Continuing our journey south, the township of Benalla VIC was a very pleasant 2 night visit. Morning walks around the lake, viewing street art, lunch and a walk at the Wetlands and driving through a couple of close proximity locations to look at some amazing silo art.
Decided not to travel much further after weighing the car & caravan (1.5hrs) so pulled up in Tarcutta at the Beaden Sportsground & Camping. It’s quite hot and humid with heavy cloud cover. Love being able to operate the air conditioning even when we are off-grid.
Essential to be under on all your legal limits. So while we had weights checked soon after taking delivery of the van it didn’t take into consideration the changes or additions subsequently made to the van. Hence the preference to have the car and van professionally weighed again. We were fully loaded for a typical summer adventure… all water tanks full plus an additional 20L water container, full fuel tank, etc. All legal requirements were under (car and caravan) except for the car’s rear axle. Fortunately the rear axle was exceeded by a small amount so by repositioning some items in the caravan and disposing of some of the water in the 20L container we were able to be “legal” on all specs.
Wonderfull time catching up with lifelong, dear friends, Peter & Sue. Dinner at home and on the next day a walk in the Lindsay Prior National Arboretum followed by a long lunch at the Royal Canberra Golf Club.
Disappointingly our off grid site was not one we could recommend. Difficult to find a level position in an uncut, weedy area, road traffic noise throughout the night on a site that might only fit 3-4 vans.
Great bush walk of just under 7km return. With the amount of rain over the past week, most of the walk was wet under foot.
Planned over a year ago including Spirit of Tasmania bookings we are now making our way south. After a (very) wet departure, we are comfortably settled into Milton showground. Perfect location to visit Rachael and grandchildren who are holidaying at Currarong, catch up with friends, Kerry & Theo and enjoy walks and swims at Mollymook.
We selected 3 sites to break up the journey home. Alstonville Showground, had been an overnight stay before, easy to book an unpowered site and filled the waters tanks prior to setting up.
Next stop was on a farm at Old Station which was close to the Macleay river and 20min. to South West Rocks beach. Without a doubt it had the best grounds… the grass was like a golf course.
Perhaps our most underwhelming site to date. A large residential site with a small dam, not level and not within close proximity of a town. Definitely not good value at $30.
Conveniently located 15 minutes west of Caloundra is our base for the next 5 nights. Yes, there is nothing offered but a paddock… no water, electricity, garbage bins, toilets or showers. You need to be completely self contained to stay at this quite typical “off grid” property… but it is sooo peaceful and safe. We are blessed 🙏.
After an early morning walk around the Showground we were keen for a swim at the beach. Couldn’t resist a swim in the surf even though I needed to be careful to protect my nose! Kirra Beach was perfect.
Then off to the Tweed Regional Gallery & Margaret Olley Art Centre for lunch and a browse.
Short trip to visit Mum, Brian & Jenny; have 2 electrical upgrades done on the van (additional BCDC Charger & Starlink mods) and a service for the Jeep. 1st overnight stop was Kendall Showground followed by Murwillumbah Showground, both were very good sites… we will use these again!
