04

We started off Sunday morning, Brian having done a twelve hour night shift, I drove for quite a while, which was good. We had prayed, as you know from the last Article (and thank you those of you who prayed with us, you are such a Blessing!), that none of our beasties would roam or be killed whilst we were away. And for traveling mercies, both of which were granted to us.

There is a huge benefit to my driving. I was able to stop any time I wanted to and view the scenery. The Great Ocean Road scenery is spectacular. What made it even more so was the heavy fog, it was lovely as there was relatively little traffic for the holiday season, and there was no sun glare.

I was able to show Alice some really interesting geological formations from the stacks of limestone, slowly being eroded back into the sea to the anticlines and synclines of rock faces. When we stopped at Peterborough, we were privileged to visit a Market that had a few garage sales in attendance, and I was able to buy a few more books really cheaply and also a bit more camping gear. Alice had a good play on the swings and staved off the "Are we there yet?" boredom.

Brian then took over the driving and we went on to Gellibrand, a tiny little settlement in the Otway Ranges. We had a budget of $150 for the two nights and three days, which included everything - petrol, food, accomodation and extras. It sounds like such a lot but when you are stupid enough not to take much in the way of food (me), you go through such budgets more rapidly than an emu over the desert. Gellibrand has a delightful caravan and camping spot, but it seemed expensive for an unpowered site at $25/night for the three of us. They do have a pool, TV room, free barbecues and use of kitchenette and a games room, so when toted up like that, it is well worth it. The General Store was wonderfully stocked and was only a short distance from the Caravan Park. We had a superb lunch there and I treated myself with some smoked salmon sushi (the last for a very long time).

We walked to the River and Brian and I showed Alice different types of vegetation, their seed pods and growing habits. The blackberries were a bit on the rampant and there were some severe cases of white ants, but that was part of the fun. In the local Park, there was a wonderful display of historical photographs all set up in one of the old, refurbished railway cabins. The rail is no longer in existence, but it was so very busy pre-War, and driving on the very well maintained road, one could only imagine the hardship of getting road and railway tracks into such areas.

I forgot the can opener (but, yes, I'm learning), so when we bought some rather more practical supplies at the Store, I had to find a neighbour who had one. Third try hit it. I wonder whether a can opener is now on their list of things to buy!

Alice grinds her teeth alarmingly whilst asleep, I have since learned it may be due to a badly aligned jaw, and will talk to the school Dentist about it, and both Brian and I snore, but Brian can tolerate Alice's grinding, so he was a darling, and I slept in the van, and he and Alice had the tent. Brian told me next morning how Alice had kicked him quite hard in the small of the back and then stolen the covers (it was very hard not to laugh, but I allowed myself a smile). He then stole them back, and she did not even open her eyes once during this. I was so glad of the van! I did also hear him snoring, and Alice says that she did too, but she is an imaginative little creature. Frankly, I think she slept through everything. The flies and mosquitoes were a little too friendly for our liking, but I had my trusty navy blue boyscout type hat with its elasticised insect net, so was not terribly bothered by them, at least around my head.

We packed early, since we have agreed that we are going to stay in as many different places as possible. Naturally, we were looking for a budget camp. After looking at alternatives on the map, we thought we'd try out Apollo Bay. The Caravan Park, although right on the beach, was far too crowded for our liking, so we journeyed on.

On the way to Apollo Bay, we stopped off at the Cape Otway Lighthouse, which is, unfortunately, being leased to private individuals as a going tourist concern, so the price for viewing the Lighthouse was prohibitively expensive for our budget. We did take a short walk up a nearby path and were treated to a spectacular view of the Lighthouse, as well as the Ocean.

I checked the maps again, as Chief Navigator, and decided that the most usable road would probably lead us to Princetown, all of the other possibilities being on unpaved roads and not suitable for the van.

Princetown is slightly larger than Gellibrand in terms of retail establishments - it also has a restaurant. We enquired in the General Store about camping, and we could camp right next to the Store. Having looked from the top of the hill that is Princetown, we saw a sports oval with a couple of dozen happy campers very close to the river with its outlet to the Ocean. It looked basic, but lovely. "How do we get to it, and who do we pay?" I asked the nice lady behind the counter.

