Down...over...across

Down, over and across … Down -Cairns to Melbourne. Tick. Over -Bass Strait to Devonport. Tick Over- Bass Strait to Melbourne. Tick Turn Left. Tick Across – Victoria, SA and the Nullarbor to Perth – TICK. God is good and we arrived safely in Perth, 36 hours before Richard is due to start work. The Nullarbor, once the road was open, is quite a journey. The word Nullarbor means ‘no trees’ in Latin and at the start of the expansive plain, that is a fitting description, however we soon discover that the Nullarbor is actually quite a diverse landscape. Several things really surprised us. Firstly, much of the early part of the drive hugs the coast. Although it is not always obvious, the road is within a few kilometres and occasionally within a few hundred metres of the cliff tops of the Great Australian Bight. There are a several photo opportunities to view the Southern Ocean, but sadly we were so far behind schedule that we don’t stop but push through....

The news is that the Eyre Highway will open tomorrow, so we push forward to the Nullarbor Roadhouse at the start of the vast Nullarbor Plain.  Our powered site awaits us and looks a little like a dirt drive-in movie site without the big screen. There is a power connection, but no water. We have enough food and water for 4-5 days, we can pay $1 for a shower and they have plenty of fuel at $2.13 a litre. We set up next to the only tree, plan to survive the afternoon heat as it approaches 40 degrees, have a good sleep and set off west on the Eyre tomorrow as soon as it opens. The landscape is flat with low bushy vegetation in every direction, as far as the eye can see. In 1 865, Henry Kingsley wrote that the area across the Nullarbor and Great Australian Bight was a ‘hideous anomaly, a blot on the face of Nature, the sort of place one gets into in bad dreams ’. Modern science explains that the 200,000 square kilometre plain was once a giant sea bed now expos...

Planning prevents…poor performance. Despite our careful planning our trip is now in tatters. After almost two weeks the road to Perth is still cut by fires, so we embrace plan B with unexpected results. Plan A was to pay Streaky Bay a passing visit and keep heading west, however the forced detention means a longer stay and time to really explore a fascinating part of Australia.   Streaky Bay, on the west coast of the Eyre Peninsula, boasts an enticing mosaic of pristine natural wonders: shelly and occasionally sandy beaches, countless fishing spots and the spectacular southern Australian coastline. From Streaky Bay the coast is primarily accessed by two self-drive loop roads each of about 30-40km of dirt. Along these drives are numerous secluded free camping spots, an array of rocky, jagged and sharp cliff formations and remarkably beautiful beaches. With little breeze and brilliant sunshine, the water shimmers with crystal blues and iridescent greens more typical of the...

After welcoming in the New Year in Adelaide, our next stop is Port Lincoln on the eastern side of the Eyre Peninsula. While eastern Australia continues to choke and burn the air is clean on the Eyre, but fires are blocking our path to the west. The Eyre highway to Perth has basically been closed by fires near Norseman in WA since Boxing Day, so we are currently becalmed hoping the road west will reopen soon. Being stuck in Port Lincoln is not exactly hardship. From our caravan we enjoy an amazing view across Spencer Gulf. Port Lincoln boasts some of the finest seafood in Australia and by the size and quality of its fishing fleet it also enjoys some of Australia’s most profitable fishing grounds. Adjacent to the town is the Port Lincoln National Park with scenery quite unique to any that we have previously seen in Australia. The beauty of the coastline is tinged with a rugged edge. Weather too continues to be extreme as we swelter one day at 41 and the next day rug up when the w...

Down, over and across … Down -Cairns to Melbourne. Tick. Over -Bass Strait to Devonport. Tick Over- Bass Strait to Melbourne. Tick Turn Left. Tick During one of Australia’s hottest and driest summers on record, we have been fortunate to avoid most of the really hot weather, apart from a couple of very hot days in Canberra. We have seen the results of the terrible fires on the North Coast and watched as the fires have devastated some of the areas we have already travelled through. Our thoughts and prayers are continually with those communities. As we leave temperate  Tasmania, we are welcomed back to the heatwave, that is the mainland. After driving off the Spirit of Tasmania at 5.45am we breakfast at Daylesford, an hour or so north-west of Melbourne. We have heard much about Daylesford’s reputation as an alternative, sustainable spa town. Breakfast, a wander through the local markets and a stroll around the man-made lake is about all we can manage, for by 9.30am ...

Penguin, could easily lay claim to the title of the quaintest town in Tasmania. Penguin is reached in just twenty minutes from Devonport along the fast moving Bass Highway or by a gentler and more scenic meander along the old coastal road, with views that rival the iconic Great Ocean Road. The sparkling green sea close to the coast is contrasted with the deeper blue ocean of Bass Strait. Penguin’s main beach proudly faces north, enjoying brilliant sunshine, golden sand, and pristine views. The town is bursting with creativity, craft, coffee and community. It is home to the beautiful children’s bookshop and toy store The Small Folk store, which has a huge online following. From Penguin it is a short drive up the coast to the amazing beaches and coastal scenery of Table Cape and Boat Harbour. The fascinating historic village of Stanley boasts The Nut, a sheer bluff which is all that remains of a volcanic plug, is just over an hour away. A similar distance south ...

