Back on Track

Well for the last couple of days we have been enjoying Christmas with our family. It has been absolutely lovely. We have been able to fix a few things on the caravan but we have been able to relax now because it seems to be under control now!

 

Pudding Flambe

Visiting Friends and Family

From Laurieton we drove onwards to Pete and Caro's place in Brighton,Brisbane. It seemed like a very long drive and we had to stop at a rest stop where i slept solidly for 45 mins. Chris and i couldn't believe it! Anyway we kept heading on and just before Balina, Chris felt like a Banana milkshake. So while he stopped for fuel, i kept driving so i could order us a coffee and a milkshake from the Macadamia Castle just past Balina.

Much to my disgust, Chris called me from the Macadamia castle and asked me where I was. I said "on my way to the Macadamia Castle still, I haven't missed it have I". Chris said, "no you can't miss it". Well it just so happened that while he took the Balina bypass, I acidently missed that sign and went through Balina. To make matters worse, Chris had waited for me to get there so we could order together but in the space of 10 mins they had shut! So I made a coffee in the caravan and we headed on.

We got to Caro and Pete's with no more major glitches and had a wonderful dinner at their friend Heather's. We enjoyed seeing the boys and John and Barbie for the first time in a very long time. We couldn't quite work out how long but it was too long anyway.

So we woke up the next morning to little Ethan (4yo) sticking his head in the window and saying,"I was creeping around your caravan while you were sleeping"! That started the day on a high and we enjoyed playing with the boys, having a swim and eating way too much! Thanks Caro :)

I must say Callum and Ethan gave me a workout playing bombs on the trampoline which consisted of dodgeing the many balls on the trampoline while jumping around! It was great fun!

Unfortunately we discovered a few errors on our parts that day:
1. I learnt that there hare two off switches on the fridge, so while we were driving to Brisbane I had the fridge on off rather than 12volt.

2. Chris did not turn the powerpoint on for the fridge for 240 volts, so for the two nights so far, when the fridge was switched to 240volts we were actually turning it off.

3. It's annoying when all of your food goes off!

4. We can't leave our freezer turned off overnight or even for a few hours, otherwise the temperature drops way too much!

Well I wanted to pack it in at this stage already but we perservered.

The boys bunkered down watching a dvd

Hamish, Ethan, Callum, Caro, Chris and Chantal

Pete, Caro, Chantal & Chris

First night out of town.

Due to our late departure, we only got to Laurieton where we found what looked like quite a rough Caravan park, but where we ended up camping was quite pretty.

We felt that we had done pretty well by this stage and we were happy with the van. The only issues we had were that the tyres were bulging a little under the weight of the caravan. And basically everything that was heavy was on the right hand side of the caravan! Also...we learnt that the caravan gets really hot unless you turn the air conditioning on or open all of the hatches and windows!

Anyway, here a few pics from the morning.

There's those PJ's again!

Finally time to hit the road!

Well after numerous Christmas parties and farewell's it was time for us to hit the road. We had a bit of a sleep in and slowly got ourselves ready. I think I prolonged the process by having a shower around lunch time! We got everything in the caravan nicely and were ready to go. So we said goodbye to Nana.

And then got in our separate cars for the first leg of the journey to Hervey Bay. We are leaving my car at Dad's so I drove that up. It was quite fun because we had the 2 way radios and it felt like a real adventure, plus we didn't have any arguments about how was driving!

But before we left, we went down to the warehouse to say goodbye to everyone and pick up/drop off a few things.

Our fake exit as were going in two cars...makes for a good pic though!

The Lancer departs :(

Well it was a sad day today when Chris had to say goodbye to his long standing project car. He had worked so hard on it, but it was just not possible for us to hold on to it any more. (I promise this wasn't my nagging that forced him into this decision, i think he had just had enough)

Packing the Caravan to go.

Well we got everything into our storage unit with literally an inch to spare! We only had a few boxes that didn't fit which was a lot less then i thought it was going to be. Half way through packing the storage unit I had to throw up a prayer that it would all fit in because it sure did'nt look like it was going to. Thankfully our prayers were heard and answered!!! Thanks to Jimmy, Devit, Chantal (not me), Dad and Mum for helping us with the move :)

All of the stuff waiting to go in even though we have already half filled the unit by this stage!!! PLUS  atill a trailer load and car full to be unpacked! Chris did an extremely good job of packing!!!

Everything had been chucked into the Caravan...we were hoping that it would all fit...

Probably the last time you see the caravan in a reasonable state!
It took an hour just to make the bed :(

I hate painting

Today I painted the kitchen, the bed, the repaired doors and the dinette bed piece. I really hate painting it's torture because you know after finishing the first coat, you have to do it again and again! Of course I had an accident and dipped my hair into the paint tin. I REALLY hate painting!

In a carvan, it's hard painting in tight spaces.

The repaired door...the only white door!

Re-Wiring the Van

Over the last two weekends Laurence and Chris spent countless hours pulling out the shoddy electrics of the van and starting all over again!

It was a big job and luckily Laurence was able to map out the circuits to maximise our power consumption. We now have fancy switchboards, fuses, invertors and more!

The person who had previously done the electrics honestly had no idea, everything we looked at had to be replaced.

Chris even had to re-wire the trailer plug.

We also replaced the hot water system and works very well.

So we still have some more to go but most of it is done now which is a relief seeing as we only have four weeks left and we need to start packing!

It's beggining to look a lot like Christmas!

Today we got to collect the stuff we got with our new Waeco fridge. We had lots of boxes to open which was very exciting. Plus we were able able to purchase a BBQ which will hopefully be good for us. We are hoping to try and use it like an oven because it has an enclosed hood and a temperature guage.

A seat cooler

A fridge stand

A chair and torch

The new BBQ

Even Lily got a new toy!!!