Knee Deep Travels

It’s hard to believe but we’ve been on the road for four weeks!

The girls were keen to do a wrap up of our past four weeks so we thought why not look at the numbers:

• 5,143 kms travelled
• Fuel bill: $2,036 (ouch!)
• Most expensive diesel: $3.05
• Most expensive campsite: $81 per night
• Cheapest campsite: free! Plus a couple of $5 / $8 ones
• States & Territories visited: 3
• Pools swum in: 3
• Natural waterholes swum in: 1 and it was amazing!
• Harry Potter pages read 😆: 1,574
• Playgrounds visited: 11 (Emily would prefer that number was much higher!)
• Lollies eaten, photos taken and times we’ve heard “Mummmma”: haha no way we can count any of those!

Things we should have left at home: Scooters and helmets (although we hope they redeem themselves in the southern states) plus some of Mums clothes (maybe!).

Things we should have bought: picnic set, large water cooler, old kids books to donate to book exchanges, car bin bag.

Things we miss: people! Of course we miss our friends and family, Emily in particular is feeling this one. Mum and Dad have to admit they miss their fav coffee spots – particularly as Three Trees kept us going in those last couple of weeks! We’d pay good money for a delivery of chai, chocodates, banana bread and HashBandi’s from Three trees cafe and some coffee and nourish bowls from you Pauly (Freestate Cafe)!

We’re getting to the end of our meat supplies from home and the eggs and fresh vege are long gone – more good money would happily be thrown towards a certain few farmers and local co-op for supplies! We’re looking forward to finding more local, sustainable supplies as we move south.

Best buys: the kids hats! And the occy straps that now hold them up in the car.

Highlights: this is near impossible, it’s been amazing and we did start the trip with some of the big ticket items! And we’re not counting today as I would have to rewrite the post 😁

We’ll give everyone a go at answering 🙂

H: There has been so much, but after the family time in Lithgow and spending time with Simo and his family, the sunset at Mundi Mundi, camping at Tomcat Hill, experiencing the wonder of Uluru and Kata Tjuṯa, seeing Emus in the wild, and the downtime at Ross River Resort are probably my highlights so far. I’ve also really loved watching the landscape change from the red sands and low shrubs of Broken Hill to the moonscape of Coober Pedy and then the incredible East MacDonald Ranges with its ever changing layers – it has me wishing I could capture the beauty and the contrast better!

Oh and watching the kids blossom as they meet and interact with new and interesting people and sprout all of their new found information!

G: Mundi Mundi sunset, Uluru and downtime at Ross River.

M: Seeing Uluru, going to Broken Hill and staying on the side of the mine at Tomcat Hill.

E: seeing Emus in the wild, Kata Tjuṯa, Uluru, Broken Hill, Dubbo’s pizza oven and Tomcat Hill.

(Ok so Mum is a little more descriptive than the rest!)

Lowlights: constant caravan/car repairs! Ah to be honest that’s an over statement but we’ve had the windscreen cracked and replaced, microwave blow up, had to repair the bed end when the strut popped out and now have a stabiliser leg to replace. Plus the three way fridge is really struggling in the heat so we’re juggling ways to keep it cool. It’s all part of the travel experience but also worth sharing because let’s face it social media – it’s not all beer and skittles!

Lessons learnt: Oh gosh so many! But one that springs to mind is the challenge of “so many attractions so little funds.”

Everywhere we go there are the “must sees” and the “must dos” – and of course we want to do them all! But we soon learnt that almost of them have entry fees and these add up quickly. Trying to decide which ones to do and where to best spend our money is a hard one – we understand all to well that these things can’t all be free and so many of them are relying on the entry fees to keep really worthwhile attractions alive but at the same time money, as they say, doesn’t grow on trees. 🌳