Days 279-281 – Twin Towns, Coolangatta Qld/ Tweed Heads, NSW (18-20 June)

Coolangatta Qld, Tweed Heads NSW

Had a lovely weekend in Coolangatta and Tweed Heads which are the twin towns on the border of Qld and NSW.  We were catching up with an old workmate of John’s - Andrew and his wife Kym who live 15 minutes inland from Tweed Heads in the northern rivers area of NSW.  As John wanted to go to an investment expo at Southbank in Brisbane on Friday we left at 7.45am to get to Brisbane at 10.00am thinking that would give us plenty of time.  It took us 2 hours 45mins to travel 137kms!  We caught the tail end of an accident and a truck breaking down within 5kms of each other.  The traffic jam went on for ever and ever.  Eventually we got there with John being 15 minutes late for a Forex seminar he had booked into at 10.30am.  I had a great time walking around Southbank and crossed the river into the city centre.  Met John at lunchtime and we started our trek south stopping to buy a new 12volt battery for the van in a place called Slacks Creek (love the name).  We reminisced along the way at Palm Beach on the Gold Coast where we used to live 20 years ago (before we were married) when John was a partner in an advertising business.  John was able to drive straight to the house we used to rent which surprisingly is still there.  It was fairly old and rundown when we rented it so figured by now it would have been demolished and replaced but it was still there and looked just the same.  We had stopped at a restaurant in Burleigh Heads which is literally right on the beach shore, fantastic views of the ocean to Surfers.  It was fun going to all our old haunts we had forgotten how nice parts of the Gold Coast are although it is very busy and populated.  We stopped for the night in Coolangatta.  The information bureau suggested the Twin Towns Outrigger Hotel which is in Coolangatta and connects to the Twin Towns RSL in Tweed Heads!  Quite bizarre how it works.  It was a lovely hotel and we had a lovely room which overlooked the Tweed River heads.  We had already decided to have dinner at the RSL as they are usually very well priced good meals and whilst we were there checking out which restaurant to eat in (there were six) we also booked into a show – a Tribute to Neil Diamond.  A lot of the RSL clubs in the bigger towns have lots of entertainment, quite a bit for free and there is always something to do.  So we figured we would make the most of it.  Our meal was great, I had a 3 course meal for $19.00, soup, fish and bread pudding and it was very good (looks like another free day for my diet!).  The show was excellent – we thought it might be a bit ho hum but Bobby Bruce (Canadian Neil Diamond lookalike) did look and sound just like him – it was great.   The funny thing was that John and I were among the few youngest in the audience, average age 65 I reckon.  Doesn’t happen often these days.  The sad thing was we knew all the songs!  If Bobby Bruce comes to a town near you go see him!  We saw him and his entourage the following morning at breakfast and he still looked the part.  Our hotel room included a buffet breakfast so we made the most of it (looks like another free day for me).  After brekkie we wandered around Coolangatta and the ocean.  The ocean is just beautiful, white sandy beaches.  Very nice.  We met up with Andrew at lunchtime and we followed him to his home along some narrow winding roads – wondered how you would even know some homes existed here.  Beautiful scenery with Mt Warning in view, though rainforest.  Andrew and Kim live amongst the rainforest and it is just beautiful, so serene, lush and green. They have 11 acres with a creek bordering their property, nearest neighbour 700m away.  During the wet season the creek floods and can mean no way out of the property – so no work that day.  They have been here for 5 months so still settling in with their two cattle dogs, Sheba who is 16 years and Missy 5 years and just recently two baby goats joined the clan.  They are now 5 weeks old and still being bottle fed.  They are adorable.  We had a lot of fun feeding them and watching Kym run around the house cleaning up after them.  Yes they come in the house at night as it is too cold outside for them.  Both Andrew and Kym are animal lovers.  We had a lovely time with Andrew and Kym and just prior to moving to northern NSW they had been on the road for 10 months in their campervan travelling around Australia so we had a lot to catchup on.  We would have loved to have spent more time in northern NSW – Bryon Bay is 20 mins away, Ballina about 90kms and in hindsight we probably should have done a housesit on the Gold Coast or nearby but as we had lived there had discounted it which we now realised was not the best move and going there again reinforced how much we like it and one of the few places we have both liked and said we could live there. 

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Day 208 – Moree, NSW (6 Apr)

Drove 350 kms north from Dubbo to Moree.  One thing we have noticed in NSW is how in some towns, cars have to park on an angle rear in first.  Very odd, but drivers here do indicate to exit roundabouts - hallelujah.  Don’t get why this isn’t the case in Victoria and SA.  Quite disconcerting not knowing what a car is doing specially.  Moree and surrounds are known for their hot artesian pools.  The park we are staying at has four pools, one at 35, 36, 37 and 39 degrees and a cold water pool.  It is very well done just like spa baths.  I spent sometime in them tonight it was very relaxing.  The water is drawn 720m underground.  Chlorine is added to comply with Shire regulations then delivered to the pools.  To obtain the choice of water temperatures, water is cooled, filtered, chlorinated and piped into pools accordingly. After use the water is piped approx. 2.2kms to parks industrial yard for use in crushing and washing concrete aggregate.  After this the water is delivered to a dam for further use for irrigation or to be evaporated.

