The next morning, Friday 2nd May, was sunny. We woke at 8am. I aired the bed and Lee cooked breakfast. The engine started after its second attempt! We both breathed easy as the washing was gathered in, the boxes packed up, some cutlery went missing and was then found. I had left it on the side of the sink last night. Lee had retrieved it and, with a sigh, we headed out for Ballarat. We were following a diagonal road up to the Blue Mountains and Sydney, in a rather circuitous route out of Melbourne. The weather soon changed and, in the hard driving rain, two sandy working dogs in the back of a ute,an Australian working truck, looked rather forlorn. We sympathised with them.
We had a long day driving through pasture land, 10am till late afternoon. This was farming country, known as, 'The Fruit-Bowl'. There were lots of shabby caravan sites inhabited by the transient fruit-pickers, in each of the little towns, we noticed. As we crossed the border into New South Wales, our fourth state, the only sign was, "No fruit on return.' This was an attempt to eradicate fruit fly. I reached for the incriminating banana on the dashboard. There is always a sense of loss as younleave a familiar state behind. You just get to work out how it all goes and it changes again.
We reached a place called Findlay around 5.30, just as it was getting dark, and quickly set up the van. No-one else was staying there. The park was beside a lake and the colourful, cabins showing Australian wildlife had been painted by the local high school. The owner microwaved our chilli meals and brought them over to us when they were ready. It tasted delicious and there was just enough time to put the curtains up before it was pitch black.
I had a restless night but the night sky was fabulous as usual. The van would not start so the owner and his partner came and gave us a push. She eventually coughed into life, and we were off again, waving goodbye to the owners. The day stayed fine;we had 10hrs of sunshine and we had covered 600ks along a perfect highway amid the rolling hills, it was terrific scenery. We passed through several apparently empty towns, saw two roadkill kangaroos and two 'very much alive', emu's, our first sightings. The grasslands were golden and the fields were full of sheep with very young lambs and fat, glossy cows. Someone told me that the lambs would be the spring lamb in a few months time! There were many multi-coloured rainbow lorikeets and the, much bigger, pink and grey Rosella's. One large herd of cows was being rounded up by a man on a horse with his dog. Two flying Cormorants and a brown falcon, sitting on a fencing post, added to my wildlife count for the day. Two nutty drivers just pulled out on us despite the fact that they could see us coming but they do this to each other too, so that is okay. Its just a different style. We grabbed some fish and chips as we passed a shop in the dark. They tasted good. Within 15 minutes we had rolled into a campsite and parked up. There were some very noisy Aussie blokes in the open kitchen area. We stayed away. I managed to drop my glass of red wine all over the bed and Lee's clothes too so I had to make a quick visit to the laundry in the cold. There was a frost too!
As we were packing up the van the next morning we heard on the news about a man who had been sentenced for attacking a neighbour with a tomahawk, in the Blue Mountains, our next destination! We had to push the van again. Luckily we were on a slope. She started as she went around a corner. I said goodbye to our neighbours and jumped in. The owner had had to fetch the police to the noisy Aussies the night before. They had eventually gone to bed and had left this morning before 8am. No doubt, embarrassed! We found this out when we went to the kitchen to cook a sausage sandwich. They were awful,(the sausages and the people!) We vowed to stick with the bacon in future. We were soon on the road again.
It was delightful to us as 'Non-city folk' to find that we could stay in The Blue Mountains area and catch a train into Sydney-nip in and nip out so-to-speak. We had headed for Katoomba, at everyones suggestion but decided to check out Blackheath first. This was a delightful little town, fully decked in Autumn finery. The caravan park was low key, quiet and small, perfect. As I think you will agree, in the two pictures above, though the cabin was a funny little affair! We took this little cabin for 4 days, as a treat and a rest. We explored this lovely, neat little town then took a train into Sydney.
It was a sunny day, and the only downside for me was the fact that we had not booked on the open bus and, as our tour was a single decker coach viewing was sometimes limited. We got on and off taking pictures at the opera House, Darling Harbour and the South Bank. In the afternoon we rode the Beaches bus and saw Bondi and Manly beaches among others. This gave us a view of the Opera House and Bridge from the other side of the bay and made me feel a lot happier.
On the third day we did a tour of the Blue Mountains, riding on a tram. We went to a teapot museum called, 'Bygone Days', and had wonderful scones, visited the Edge and viewed the 'Three Sisters'. We rode the worlds steepest railway down into the gorge, then came back up on the aerial cable car. We had a stroll around Leura and bought our tin dog. He was immediately dispatched to England. A good time was had by all.
We headed to Katoomba on the fourth day and did our shopping before heading out.