She gave us directions on both, and we found that we could stay there for $14/night, hot showers included, so we picked a spot near the ablutions block but far enough away to not be too near the noise of nightly comings and goings.

The gentleman who was in charge could also sell us firewood. I thought of our much reduced budget, and how we still needed petrol to get home, and said I would talk to Brian. On the way back to the van, I thought "Why should we bother paying. He's already told me that many campers have left, so they have probably left behind a fair bit of wood, too." I discussed this idea with Brian, and whilst he and Alice were setting up the tent, I went scrounging.

I told Alice it was fossicking, and came back with plenty of wood. The site we had chosen had a smouldering fire left over from some previous kind soul, but we had such basics in the way of cookware, I was beginning to wonder what to do.

More scrounging, sorry, fossicking, and I found the lid of a 44 gallon drum, which provided a perfect cooking plate, we had a billy (the open small pot with a wire handle for boiling water, often used to make billy tea. Billy tea is strong black tea, usually with a gum leaf or three, heaps of sugar, and when all of this is boiled NOT STEWED, you grab it by the handle and swing it around like a ferris wheel powered by Ferrari), a small (miniature) frypan and some enameled mugs.

Brian found some aluminum extendable rods that worked a treat for poking and prodding (which is a camp pyromaniac's hobby, after all), and also for lifting off the billy. He also found a nice, coat hanger style, piece of wire which he formed into a rounded "w" with handle, ideal for toasting bread.

We had so much fun! That afternoon, we decided to go fishing. Outside of the Oval, we found a path that led to the River. This was National Park property, but fishing is OK with a licence (required now in all Victorian waters, unless you are under age), and with the usual size and bag limits depending on the fish caught. After a long walk, we found the beautiful River inlet, and asked some local fishermen and women how they were going. Not too well, it would seem. But we found some cockles that some people were kind enough to leave behind, although Brian did not want to fish there, as it was too far to cart all the gear.

An interesting bit of history was the large concrete block with a flood gate in front of it. Apparently, in the 1930s a hole was actually bored through the solid rock so that there would not be a constantly silted up river mouth. It didn't work. Thankfully, they filled in the hole. No children to lose whilst investigating a fascinating engineering feature in a child-filled environment.

We decided to head back up to the General Store because we had budgeted for pizza for dinner but were unsure of when the Store closed. On the way there, we saw that there were plenty of people fishing around the bridge that led to the Camping Ground. There was another bridge that was part of the Great Ocean Road closer to the General Store, and seeing that, Brian thought it would be good to investigate underneath the bridge. We found that the old Ocean Road went just past the new one, and led to under the bridge. It was an easy matter to drive the van down, and, being bridge shallows, were certainly deep enough to hold fish. Brian very bravely tasted the water and said that it was salty enough to have fish in it. We decided to come back with our pizza and eat it while we fished.

It turned out that the pizza was better available at the Restaurant opposite the General Store. The Talk of the Town is a great restaurant of a reasonable size, with a fantastic scenic panorama (don't forget Princetown is on a hill) down into the valley and over to the surrounding hills, which were just being enshrouded with fog. You can't see the Ocean from this vantage, but, my goodness, it is stunning!

Pizzas in hand, we drove back down to the old Ocean Road and our secret fishing spot. We didn't get to stay long enough to catch fish, but we caught plenty of mosquitoes. Brian kept telling Alice and me to shush as we would scare away the fish with all of our slapping of mozzies, but I reckon the mozzies scared off the fish long before we arrived.

We moved to where the other campers had congregated along the river near the second bridge. No bites, Brian maintaining that we were too late. I had brought along a sample size Aerogard, which is specifically for deterring insects, and I finally had enough time to put it on everybody. Wow! Was that a relief! I'm not big into chemicals, particularly insecticides, but this stuff is essential, and I have found that herbal ones don't work nearly as well, unfortunately. The old advertising blurb used to be "Remember the Aerogard and 'aveagoodweekend"

We headed back to the tent, and Alice was so tired that she barely had enough energy for the pizza, but she womanfully wolfed it down, and then headed off to the tent for a good kip.

