Holiday memories…

 Prelude..

 Oz has been in drought for years now, this winter we had no rain of note, we are now in spring, it should be hot and fine with light winds.

 

Tuesday 7 th of November.

 Phoned the garage;

“How much for a service on my Ford, and could you check the brakes please?”

“About $160.00 Taff, bring it in first thing tomorrow.”

“Cheers mate.”

 

Wednesday 8 th November

 Drop the car off at the garage. Take the dogs for a walk, fartarse around the house all day. Phone call from the garage; “Your brakes need new cylinders and shoes. The seals are shot on the cylinders, and they’ve been spraying brake fluid over the pads. We can’t let this car be driven away from the garage until that has been done.”

 Oh, so that’s why it wasn’t stopping?

 “Ok, go ahead, no worries eh.”

 Walk the dogs up to collect the car; “$495.00 please Taff.” Burn my credit card down a little more.

 Ok, get the car and drive over to the school to collect Bethy. Take the dogs for a walk around the playing fields there. Walking through the trees I manage to walk into a branch that was pointing directly at me, neatly skewering my eye. Blood pisses out.

 “I wonder what I’ll look like with an eye-patch” I wonder, thinking I’ve definitely lost an eye.

 Go up to the school, clutching at my eye. Small children run away screaming. Bethy sees me and embarks on a long session of mickey taking. Unable to slap her due to holding my eyeball in, I manage to get her into the car, and drive home.

 At home I check the damage, and although my forehead, eyelids, and cheek are scratched, the eye is ok. Lee-Anne gets home and tells Bethy off for taking the piss. Bethy bursts into tears, I feel bad about this.

 Hang about…

 Anyway, we load the car up with enough luggage to see us through a Siberian winter, and drive off. Stopping in Braidwood for pastys and pisses, I noticed a map of the shire in the bus shelter. There was a road, branching off the main one, that would take quite a chunk off our journey, “we’ll take this shortcut I’ve just found” I tell the crew.

 Further down the road I find the village of Nelligan, and take the shortcut. I actually take the shortcut as far as a dead end, as I’ve wrongly turned right instead of left.

Turning around we take the road the right way. Now on the map it looked like a straight run between Nelligan and Mogo, however in reality it turned out to be a corkscrewed, dirt road, through a forest, with arse-tightening drops on either side, blind bends, and loose gravel. Not really a shortcut then.

 Half way along this long cut, Lee-Anne notices the temperature gauge on the car is well into the red. “Don’t worry,” I tell her, “it’s just all the luggage we’re carrying and this bloody road.”

  Politely, she declines to comment.

 Stopping off at Moruya I phone the whale watching people from a public phone booth. “It’s not looking great, give me a bell tomorrow morning and I’ll let you know.”

 We drive onto the place we’ve booked “The Scooby Shack” at Congo, and find it’s wonderful, wacky, place, with a dog obsessed décor. Great, suits us…

 It starts to rain.

 

Thursday 8 th. November

 Lee-Anne wakes up with stomach problems.  We walk the dogs on the beach, we have the beach to ourselves, very nice. We drive to our favourite small cheese makers, at Bodalla. That’s small-scale cheese makers, not small people making cheese, or people making small cheeses. I buy a boot-full of cheese.

 We drove into Moruya to get a few bits and bobs, navigating the town we finally see a sign that says; “Supermarket car park”. Unfortunately I turn left before the sign, not after it, and find myself driving up the pedestrian area, much to the horror of my passengers.

 I phone the whale watching people from the same pay phone. “No chance of a trip tonight, the weathers not good enough.”

 I could tell that, as I was getting soaked by it at the time.

 I took the dogs to the beach again, had it to myself again too. It was still pissing down.

 Spent a night at the shack playing games and watching TV, while eating cheese.

 

Friday 9  th. November

 We take the dogs down the beach. Bethy runs down sand dune. Bethy trips. Bethy badly twists ankle.  Lee-Anne helps Bethy home, I walk the dogs.

 Part way along the beach I come across two other dog walkers with Labrador/Springer spaniel and something crosses. Big, hairy, stupid, buggering things whatever they were. “That little one won’t need much walking, not like our two,” they state. Didn’t have the heart to tell them….

 So Millie chases their dogs the length of the beach, and by the time we catch them up the two dogs are fuckered, as are their owners, and Millie is still trying to kill them.

 Barnum is still trying to screw the male dog of the two too, just to add insult to injury. (It’s a hard life being the owner of the worlds most savage yappy, and the worlds gayest heeler.)