Down, over and across … Down -Cairns to Melbourne. Tick. Over -Bass Strait. Tick Sailors often farewell each other with the saying ‘fair winds and following seas’. Unfortunately, our over was straight into a southern swell of 4 to 6 metres. Normally in a large ship like the Spirit of Tasmania this is not a problem, but in a cabin almost in the ship’s bow it was ‘a little bit up and down’. Those with sea legs cope, those who are less ship shape, suffer. Nevertheless, the Spirit is a great service. We drive on at 1830 (6.30pm), have a cuppa and a shower, go to sleep and wake before dawn at 0500 (5am) ready to drive ashore at 0600 (6am) without the burden of leaving ships stations, securing inspections, toxic hazards and damage control exercises that are normal routine first day on a warship. Our only drama is the sleep part as yes, it is, ‘a little up and down’. Tasmania mid-summer greets us bushfire free, mild comfortable weather, lush green pastures, ...

If you are driving to your new posting in Defence, one question is always asked by your workmates, ‘Are you towing something?’ Defence provides a generous daily allowance to drive to your new posting as well as a reasonable number of days to make the trip. If towing, the daily distance allowance is reduced, thus increasing the number of days that you are entitled to travel and therefore the allowance. In 2014 we returned from Darwin with an ancient and character filled 1984 Jayco camper trailer, affectionately known as Matilda. This time we have gone up market with an Avan Cruiseliner Adventure Plus known as Morrie; the name deriving from the fact that it is a van and one of our favourite singers is Van Morrison. Morrie is proving to be a good investment. Compact, light to tow and easy to set up Morrie is providing convenient, inexpensive and homely accommodation. With all the mod cons, microwave, air con, three-way fridge, running hot and cold water we are living like royalty i...

Compared to Cairns, most places can realistically be called the ‘big smoke’. Sydney and Canberra give us two big highlights and one constant smokey challenge. Seeing our scattered family is special. An early Christmas celebration with the extended Quadrio clan is a treat. Richard’s brother Scott and his wife Jenni welcome fifteen family members for an early Christmas lunch. An annual tradition that started almost ten years ago, provides a memorable tribute to the year. Each family produces an i-movie which showcases the year’s highlights. Set supposedly to only one song, each movie features achievements, birthdays, sporting highlights, travels, moves, births and much more. Richard’s eighty-five-year old mum, aka Gran and Great Gran is the only member of the family that appears in every presentation. No one can really believe another year has flown by. The day finishes with a memorable afternoon tea with our youngest son Pete and his wife Ashley in a very tiny ...

What is your address? It is a simple question that until recently we have never had trouble answering. Now it’s absurdly complicated. Richard has a QLD license to an address in Cairns that he has now vacated. It’s over six months since Wendy finally moved out of our family home of over two decades in Eastwood. It’s still five weeks till we arrive in Perth where Richard needs to find a unit to rent.  Wendy spends her time at Arakoon and being Mum and Grandma to our family scattered around the country, as well as spending time with Richard. Home is basically at 78 Smoky Ridge Drive, Arakoon, a short distance from South West Rocks. Visiting for three days in transit is a wonderful blessing and a significant amount of work. Maintaining any house is a challenge – doing it by distance adds to the complexity. For Richard, mowing the lawn, removing lantana, spreading mulch, pulling weeds and feeding the fruit trees is a taste of heaven. An afternoon walk on Gap Beach is a highlig...

As survivors of the 1960’s Social Studies curriculum we have a reasonable grasp of this nation’s regions. The coastal fringe, the golden slopes and the western plains. One that alluded us was The Granite Belt. Nightly on the news in QLD one cannot escape the plight of this area of the Great Dividing Range which stretches from Queensland’s Darling Downs to the New England region of NSW. Centred on the town of Stanthorpe this is a region that is all but bone dry.   This normally subtropical highland region is presently dominated by death and dust. Gum trees are dying. Scrawny stock graze on dust. Towns are limiting residents to a mere100 litres of water per day. It’s pretty grim. This is not the arid western area doing it tough. This is lush, productive country being brought to its knees by an unprecedented prolonged lack of rain. Thankfully this week they did receive 30mls, a mere drop in the ocean of what is really needed. We stay 40kms west of Armidale...

Do you know of anywhere on the east coast of Australia where the sun sets over the sea? We know of one, but this week we found a second. A touch over 700kms south of Airlie Beach is a place we had never heard of, until a friend at church suggested that we make it one of our stopovers. 1770. 1770? Yes, Seventeen Seventy. It is one of only a handful of places on the east coast where Cook came ashore during his epic sea voyage of 1770, on HMS Endeavour . Someone had the idea to name the place, after a date and to build a memorial cairn to LEUT James Cook. This was dedicated by the Fleet Commander of the RAN in 1926, while the original HMAS Sydney lay anchored in the bay.   On the headland at dusk we are joined by about 40 people including backpackers, tour guides offering champagne and a couple of leather clad bikers (who actually arrived after the sun had set). It is indeed a glorious golden spectacle as the receding sun sets the smoky skyline ablaz...

Is there anything sweeter than sugar? Driving through North Queensland today, bound for Airlie Beach, the so called ‘Dry Tropics’ are not all dry. Having endured the driest November in a hundred years, most of the landscape is painfully parched. Dust seems to be the only outcome for a farmer ploughing her fields in the midday sun. Approaching lunchtime, however, the picture changes in an instant. Brown is replaced by green. Water flows through deep channels. Pipes carry moisture into thirsty fields. The Burdekin Shire boasts wonderfully fertile irrigated land. Green acres as far as the eye can see, disappointingly, boasts just one crop, sugarcane. There is one thing sweeter than sugar and that is water. The Burdekin is blessed with a vast underground aquifer that brings the land to life. The western diet is increasingly criticised for including too much sugar. Sadly, this incredibly fertile district, which could be producing vast amounts of nutritious food, is only satisfying...