Southern Trip Day 10 - Jervis Bay

This morning after breakfast and after the kids went to school, Scott took Shan, Finn and I for a drive out to the Booderee National Park and went to check out the 'Old' Lighthouse.  The national park is actually part of the ACT even though it is whack bang on the South Coast of NSW.  Reason being is because of the Naval base which is situated there.

You see every other Capital City has a 'port' which clearly wouldn't work for ACT itself (as its land locked), so it has been deemed ACT for port purposes.

So enough babble about that.....

The 'Old' Lighthouse was apparently built in the wrong spot after much deliberation.  Even though the lighthouse was built still ships continued to crash.  It was then decided that a lighthouse on the other side of Jervis Bay, at Point Perpendicular, would be a better location.

On the way up to the old lighthouse there is a photo which shows the area in its heyday, which was really trippy.

There was also a sign which advised of the many grim misadventures of the people who occupied the area.  For instance a lighthouse keeper was kicked by a horse and perished, a guy was shark fishing and ended up being eaten by one, just to name a couple!

We were wondering why historians would let the lighthouse end up so dilapidated, and not try to restore it.  It wasn't until we were walking back down and re-read the sign we saw that once the new lighthouse was erected, the old lighthouse still distracted ships so they decided to use explosives to reduce the size of it, causing it to be the rubble it is today.

It was really interesting.  Oh we also saw whales cruising past which was cool.

After the lighthouse we went to Murray's Beach which was really pretty.

After Murray's beach we went to Hyams Beach which boasts the 'whitest' sand in the world!

When we came home Scott started to prepare our dinner..........Paella!  Talk about a work of art, and it was delicious!

Tomorrow we are catching up with Shan's Sister, and the boys, then the rest of the Hatton clan are coming over for pizza around the fire!

Till tomorrow.......

Wanderin Watson's

Day 9 Narooma to Jervis Bay

Last night we went to the Service Club at Narooma.  We were very proud of Finn when at 6 p.m. the Last Post was played and we all had to stand to attention - he was so well behaved!

The lady behind reception gave Finn an activity pack, I'm not sure who was more entertained by the pack........I'll let you be the judge.

There was a funny sign when we went into the club - apparently you are not allowed in in your swimmers - we were lucky to get in given Finn had bare feet, Shan was wearing a bikini and I had an offensive shirt on...........kidding!

Anyway we stayed at the Surf Beach caravan park and it was really nice, the sound of the ocean was lovely.

This morning we got up, had breakfast - Shan was very happy with his home made Chutney courtesy of Uncle Glenn.

After breakfast we hit the road aiming for Vincentia, Jervis Bay to see his family.  On the way we meandered up the coast, we drove into Tuross and had a look around, then stopped by Eden and went to the Whale Museum.

It was really cool.  There were bones of a Killer Whale called Old Tom.  He used to help the Whalers heard in the other whales, even going so far as to pulling the whaling boats in by the harpoon cord, which ended up wearing a ridge into his teeth!  His reward for helping the whalers was to get to eat the tongue of the catch.

Old Tom's remains

You can see the wear on his teeth, particularly the ridge in the back tooth which was from the harpoon cable

The Jaws of a Blue Whale!

Whale Bones

 It is so surreal to think of the relationship between the Killer whale and the whalers which was beneficial to them both (but not to the poor other whales).

Then Shan took us on a tour of his past.....Burill Lake, Ulladulla, Milton and then Jervis Bay.

We arrived and Finn was really excited to see his cousins here.  Since we arrived he has helped Josh with the chooks, played with Luke and followed Brock around.

Shaz cooked us a great dinner and we settled in for the night.  Watched the State of Origin, which we wont talk about (until QLD wins!!!!).

Tomorrow Scott will take us on a tour of the local lighthouse - the old one.  We cant go to the working one as it is situated on the Navy Range and is closed to public access until Friday afternoon, oh well.

Till tomorrow....
Wanderin Watson's.

P.S. Sorry we are light on photos this post

Southern Trip, Day 6, 7 & 8 Orbost and Narooma

After arriving in Orbost, well Newmerella (Snowy River Homestead) to be exact we had heaps of time to catch up with all of the Herbert's/Lawrence's (17 of them in total).

Finn was so excited and happy to get to spend time with his 9 cousins on that side of the family, them and the train set!

The first night we had a sausage sizzle and had a catch up.

On Sunday the kids had footy.  After Paul finished up with AusKick he was kind enough to take Shan, Finn and I for a tour of his and Kirsty's Marlo house which is so awesome (we would have photos, however we got too caught up talking and forgot to take any).

On that note this blog post will be fairly light on photos - we were too busy catching up and talking to everyone to take photos! (Aunty Sue can you email me some of what you took while we were there and I can add to the post!).

After going to Marlo and having fish and chips with Paul and Mitch we had a family dinner at Aunty Sue and Uncle Glenn's (now the kids cant complain they don't get to come over for dinner!).

