Eden - aptly named!

It's not hard to see how Eden got it's name, although when the sky was gray and it was windy and raining earlier in the day we had our doubts. This is Discovery Bay just south of Green Cape which boasts the most southerly lighthouse in NSW.

We missed out on the whale watching cruise from Eden harbour but it was pretty rough all weekend so we did not feel too hard done by. Some interesting boats in the harbour. We had our Sunday evening meal at the Fisherman's Club. I was a bit concermed about having a Victorian registered vehicle in the car park after Melbourne Storm beat Paramatta Eells in the rughby league grand final!

We have seen a bit of wildlife on our travels including an echidna, a wallaby and lots of parrots.

Marine life at Narooma

We have been whale watching at Narooma. Cathy tried her King Canute act but only just avoided a dunking at Mystery Bay. We did see several whales but they were well out to sea and it was getting dark so the photo is not very convincing.

We did manage to get up close, if not particularly personal, with a small octopus which was next to the boardwalk on the Wagonga inlet. After that lot the day just had to be rounded off with fish and chips for tea!

Kiama

Kiama is a beautiful little coastal town just south of Wollongong and Lake Illawarra and is notable for this splendid lighthouse out on a headland which also boasts a blowhole. In fact the town has two blowholes - the photo below is the Little Blowhole, quite near our caravan park. I discovered the error of standing directly downwind!

The town has a small harbour and some resident pelicans who hang around hoping to pick up the odd fish or two when the catch is brought in. They seemed quite tame and let me get very close for the photo - probably too full of fish to move.

The caravan park has the best ensuite we have ever seen - better than home! It also boasts some interesting trees, one of which had fallen on top of the original site we were booked for. Fortunately we arrived after the tree fell over. Next to our site is this tree which we named "Womping Willow" after the one in the Harry Potter movie.

The Kiama hinterland is dominated by the Illawarra Escarpment which goes 600 m straight up and we went for a visit to the Illawarra Fly which is an arial walkway similar to the one in the Otways.

This is moderately scary being about 50 m above the forest floor and inclined to wave about as you walk on it. Luckily we avoided the coachload of schoolkids.

Also up on the Escarpment is the Carrington Falls on the Kangaroo River, a magnificent 90 m sheer drop. The photo does not do it justice. Cathy enjoyed rock hopping but we stayed well back from the edge just to be on the safe side.

War Memorial

On our final day in Canberra we visited the War Memorial, or at least as much of it as we could handle emotionally. The highlight was a film by Peter Jackson (of Lord of the Rings fame) describing the Australian Flying Corps in WW1. We saw some of the wreckage of the Red Baron's Fokker Tri-plane and one of his sheepskin boots which were souveniered by the AFC.

 

The centurion tank outside the building looked as if it had just been parked in the car park - perhaps it is the Memorial director's company car.

Like most of NSW Canberra was in the grip of dust storms and then violent thunder and lightning and torrential rain. We could not see Parliament from the Memorial steps because of the dust. However it was much worse in Sydney.

Floriade Festival - Mind, Body & Soul

We visited the Floriade Festival in Canberra and spent a most enjoyable morning walking around the glorious flower beds. If I did not know what Floriade was I would have guessed some sort of flower-flavoured drink like Rose Hip Syrup.

We encountered some local residents, or were they politicians, taking it easy under a tree and looking very pleased with themslves. Perhaps they were from Treasury - Gnomes of Canberra rather than Zurich. No place like Gnome!

One of the more surprising sights was the Berlei Bus (14D - or the Big Bra) with a long queue of women waiting to be fitted for an over-the-shoulder-boulder-holder as Bette Midler once descibed them. We were sure there was a guy in the queue!

The National Capital

We have been on a boat trip on Lake Burley Griffin and visited Parliament House twice, once at night and again during the day, when we went inside and saw both the House of Representatives and the Senate. The politicians obviously don't work on Saturday.

Dog on the tuckerbox

So we reached Gundagai after visiting the Southern Cloud Memorial and seeing more snow capped peaks. We stayed in the world's noisiest caravan park although our van did have it's own little house! The Hume highway seemed to be immediately above us on the hilside and trucks were compression braking down the hill all night long.


One of Gundagai's claim to fame is a very long tressle bridge - in fact two, one for road and one for the railway, but both now defunct.

The dog is still sitting on his tuckerbox - will he never learn!

On the road to Gundagai

We are on our travels again and have reached Corryong in northern Victoria, although last night was at Hume Weir in NSW. Tomorrow we travel to Gundagai via Tumbarumba (what a great name!). The weather has been great but very cold at night - in the zero region. We found yet another rail trail on the disused line from Wodonga to Corryong and a tressle bridge at Boggy Creek, of which there must be hundreds in Australia. It was amazing to see the snow on top of the Snowy Mountains - you can see how they got their name.

Mt Hotham and Baldy Hollow

The drive up Mt Hotham from Omeo is quite easy - at least for Dave who was the passenger for this part of the journey. Up the top it was 23 degrees, windy and sunny so one of the best visits we have made - same time last year we were here in the swirling mist and about 10 degrees C.

The view from the top at 1800 m is magnificent! "Not too near the edge!", said Cathy.

It was so kind of someone to have named part of the mountain after me. I have a similar photo from many years ago in fromt of the "Little Baldy" signpost, but that does not seem quite so appropriate these days.

Dargo and beyond

We are camped on a hill overlooking Omeo having spent a great few days in the caravan park at Wonangatta where we swam, rested and drove the Disco up and down precipitous mountains. Hill Descent Control is amazing but somewhat frightening to take your foot off the brake to let it work!

Our first 4X4 trip was curtailed by an inconvenient tree, which had fallen across the track and wedged between two others. None of us had a chain saw so 10 point turns were required to head back the other way.

More fun was had fording a couple of rivers but the water level was down from last year so no water over the bonnet this time.

The trip from Dargo to Omeo on Australia Day was uneventful apart from the need to dodge oncoming log trucks whose drivers were not aware it was a public holiday. Stopped for lunch by the Tambo River.

And so on to Bright where it's supposed to be 40 degrees, but at least there is the river!