After another hour or so, Brian and I headed off to bed. I heard him stir at around 3am, and we spent a couple of romantic hours burning leaves and sticks, having a cuppa, and talking quietly, with the occasional good laugh.

We actually managed to sleep in a bit, but then headed off, all fully packed, to Koroit, stopping off at the Twelve Apostles to marvel at the incredible stacks, and look at the wonderful interpretive centre with poems of great evocativeness on every aspect of the area.

Our last real tourist stop was at Loch Ard Gorge, where the ship Loch Ard was wrecked. A cabin boy and a young girl, saved by the cabin boy after clinging to a spar for hours, came ashore at the Gorge, sleeping in separate caves, which you can access quite freely even today. This was the only spot on virtually the whole coastline of this area that could be ascended to the interior. The cabin boy managed to climb out of the Gorge and find help at a nearby homestead. Naturally, he became a hero. The Captain decided to go down with his ship. At Warrnambool's Flagstaff Hill Maritime Museum, you can read the whole history of this and other shipwrecks, view the diamond ring and the fabulous Loch Ard Peacock, a huge ceramic enamelled sculpture that survived with just a small piece out of it. There is only one other surviving example of it in the World.

On the way home, we started compiling a comprehensive list of camping articles to take with us NEXT TIME. We popped into an outdoors store in Warrnambool and increased the list, with a whole lot of "Oh, look at that." and some "My, that would be handy, wouldn't it?"

It was good to be home, for all that we had enjoyed ourselves being away. Not one animal had died. Until that night. Then, heading towards sunset, three ducks were run over, we still have one missing, so we only have a pair left.

The next day, Brian discovered two dead chicks and a third one dying, why, we don't know. Another died the next day, so Brian let them out with their Mum to see how they went. So far, no more deaths.

We also came home to infection. We have an absolute plague of little mite-like things (technical term) infesting our kitchen. I showed them to our local Doctor (also Alice's Godfather, I am not silly all of the time), and he said not to worry, that they were probably harmless. I pointed out that as they are clearly living creatures, they have a tendency to defecate, and I really don't want the family to be eating that. He suggested that I take a sample to Murray Murfett, our most genial and knowledgeable Health Inspector at the Warrnambool City Council. He is such a lovely man. He couldn't quite identify the little darlings, but has posted them off to the powers that be who might know. I told them to also ask them how to easily get rid of them. I don't want to set off a bomb in the kitchen, and bleach doesn't affect them hugely. Brian tried various other methods, only boiling water or freezing really works. Even putting them in the refrigerator overnight does not seem to do much. They are white, barely visible in terms of size, and cling to any moisture or food. They form great piles like an animated coral reef in the cupboard. I have no idea how we came to be their apartment block. Perhaps they came in in some already infested food. Perhaps it was my Mother, who complained of bugs in her home, and went quite troppo for a while. Perhaps it was the other, mammalian vermin who brought them in on their fur, rats or mice or both. Yecch. If you have any ideas, please don't hesitate to contact me on [email protected].

Tonight we ate home-grown spuds, carrots and Jerusalem artichokes flavoured with chervil, chives and parsley, also all home grown. Lovely. It was the first time we had tried the artichokes which are disgustingly easy to grow, and in fact they are in our herb bed, so just outside the back door.

We still haven't heard from our neighbour over the road with his fencing material so Brian and I have reluctantly agreed to sell or give away the goats this time next week. The sheep will be butchered very soon, as soon as we can afford, and the calves will be going to market when we can pay for the tagging, as the pasturage is too little for the amount of cattle we run.

I look forward to letting you know what happens, what sort of price we get for the various critters and how the lamb chops taste!

Dominus tecum,

Leonie

Ahh, Autumn

My days are bound by

Natures schedule

Summery days

are for washing

and gardening

The frosty-cool

fog-laden mornings

with white iced lawn

has me starting the fire

with gum leaves and pine

If it rains, it is a deep rich soup

simmering for hours

and indoor pursuits

and warm naps

in a rocking chair

gentling me in the kitchen

How I love Autumn!