Finn had a great time playing with all the kids and at one point he and Mitch were like double trouble.  Finn has greatly expanded his 'best friends' list, as Beau advised us.

Shannon, Finn and I were lucky enough to be given hand made Loom Bands courtesy of Heidi, although there was a slight argument between Finn and Shannon when Finn decided he wanted one of Shannon's (Shan made sure to hang onto the one that glows in the dark!).

Toby is even so talented he was making Minions from Despicable Me out of the Loom Bands!

The older cousins, Jake, Jack, Max, Will, Meg, Heidi and Beau were kept busy playing Pool - I watched but didn't participate, as they all looked too good!

On the Monday when everyone was at work, except Krissy, Uncle Glenn, Kirk and Aunty Sue, Shan and Kirk went bush to go for a fish and take the Hobie Kayak out for a run.

They went to a property in Kirk's family which is way out bush and quite remote.  They were planning to go for a fish in the kayak so Kirk could see how the peddles in the Kayak work..........only problem was that the peddles were in our camper, back at Newmerella!

Way to represent Kirk! Team Daiwa

Hobie sans Peddles!

Shan took some beautiful shots at the property.

While the boys were out fishing, Uncle Glenn, Aunty Sue, Krissy, Finn and I went out to Cape Conran for a bbq, it was lovely.

 On our way back we stopped to have a look at a lookout near Marlo.

Uncle Glenn filled us in on the Bush Sprites (Clay faces ranging in sizes from a 50 cent piece to the size of the tip of your little finger) that a local has 'hidden' all along the track.  We were all searching high and low, until Aunty Sue spotted the first one.........and the second one! Smarty Pants.

Bush Sprites

The tiny Bush Sprite

Finn found Deer Antlers too!

We then had to stop for the obligatory beer at the Marlo pub!

Because that was our last day in Orbost I wanted to take Shan to see Craig and Bec's house, Shan  is so envious of the shed and the timber shed!  Although I don't think there are enough winters to ever get through all that wood!

Sadly this morning (Tuesday) we had to bid farewell to everyone and we headed north.

On the way we stopped at Genoa to have a fish, Shan was really surprised at the creek bed as it had changed so much since he fished there for Adventure Angler a year and a half ago.

We were lucky enough to see a freshly dug wombat burrow, there were cute little foot prints going in and none coming out so we assume Mr or Mrs Wombat was still in there.

We then made the trek to Narooma, which is where I will leave you for tonight as we are headed out to dinner.

Southern Trip Day 5 - Blowering to Orbost

Well we survived the night last night.

We awoke to a foggy day, the camper didn't blow away during the evening which was a bonus :p.

We were not sure what our movements would be today when we awoke.  We were hoping there may be some snow on the peaks south of Blowering, unfortunately Finn missed out on seeing the snow for the first time.

The view from a lookout

The drive down the Snowy Mountain Highway and came across some beautiful little streams.

When we got out of the car we nearly froze - the wind chill was crazy!

From there we went via Adaminaby (I tell you what we were struggling with the pronunciation of that one!), where the BIG fish is.  The fish was made to commemorate the moving of the Old Adaminaby township to where it is today (the old town is now underwater, underneath Lake Eucumbene).

For the whole drive along the Snowy River Highway we were thinking of The Man from Snowy River, that is another movie we will have to watch!  Bring on the Australian movies.

After Adaminaby we went through Cooma, and then on to Bombala, down to Cann River and on to Orbost.

When we arrived we were greeted by all of our family (on my side) and were given multiple warnings that when everyone gets together it can get LOUD.  We had to warn everyone that even though we only have one child he can be extremely loud all on his own!

Until tomorrow

The Wanderin' Watsons

Southern Trip Day 4 - Blowering Dam

Today we headed from Dubbo and again managed to find some back roads and avoided the main roads, for a while anyway.

Our trip was pretty uneventful, nice quiet roads with spectacular Aussie bush all around us.  We were somewhat shattered that we had to join up to a main highway (the Hume) for a kilometer or two before we hit Tumut.  When we got to Tumut we stopped at a park to stretch our legs and were again blessed with deciduous trees, Finn loved playing in the leaves.

From Tumut we joined the Snowy Mountain Highway, and came across the area we had already pre planned to stop at – Blowering Dam.  It looked so different to the pictures in our Camps Australia Wide app, in the picture the camps are up in the bush and the water levels at the dam come right up to the tree line.

When we arrived we found that the water levels were waaayyy down, we ended up driving along what would normally be the dam floor and found a nice little spot to set up for the night.

Once set up we lit our fire (which we missed last night as we were in a caravan park), and had a quick flick of a lure in the dam – no luck again :(.

As soon as we finished up dinner the weather came in, it was really squally and started raining.  Shan decided to run a few ropes off the awning so it wouldn’t flap about.

The rain put a dampener (pardon the pun) on our fire so we decided to sit in the camper and watch a movie on the laptop (first world problems, lol).

Tomorrow we are headed further down the Snowy Mountain Highway, and may even get to Orbost a day early.

Till then

The Wanderin’ Watson’s.