See how they park!

Days 202-207 – Dubbo, NSW (31 Mar to 5 Apr)

Left Junee and travelled 372 kms NE to Dubbo to stay with Scott, Joanne, Briette and Alec.  We haven’t seen them since last June so looking forward to catching up.  They have finished their travels and back home into the grind.  We stopped along the way at the Temora Aviation Museum in Temora.  They were having a meet over the Easter weekend for all flying enthusiasts including light aircraft and microlights, etc. There was guy on our tour from Busselton Aero Club, small world.  It was an interesting museum with old military planes on display including a vampire, tiger moth, Sabre, dragon fly, Canberra bomber, a lynx and spitfire to name a few.  They fly the collection aircraft on various weekends during the year.  They attract huge crowds from far afield.  They have 9 aircraft engineers, 6 local volunteers and over 30 volunteers who help out on the flying weekends, some of these vollies travel quite a distance to help out. 

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From there we continued onto Dubbo and the weather started to cloud over and we did get caught in some very heavy rain.  By the time we got to Dubbo it had already been and gone.  Along the way we hit a couple of locust swarms. They seem to lie on the warm road and then get sucked up by the car.  Quite a few bit splats on the windscreen.  Scott and Joanne have a 30 acre property about 7kms east of Dubbo.  It is a really nice area and so very quiet.  They are still getting organised and unpacking after having the tenants from hell!  We don’t want to hear these kind of stories!  They recently acquired the cutest border collie pup named Ozzie.  Dubbo is a rural town with a population of about 40,000.  Properties are very well priced and the town has all the facilities that you need with two shopping centres, hospital and community health centres. Joanne and I went to the Saturday morning markets.  All local produce, olive oils, the best sourdough bread with so many variations.  It was delicious.  Eggs, cakes, biscuits, free range coffee? (cant’ say I noticed a difference); chickens, meat, veges, fruit.  You name if it could be made or grown it was there.  Just a shame I am so limited on space to buy anything.  Easter was fun with the kids having so many easter eggs and a couple of egg hunts.  They joy on faces is great to see.  We pretty much chilled out for the few days we were there.  The boys set some yabby nets in the properties dam and caught enough for us all to have a good taste.  They were very nice – bit like crabs bit of work to get a small amount of yabby meat but very tasty.  The kids had a great time sloshing around in the mud on the edge of the dam.  Billy and Cobber the horses often cool off in the dam.  Scott kindly organised a complimentary pass for us to go to the Taronga Western Plains Zoo where he works as a zookeeper caring for the elephants.  The park is very open and the animals generally have a wide range in which to roam.  In some cases you can get quite close to the animals as they are only fenced by a moat. We were up at 5.30am (yes John as well) to go on an early morning Zoorise walk with a volunteer tour guide.  It lasted two hours and we got an insight into the ‘behind the scenes’ of a few of the animals.  It was very good.  Scott organised for us to go in the elephant enclosure (yes right in there with him) to watch the morning rituals of the elephants.  In total there are five elephants, YumYum and Cuddles who are African elephants, Burma, Arna and Gigi who are Asian elephants.  Arna and Gigi used to belong to the Stardust Circus and Arna was the elephant who killed a circus trainer.  Although she is the kindest and gentlest ellie.  The story is that she and Gigi were very close and Gigi’s trainer was being rough with her and Arna stepped in to help her friend and the trainer died as a consequence.  Very sad and a one off.  Cuddles gave us an ellie kiss (she grabs your arm with the end of her trunk and sucks your arm) it was a great sensation.  YumYum shakes herself like a dog, funny to see.  We watched while Scott gave Burma her morning bath (a hose down – they have cold and warm water washes) and we watched Arna have a pedicure.  When Arna and Gigi arrived they had exceptionally long toenails that needed some major attention.  It would have been very painful for them and two years later Gigi still needs a lot of foot work.  Each morning she has a Epsom salt foot bath and a clean out  of her toes.  Treats for the girls is bread and veges.   We were so fortunate to be able to see this and it was great that Scott could arrange it for us. The rest of the time we chilled out with the Smiths and met Joanne’s parents and two of Scott’s brothers on Good Friday.  We would loved to have stayed longer in Dubbo but we are on a time limit to get to Queensland to start our housesit in Glass House Mountains.  We will definitely be back Scott and Joanne.

