Day 24, Saturday 14/07/2012, Tamworth to Lake Macquarie and the week after. (The End, for 2012)

This morning Lisa and I headed into town at Tamworth to get the rest of the birthday presents for Madison, Chelsea and Katie. I am so tired! I feel like I have hit a brick wall, or someone has slipped me a couple of sleeping tablets. I’m not sure if it is physical exhaustion or the post holiday blues already hitting.

We returned to find Col upset that it had taken so long at the shops. I had completely forgotten the headlights weren’t working (it wasn’t a simple fuse), sorry Col.

After a very quick gift giving for Madison 10yrs and Chelsea 1yr we did a racing departure, arriving home right on dusk.

 

 



Total kms:                         6,500km

Total fuel:                          916L

Total fuel cost:                 $1,478

Average Fuel Economy   14L / 100km

The following week:

Peter lost his hiking boots. He last remembered them in Bourke. He phoned Kidman Camp and sure enough, there they were. She plans to post them to him.

Col pulled the headlight switch apart. A metal contact was worn away. He had to replace the switch.

Peter dropped the T Van back to Newcastle. The lady wasn’t too worried about some damage on the van. She said “you expect worse than this in the Outback!”

We had a lovely baked dinner here with Peter, Pockrans and mum and dad as a welcome home.

Peter went and spoke to the boss at the workshop in Tamworth that set up and wired his car for the trip. The boss was shocked by Peter’s story and somebody’s skills will certainly be reviewed. He was horrified by the potential danger the Freeman family were placed in by the less than satisfactory job done on his vehicle. Peter was reimbursed $400 to cover the Ceduna bill and they plan to do a thorough check of the entire car.

The T Van people got in contact with Peter to let him know that he still had their coupling attached to his car. He will post it back.

Day 23, Friday 13/07/2012, Lightning Ridge to Tamworth

Black Friday! Our plan had been to tour a mine today. The guy that owns it has spent the last 14 years carving statues while mining (for decoration). It was closed due to the rain so we did a self drive tour instead through the older section of town. It is called the “Red Door Tour”. Lisa and Stuart lead the way, reading the guide as we went. It is a novel way to see old Lightning Ridge, with red car doors as our guide. It was a 4WD tour as the dirt roads had again become creeks with the downpour we’d been having since last night. There certainly are some crazy buildings out here. I’m not sure about their council building codes.

Following this was a spot of opal shopping.  We had to wait for the shop owner to be phoned. He hadn’t come, thinking there would be no tourists on such a wet day.

There was some beautiful artwork in John Murray’s Gallery with beautiful and novel paintings of Lightning Ridge and the outback in general.  Michael purchased a poster, then it was time to head to Tamworth. There was a rain cell sitting over us the whole way.

Heading into Wee Waa Col hit a galah. I could hear it scream moments later. The poor thing was still alive, caught up near the front wheel. Col helped me get it out. There didn’t seem to be any broken wings. Hopefully there’s not too much internal damage. I took it back into the bush away from the road, getting a decent bite for my troubles. A flock of galahs came to its cries of distress. I hope it will be alright. I totally swamped the bite in antiseptic gel. There can be all sorts of nasties from parrots.

The plan was to take the kids to Macca’s for lunch which they think is an amazing treat. Our headlights stopped working, so we had to follow Stuart closely into Tamworth, arriving at dusk at the Freemans for a little reunion and a one night stopover.

It was a very enjoyable farewell dinner at the Safari Club where we ate, drank, were merry and celebrated some amazing memories from an epic adventure. Time to plan the next one!

We gave Madison part of her birthday present, an opal necklace (more to come tomorrow). Col ordered 1 of everything in what were already massive meals. Even he couldn’t eat it though.

Thursday 5/8/2010 Tamworth to Lake Macquarie...The End.

(Tamworth to Lake Macquarie)
Busy morning, everyone off to work and school.

Bye Peter, Anthea, Madison and Haley. So wonderful to see you all. Miss you guys!

We left at 0900hrs for the last leg of our trip. Driving east through our beautiful mountain ranges.

Jack's excited that he didn't miss his Wednesday night soccer game as he found out it was washed out.

Poor Phoebs will lose a house. Thanks for house sitting Phoebe.

Lisa and Stuart will be pleased to lose a dog. Thanks for minding Jet for us.

I spoke with mum and apparently she has even more photos than me! ie 1600 to 1200!!

So sad. 5 weeks absolutely flew by.

Stopped at Singleton Maccas, saw acouple of kangaroos at Branxton and were home by1330hrs.

Home sweet home...

Started the unloading and washing, all had a shower and checked the mail.
Jordan and Jack were desperate as their school reports weren't there.
Apparently Bob next door had collected the mail until Phoebe arrived.
We were visited by Larissa only 2 hours after getting home, giving us the social update.
Then we were off to Lisa and Stuart's to pick up Jet, buying them some wine and beer on the way as a thank you.
Jamie and Michael were pretty happy to have their big cousins back.

