Tuesday 29 July—Monday 18 August 2025
Hitting the road again for a few weeks, we left Granville at 1030 hrs on a sunny day and headed to Tea Gardens, a favourite of ours. We arrived at 1330 hrs and set up in the car park of the Baptist Church as the grass was still too wet. At 1600 hrs we headed off to Bible Study and afterwards went with the group to the club for dinner. When we got back our 5R we found that the key would not unlock the door. Not sure if it is called luck, more likely God’s intervention I think, as earlier in the afternoon I had opened the kitchen side window which allowed Dean with a little ingenuity and climbing, a way to break into the van. On Wednesday Dean investigated the issue with the lock and found it had actually broken. He rang Travelhome and again God’s hand was at work, as they had had a door returned which had the same lock as ours. On Thursday, in heavy rain, we travelled to Cardiff to pick-up the lock. Dean installed it when we got back and it all worked well.
August is a busy month for birthdays in our family and on Friday 1st, Dean celebrated his 67th, Wow! and for lunch we headed to Tea Gardens Hotel because he wanted a steak, which he really enjoyed. As seems to be normal for this year it rained again and of course the carpark commenced flooding again. By Sunday we’d had about 100 ml of rain and our 5R was surrounded by 15cm water. Tuesday was travel day so gumboots were needed to hitch up and leave, we were heading to the Bonny Hills (near Port Macquarie) Ingenia Caravan Park. It was a sunny day as we drove into our space #111 and set-up for nine nights. After searching Google for where to have dinner we found the Beach Hotel, not far away.
On Wednesday we visited Geoff (Dean’s brother), Lois and Lyndell and had lunch at Lake Cathie Offshore Coffee Bar with them. Thursday found us working around the 5R. Friday was Reen’s 65th birthday and we headed to Timbertown Historic Village at Wauchope for the day. It was great to explore and ride on a steam train, a horse and cart and on a miniature railway. Lunch was very exciting—pie and drink—but we made up for that and dined out at the Family Chinese Restaurant, which was great.
Saturday morning was overcast with showers and we headed to Lyndell’s AFL game at the local ground. She plays for the Magpies, but they didn’t win; no finals for her. On Monday it was sunny and we all headed to Tacking Point Lighthouse, lovely views and photos. We left there and headed to Port Macquarie to walk along the Breakwater path overlooking the water, well set-up. Dean and Geoff walked to find a Fish & Chip shop for lunch and we sat in the park overlooking the water, nice spot to catch up.
On Tuesday Dean and I were off to to Laurieton for morning tea of scones with jam and cream at My People Cafe, it was recommended by Geoff. We then drove up to the North Brother Lookout which included a very steep hill climb. There was lots of really interesting information and it had great views over the coast. We also visited the Big Axe at Kew and then it was off to lunch at Geoff & Lois’; Lyndell was cooking.
While we were in the area we caught up with Geoff, Lois and Lyndell most days. They even brought Kiko (dog) with them and they especially enjoyed our coffee. We farewelled our family on Wednesday, took more photos and started packing up.
On Thursday we hitched up and at 1030 hrs we were ready to drive to Morisset Showground, where we stayed for five nights. On the Sunday we drove to Granville for Brad’s 50th birthday—family photos in Parramatta Park and dinner at 317 Cafe, which specialises in GF1 meals.
- Gluten Free ↩︎