Thursday, March 5, 2015

Aussie Camping Trip

We had been wanting to go camping for about a year here in Australia and we finally booked it!  We went with another family and had a fun couple nights at a beautiful site with amazing white sand beaches!  We pulled the girls out of school a little early to get a head start on our 3-1/2 hour trip south to Jervis Bay.  We arrived just before dark, got our tents set up then went to work on our hobo pie pizza dinner and banana boat dessert.

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There were SO many possums trying to get into our rubbish.  Our friend, Liz, who wasn’t even keen on camping (has never been and her husband and I had to work hard to convince her to come along) in the first place, had one give her a little nibble as well as jump up beside her to try and steal her dessert!

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There was a beautiful, bright moon shining through the trees on us.

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Up the next morning awaiting our pancake breakfast

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Brian and the girls playing  little Simon Says

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The amazing, squeaky, white sand Green Patch Beach 5 minutes walk from our campsite-fun!

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After lunch back at the campground, we decided to check out another beach-the famous Hyams Beach.

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On our way back to the car, about 30 seconds after this photo was taken, Alaina stepped up on the rocks to meet us up on the beach and the hard shells on the rocks cut deep into her feet in 2 spots and she started screaming and bleeding everywhere!  There was so much blood as the one cut was so deep.  She was carried up to the cars and bandaged up.  Thankfully it’s healing nicely, but, OUCH!

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We then headed over to Murray’s Beach to try snorkeling, but unfortunately, there had been a huge colony of Bluebottle Jellyfish (Portuguese Man O’ War) come to shore and we decided against it.  So, we walked to Governor's Head Lookout in hopes of seeing some penguins or dolphins playing in the water, but to no avail. We enjoyed the beautiful view none the less.

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We decided to spend a little more time at the first beach we went to earlier in the day, but discovered the Bluebottles all over the beach! It was crazy how there were none earlier and then everywhere later on!  We enjoyed some fun in the sand doing handstands and cartwheels and walking down to the other end to check out the rocks and the lagoon.

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Back at the campsite, we cleaned up and got ready for dinner and more campfire desserts before putting the girls to bed and having some fun adult time with wine and cribbage.

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Hallie checking to see if anyone is coming out of the other tent early the next morning.  We love our hinged door on our tent!

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The kids enjoyed playing with bubbles, skipping ropes and elastics while waiting for breakfast.

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We played a little Bocce Ball before having lunch and packing up.

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The Mann family headed home while we drove a little further south to check out Cape St. George Lighthouse.

There was a lot of controversy on the building of this lighthouse in 1860 due to poor location, but it was built anyway.  Over a 10 year period, 198 vessels were lost off the NSW coast. The Wreck Bay coast acted like a trap for ships sailing too close to shore. Once inside the bay, there was no room to maneuver and ships were driven ashore. 38 years later, a replacement lighthouse was built on the northern side of Jervis Bay.  Even unlit, Cape St. George Lighthouse caused navigational problems especially on moonlit nights when the golden sandstone tower glowed in the dark. Eventually the tower was reduced.

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From here, we headed home.   We had a great weekend for our first ever Aussie camping experience.

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