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Days 199-201 – Junee, NSW (28-30 Mar)

As we were packing up this morning and as John was rolling the van forward to remove the blocks from under the wheels it ran over the TV satellite dish and reshaped it.  He had forgotten the dish was there.  Whoops!  Now we need a new one!  Glad it wasn’t me who did that.  Junee is an agricultural town of 5000 people and almost halfway between Sydney and Melbourne.  The caravan park was voted best NSW inland park in 2006 and had some good reports so we decided to try it and are glad we did.  It is beautifully grassed with thick green grass (not sparse as in most parks) and overlooks a small lake.  The amenities are spotless as is the BBQ and campers kitchen and there are bathmats in the showers (luxury), showers and drying area are large with lots of hooks (very unusual).  Amazing what excites you when you have been on the road for almost 7 months.  The town reminds us a little of Collie in that it is split by a railway line with an older part on one side and a newer part on the other.  It doesn’t strike us as being a prosperous town with a lot of shops either for lease, closed down or empty. Haven’t been to a town with so many P platers either.  This town is famous for having Australia’s most haunted house “The Monte Cristo” which sits on a hill overlooking the town.  We did the tour and it was very interesting.  The owners (Reg and Olive Ryan) bought the house in 1963 after it had been empty for a decade and consequently had been badly vandalised and was a shadow of its former glory.  After the original owners family had moved out the house was left empty and deteriorated.  A caretaker was put in to care for the property but did little to maintain it and vandals and looters took over.  The caretaker was shot by a youth who had watched the Hitchcock thriller ’Psycho’ and no one would take on the caretaker position so the vandals had a freehand.  No room escaped vandalism.  Without running water and electricity the young family (three young daughters and Mrs Ryan five months pregnant with the fourth) started renovating the house as close to its former glory as they could.  They have done a fantastic job and even today they are still making improvements.  To pay for the renovations Reg Ryan got into trading antiques so they could furnish the house.  Luckily this was before antiques really took off and could be bought fairly cheaply.  The house is still the family home with Mr and Mrs Ryan still living there.  There are many stories of the hauntings and much interest from ‘ghost hunters’ nationally and internationally and many TV stories have been made about the house including Getaway.  Some tourists to the house have had ‘reactions’ in certain rooms, mainly the drawing room, dining room and the boy’s room.  Murder, suicide and unexplained deaths have tainted the house’s history.  No animals will enter inside the house.  When the Ryan’s moved in with their family pets, the pets ran away from the property never to be seen again. Each year the Ryan’s hold a charity ball with guests travelling from all around Australia and overseas and everyone has to dress up in Victorian costume.  It is now so popular they have a waiting list with no guarantee of getting an invite.  They also do a ‘Ghost Tour” which is a dinner and B&B and are booked out for months ahead.  It was a very worthwhile and interesting tour.  The Monte Cristo website has some very interesting info about the house's history and its hauntings.  The ext day we went to the licorice factory.  This is the only organic licorice manufacturer in Australia and one of three in the world.  It is an old flour mill that still produces flour and licorice is a value add product and just recently they have included chocolate.  We went on a tour to see how the licorice is make, mainly flour and sugar with licorice root powder. They also make a spelt licorice which I thought tasted nicer. It was definitely the nicest licorice we have tried and yes we bought some.  The other thing we did was save a fish that had got hooked to an empty coke bottle that was been used as a float on the lake and had a line with a hook attached to it. People must think we are mad but John managed to hook the coke bottle and release the fish, a carp which is a large pest but we couldn’t let it die.

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Day 198 – Albury, NSW (27 Mar)

With great reluctance we left Porepunkah this morning heading north to NSW.  We really enjoyed our time in the Alpine country it is one of the loveliest places we have encountered so far.  We would like to experience all four seasons there.  Who knows maybe one day we may move there for a year or so.  We crossed the border in NSW at Albury and after much discussion about our fruit and veges and what we can or can’t take over the border it was a none event as there was no border control or even bins to toss stuff.  We are staying in a resort about 40kms outside of Albury called Wymah Resort.  It sits on the edge of Lake Hume.  At the moment it is 18% full and was down as low as 5%!  There is a great boat ramp about 500m from the shoreline.  Huge fish are jumping out of the water and apparently there is redfin, murray cod, carp, trout (brown and rainbow) in the lake.  Not sure what we saw jumping.  It is very pretty particularly as the sun was going down with lots of dead trees (not sure if they would be petrified) in the water.  Not sure how long we will stay here, originally booked in for one night.  We are heading to Dubbo to spend Easter with Scott, Joanne, Briette and Alec who we met on our trial run last year in Walpole and who we have since caught up with on the road in WA.  We plan on getting there on Thursday and there is lots to see between here and there.

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