Christmas and off we go!!!!!

What a great Christmas! Father Christmas managed to find us! The girls left him a cold beer, mince pie and some carrots for the reindeer all of which were gone in the morning! They were more excited to find the food gone in the morning than xmas pressies under the tree.  After opening a couple of presents we went down to Noosa main beach first thing Christmas morning but a big storm the day before had closed the beach and the swell and surf was huge! However the sun was shining and we enjoyed a traditional Christmas round the pool with friends and family.  Amazing food and drink was consumed by all....too much actually, including belly pork, roast duck, ham, chicken, prawns, roast potato, parsnips, red cabbage and xmas pudding!!!!

On boxing day Daisy swam a whole lap of the pool without armbands so we were all very excited considering she has only had one week of lessons since she was 1...very proud!
After catching up with some more school friends today we are now looking forward to the next few months....

Australia is now in front of us and we're all packed up and ready to go! Home for the coming months is an 18ft Jayco outback discovery poptop caravan. She comes with bunks for the girls a shower/loo etc, fridge freezer, gas cooker, microwave, tv and air conditioning! Externally is a large awning,
shower, solar panel and the list goes on. Power supplied by mains or DC/battery whilst on the road and when we are in the middle of nowhere the gas also cools the fridge, lights the external cooker and heats the water. The van holds 190 litres of water in total!

In the Toyota Prado we have a back up battery which has its own solar panels which also keeps the car fridge cold when we are off road. There are built in draws in the back holding all our beach and fishing gear and another kitchen basically! We have the standard issue roo bar, electric winch and CB to keep us out of trouble! There are two 90 litre fuel tanks so no excuse for running out of fuel!!

So off we go!!! Thanks mum and dad, we couldn't have done it without you xxxx

Happy Christmas!!!

Not much else to say apart from.....have a good one!!

Christmas, King Parrots, Carpet snakes and Cuts!

We have started to bump into some of the local wildlife. Apart from the usual kangaroos, kookaburras, galahs and lorikeets we have seen king parrots and the resident carpet snake (python) at Tristan and Jenni's aswell as a green tree snake. Plenty of green tree frogs and cane toads knocking around as well!

Christmas started this week for us with a visit to the year round Christmas shop in Eumundi and then the girls decorated the Christmas tree and the house with lights. We even managed to make mulled wine from scratch and decorated the tree over a few glasses as well as a few xmas tunes.  The girls also 'helped' their grandma Omi  make the xmas pudding.

The rest of the week was spent catching up with Jo's girlfriends and their children where Daisy and Holly rode a pony for the first time, as well as lunch with Jo's grandfather Arne and Elaine.

Finally for the week an early start and breakfast cooked on the bbq down on the river. Beautiful morning and a few fish caught after breakfast. Jo managed to hook a monster but sadly it took the line with it and almost the whole rod, which was just sat in the sand when the fish took the prawn!  The girls were having a great scoot with  cousins Max and Sam when Holly took a small diversion into someone on a bike and managed to split her top lip open! After a brave visit to the doctor without tears she was glued back together!

Next week update on the caravan and 4wd as we finish off kitting them out for our travels!

Wiggles and Fish

Another eventful week! First a trip to see The Wiggles celebrate their 20th birthday in a big tent at the agricultural showground in Brisbane. The girls loved it, dancing to all their favourite songs and Daisy a little overwhelmed by the whole thing, especially when Dorothy the Dinosaur came on the stage. 20 years has been pretty kind to the four Wiggles, Murray, Anthony, Sam and Geoff, although Geoff has recently had a pacemaker put in and lucky for us managed to get through the show! Great day out!

With some much needed rain starting to fall we managed to get down to the river between showers to do some fishing with all the cousins! Using frozen prawns Jo, Daisy and Holly all managed to land whiting or bream.....Tom was after the bigger fish!! A few more trips to the river planned in the coming days to see if we can land something big enough to eat!

We have started to kit out the caravan and have now booked/planned all our stops to get us to Sydney in early January, final prep this week before the lead up to Christmas!

Finally a couple of trips to the beach to soak up the sun and for Daisy to practice her boogie boarding, her confidence is growing all the time even though she has managed to get dumped by some waves a couple of times. 

Test Match and Trains

Its been an eventful week! We left the girls in Noosa and travelled down to Brisbane to watch the first day of the first test between Australia and New Zealand at The Gabba. Great mornings cricket but by tea the rain started to fall so we reverted to the pub for a few jugs of VB and then onto our hosts for the evening, thanks Kate and Dave for your great hospitality! Back to Brisbane next week with the girls to watch The Wiggles!

We have also been up to Gympie with the girls, Tristan, Jenni, Max and Sam to travel on The Valley Rattler steam train. We headed out of Gympie and through the bush and farmland over the Mary River before stopping for morning tea/snacks and a turn around. Great fun although everything needs a good wash to get rid of the smoke and coal!

We have started to fit out the caravan and have been making the girls bedding and sleep sheets. Trying to plan our first weeks travel but not easy as its the summer holidays here and most caravan parks busy for Christmas and New Year!

Finally for the week a BBQ on the river with some of Jo's old school friends, kids having a great time scooting up and down the footpaths and messing around on the rivers edge but whats with the beef sausages...cant find a decent bit of pig anywhere!

Scooters and Australia Zoo

Well with 4 litres of duty free Bundy rum we seem to have settled into holiday mode and started to relax apart from dodging jumping ghekos and those pesky ants which seem to have taken a shine to Daisy's English fair skin unlike Holly who seems to be soaking up the sun and turning herself brown with ease. We have visited the beach several times and got the girls body boarding in the small surf. There isn't too much swell though so paddle surfing will have to wait till the wind changes and brings in the surf.

Father Christmas seems to have come early already and dropped a couple of pink scooters off for the girls before going onto Hastings Street to turn on the Christmas Lights. The girls are getting used to the scooters along the river at Noosaville and will provide them with some transport when we start our travels.

We have also picked up some fishing tackle to do some fishing on the river in due course and will keep you posted with any notable catches!

Tristan Rankine, Jo's brother, celebrated his 40th over the weekend and a great party it was too with bouncy castle for the kids and cold beers for the Mums and Dads! Plenty of kangaroos in the garden at party too!

Finally a trip to Australia Zoo meeting the local wildlife and visting the famous Crocoseum to watch the wildlife show. We all got up close  with the kanagaroos and Koalas, Holly deciding she wants to bring some home.

We've arrived!

Well we have arrived! Departed Manchester on the new A380 to Dubai touching down for 2 hours before we headed to Brisbane, via Singapore, on a brand new 777 which the girls manged to break in nicely! Arrived in Brisbane about 26hours after departing Manchester and to our suprise the journey was pretty painless! However the jetlag has since come to haunt us and we haven't manged to get much sleep since. However the sun in shining and the girls seem to be enjoying the pool and the beach so hopefully we will get back to normal sleeping patterns soon! All in all painless trip over and we intend to start planing and getting organised next week

Welcome to our travel blog!!!

Well shortly we depart for Australia for what hopefully will be a trip of a lifetime. We aim to drive round Australia in a 4WD and caravan! We thought we might struggle to send you all a postcard so hopefully this site will keep you informed of what and where we are up to!

We hope to update this blog on a regular basis, so please feel free to follow us and get alerts when we update the site by simply entering you email address below!

You can also follow our whereabouts using the link to our GPS tracker on the right.

First stop Noosa on Queenslands Sunshine Coast for 6 weeks for some R&R, paddle surfing, Christmas.....and maybe a bit of test cricket and The Wiggles!!

Noosa Main Beach