods and the floods have changed the river mouth now she can't get out again - oops!

The Set-up

Camp kitchen - just like a bought one eh! The kitchen folds away into the hole on the left and becomes the back of the trailer. Features - 80l waeco fridge/freezer (personally I liked our last one better), above that our little stereo the iPod plugs into, drawers close away (don't need to remove stuff to travel, yeh), fully automatic three ring gas cooker with glass lid, next to sink with tap (cold water only unfortunately), underneath is our sovereign portable bbq - man have we spent some money although its cheaper than our last house! We also splashed out on an 80w portable solar panel for when freecamping (we worked out we'd get our money back over six months of using cheaper sites and freecamping - we'll see how good our math turns out!) And, so Rob could have his hot showers we bought a shower tent and a hot water on demand unit with shower attachment. Boat - action shot to come, 3.7m quintrex dinghy with 15hp suzuki outboard.

Master bedroom, sleeps 4 uncomfortably. Trailer folds away on top of bed so we need never remake it to travel.

Ruben's only requirement on this trip was a bunk bed, and we found these fantastic camp stretchers that can either be bunks or single (we weren't sure the bunk bed interest would last but they both seem to love it), as you can see below...