 Leaving them to sort their own dogs out, I call mine to heel, the only trick the know, ands start to walk back. As I reach the middle of the beach and turn around I see they are still trying to persuade their dogs to get up and walk again. They must have known Millie was still looking for something to kill.

 Drive into Moruya, phone the whale watching people from the pay phone. “Too windy mate.”

  I could tell that by the way all the signs were being blown from the shop fronts…

 Spend the evening at the Scooby shack playing games and eating cheese.

 

Saturday 10 th Nov

 Walk the dogs on the beach, some surfers now in evidence as there is a frigging HUGE swell.

 Drive for an hour to take Lee-Anne and Bethy to a horse riding stables so they can go riding, take the dogs for a walk along a local beach. See Camel rock. This looks a lot like a rock and fuck all like a camel.

 Bethy and Lee-Anne get back from the ride most dischuffed. The owner of the horse riding stables had done nothing but criticise their horse riding technique from the moment they got on the horses to the moment they got off.

 Drive into Moruya, get to meet people organising alleged whale watching trip. “Come here at 5.00 pm and we’ll definitely be going out. We saw some whales in the distance this morning.”

 Buy chips and fish (Bethy & Lee-Anne) and falafel roll and chips (me) for lunch, chips far too salty, not good for sea stomachs. Drop the dogs off at Scooby. Drive back to Moruya.

 The boat owner gives the twenty or so intrepid whale watchers a brief lecture before we get on the boat. This boils down to; “It’s going to be as rough as fuck, and you’re not going to see any whales.”

 Crossing the harbour bar is like doing g-force experiments in a storm. Actually it was doing g-force experiments in a storm. But, fortunately, once we clear the bar it gets worse.

 We search the ocean for half an hour looking for whales, and seeing waves and seagulls. Boat owner keeps us on our toes by dashing off at new directions randomly, and seeing how much punishment his boat can take before it sinks.

 Tour guide, “Where you from mate?”

Me; “Wales.”
Him; “I did wonder, seeing as everyone else is wearing souwesters, sweaters, and thermal clothes, as you are.”

Me; “And?”

Him; “Its just that everyone else is actually wearing them over their T-shirts, not tied around their waists.”

 Boat owner then decides to try slaloming up the biggest waves, then falling helplessly off their tops into the abyss. The puking begins.

 Eventually giving up hope of seeing whales we get driven to Montague Island.

 First thing we see is a magnificent sea eagle, which pisses off before we get a chance to get the cameras out.

 The next thing we see is a colony of seals. We get quite close to these, but as it’s dusk we can only get very blurred pictures. I thought the guide was throwing chum overboard to get them to come closer, but he was only sweeping the puke overboard. The seals stank of a rich musk, which only another seal could find attractive, or bearable even.

 So we get to tour the Island, and it’s mildly diverting. The seabird colonies stank.

 Then at dusk we’re told to sit down, shut the fuck up, and not under any provocation to use flash photography. And ashore came hundreds of fairy penguins, coming within pecking distance of our feet. Shame it was so dark.

 So we get loaded back into the boat and we’re heading back to shore in the now suspiciously calm sea. Capt’n calls out; “all to the front of the boat please,” and backs off the throttle. All those who are capable of movement make for the front, and by elbowing assorted pregnant women and OAP’s out of the way I get a prime spot.

 There are a dozen dolphins racing the boat. Magnificent in the moonlit water they charge back and fore under the bows and race off at 90 degrees after fish. The water is slightly phosphorescent, and there are hundreds of luminous jellyfish which flash like minor nebulae when we pass them. Using the flash (ok, and a little judicious Photoshop,) I manage to get some half decent shots of the dolphins.

 This does not compensate for not seeing whales.

 

Sunday 11 th Nov.

 

I give the dogs one last walk on the beach. The sea is now as flat as a pancake, and with perfect visibility all around, it must be a perfect day for whale watching.

 We pack the car with our stuff and a couple of hundredweight of sand just for old times sake.

 We decide to go back the scenic way.

 We stop at Tilba where there’s another small cheese producer, so I buy some more cheese.

 Half way up Browns Mountain the car blows up. Letting it cool down we add more oil and water, which only makes it worse. Following our car is now like standing in front of the fog generators at a motorhead gig. We nurse the car home taking about double the time we expected.

 Getting home we unpack the car, I phone the garage to book it in, and vow never to go on holiday again.