Heading Home

Hi all, we had a fabulous day and night catching up with some Sydney/Blue Mountain friends. Then headed up through the Upper Hunter Valley (more wine) and hit the Pacific Highway on Wednesday. I think this is a good place to end our blog - we are going to spend a couple of days wandering up the coast and then Jim is going to get on a plane and head up to Innisfail to visit his new great grand daughter - Charlii who has been born while we have been away and his kids of course. Jim is going to park Midi Bus for me somewhere near a beach and I am going to try and get used to the idea of going back to work.

We have had a truly fabulous time and we both hope that we have inspired you all to get out there and see this great country of ours. She really is beautiful and fascinating and amazing and all those other adjectives I have used over the last couple of months. Thank you to everyone who has been following and adding your comments along the way. Keep your eyes open for the book I plan on publishing - that is a joke!

Cheers Carol and Jim

Big day at Bathurst

Staying at the Bathurst Showgrounds - very peaceful, close to town and pretty cheap. So what do you do in Bathurst you go to the track of course. Actually I found it much more exciting than I thought I would and the National Motor Racing Museum was great. Bathurst has a long history and some very beautiful buildings - I might relent on my promise to not bore you all with photos of buildings and go out and get some tomorrow.

The Nations Capital

I have been here a few times before but it is new to Jim and he is loving it - that is when he finally got to see more than the inside of the bus and the caravan park (which by the way has its own pub!) Sadly we did blow the water pump and Jim has spent close to 3 days pulling the old one out, cleaning up the mess and putting the new one in. Now it is just fingers crossed when we head out tomorrow to go visit with some friends in the Blue Mountains. We are thinking of leaving Midi Bus at the bottom and taking the car up.

Batemans Bay to Jervis Bay

We left Bega and headed back to the coast. Now we are getting closer to Sydney there are lots of towns and lots of people. The bays and inlets are beautiful and there are some quiet places but I suppose we had better get used to people being around again. Parked the bus at Batemans Bay and did a couple of drives north as far a Jervis Bay.

We then headed off to Canberra but I think we should have checked with someone about how steep the climb was up the Kings Highway. Great road don't get me wrong but I think it is the steepest and highest we have taken Midi Bus up. She got us here to Canberra but at one point on the road we were doing around 12km and hour. She got a bit hot under the bonet as you would expect. Jim is busy checking out the engine today - he thinks we may need a new water pump. Oops!

Eden to Bega and around

We made the move into NSW and how loverly it is too. The Sapphire Coast it is called - after the colour of the water I am thinking. We camped in Bega (yes the cheese town) and have been doing some day trips to the nearby coastal towns and today headed back into the hills a bit Cooma is only 105km from Bega so the Alps are not to far away. We think we will come back in a Spring or a Summer to see the Alps as Midi bus is not liking the hills to much and adding the possibility of snow and ice to the trip it is not very inviting. As I have said before it is very strange to be at the beach in the morning and seeing snow in the afternoon.

Must tell you the story of the windmill - John Geldmacher was a German immigrant who thought he would build a windmill to produce flour. It took him 7 years to collect the stone and build the mill, soon after it was finished he was told that he could not use it as it was to close to the road and it was thought that the noise from the sails would scare the horses. He removed the sails and ironically used horse power for a couple of years but it sounds like he just lost his soul and he soon give up the mill. It is a beautiful building but a sad story of some official making rules.