Jet was also pretty excited to see us!

I have such a huge job ahead of me, sorting the photos, making a book and hopefully a travel documenary once Jordan gives me a lesson on video editing.

I hope you enjoyed our trip, and hope to see you on our next big adventure!

Total kms:                     10,891km

Total fuel:                      1,410L

Total fuel cost:              $2,220

Average Fuel Economy 13.5L / 100km or 7.4km / L

For itinerary, planning and stats, see the "pages" contents in the sidebar index. I have also added many photos to earlier entries.

If you are interested in any of the photos, they are for sale (in their original size) as framed photos, posters, canvases, cards or calanders at www.redbubble.com/people/parkes for very reasonable prices, delivered to your door. Cheers, Cheryl

Wednesday 4/8/2010 Tamworth

(Tamworth)
Anthea left early to go to work, but poor Peter and Madison felt too sick to go to work or school and were forced to keep us company.
Peter drove Col in to pick up his clutch kit ($45). Col then spent most of the day fixing the clutch.

I did some blogging, Momento and photo editing, then Peter took me to the shops so I could get Madi a birthday present. I also picked up a few grocery items and a bottle of wine as we are eating them out of house and home.
It was 1 degree celcius last night. No wonder we were cold in Bourke.
Madison loved her new trendy jacket. The kids all put on a play they had been working on since we arrived. Ended up having a very late lunch at 1530hrs. Anthea was home from work and the car was fixed. Good one Col!
Therefore nobody really felt like tea, especially after all the nibblies and wine.
Poor things. They were then subjected to torture by photos and videos.
The wine helped soften the blows.
Col and Peter then played playstation until all hours of the night.

Tuesday 3/8/2010 Bourke to Tamworth

(Bourke to Tamworth)
A big drive ahead of us today. Up at 0700hrs. No breakfast, just packed up the swag and tent and left by 0720hrs!
We'll stop at Brewarrina for breakfast and check out the fish trap.
I'm reading about it now. Amazing. Apparently the Darling and Barwon Rivers flow through what is thought to be the oldest manmade structure on earth!! They are estimated to be about 40 000 years old and still work today!
Hmm sounds more interesting than it looks, but amazing all the same.

Stopped for a scrumptious breakfast in a rustik cafe called "Muddy Waters Coffee Shop" from 0900hrs to 0930hrs. Delicious.

Now we're stuck here. The clutch has died!

Jordan and I walked a couple of blocks to the petrol station to get some clutch fluid. There were a lot of Aboriginal families along the street and Jordan was very clucky, smiling and waving to all of the beautiful children and babies.

Col topped up the fluid and tried bleeding it with no luck. Col thinks it will be the master cylinder.

There is no signal on our phones so Col walked around to the servo to ring NRMA and get assistance. They told him there wasn't much they could do and to try the local mechanic another couple of blocks away.

We wanted to drive there rather than waiting a day for NRMA or paying for a tow truck.

Col did well. He managed to start the car uphill with no clutch, kangaroo hopping, to get to the mechanic.

The mechanic also bled the clutch plus suctioned and pressurised it with no luck and no parts in stock to replace it.

He let me use his phone (telstra only here) to let Peter know and gave us a number to ring to check for parts in Tamworth.

Wow. He didn't want any money for his time as he "..didn't fix it". Thank you for your wonderful attempt and friendly hospitality. Very kind. The mechanis was across the road from the local school. I thought they didn't have a uniform, but he said the kids are just slack and won't wear them.

We managed to leave Brewarrina at 1140hrs.

Col's going to drive to Tamworth with no clutch!

Jack's laughing, saying that this is just like on "The Gods Must Be Crazy" where he also can't stop.

Sheep, galahs, emus, cows...almost made us stop! All screaming at the cows.. "get off the road, it's too hard to start again!"

Then Jack announced he had to wee. We considered letting him jump out, driving along slowly while he caught back up and jumped in again (don't worry just kidding). That would have been a scene off the above mentioned movie.

So we stopped for all to have a drink and toilet break and had a lot of trouble getting going and up the gears again.

Luck was with us though, managing to coast through towns in 2nd or 3rd and not having to stop.

It's amazing to see green mountains again coming into Narrabri, and the creek was about to break it's banks.

We've phoned a place in Tamworth called Woodleys and they've ordered in a master cylinder kit for the clutch which should arrive tomorow. Lots of entertainment ahead for Col.
We arrived at Peter and Anthea's at 1800hrs. Madison and Haley were so excited to see Jordan and Jack.

So lovely to see family again. After showers we had dinner, then relaxed in comfy recliners watching Discovery channel and chatting about our trip.