The real beginning

We left the farm today, so this was really the beginning of our aimless travels. It was very exciting. Even just driving down the road from the farm with nowhere in particular to be was so exhilirating.

We had decided to head to Coffs Harbour to attend to some business, mostly internet related. My poor mother hasn't heard from me in over a week now and is probably going a bit crazy (Hi Mom!) so I would like to be able to get these blog posts, well, posted. Our wireless internet still isn't working though. Tomorrow we'll have to find an internet cafe to sort it all out.

First stop, Bellingen. I went to Bellingen yesterday with Kathryn and I LOVED IT. It is an awesome little town with a real hippy flavour - great clothes shops, organic bakeries, homemade gelato shop (yummm), and a wonderful health food shop that carries everything one could want, including all of the somewhat obscure ingredients I use in my cookbook (rapadura, coconut flour, wholemeal spelt flour, etc). It had a little recipe book put together by local people to raise money for a local cause, and Kath said that I should try my recipe book out there. It was a good idea.

So today we headed down Waterfall Way to Bellingen. We explored a bit, got some aforementioned gelato, and dropped by the health food shop that was unfortunately closed. I left a book and my blurb and contact details, and hopefully they'll be interested in carrying them! Nate found a little shop with pirate excavation sets for sale - they are little treasure chest shaped packed sand with something hidden inside, and you use the mallet, chisel and brush to get the treasure out of the middle. He absolutely loved it. Here's him at work:



And the treasure emerging:



Taking shape:



Maya coming to help:



He loves his new necklace and plans to wear it until he is old so that he can remember how much fun he had as a kid. Awwww.



The kids used all of the leftover yellow glittery sand as "fairy dust" and sprinkled it in tiny quantities all over the place. The fun lasted for ages.

We took the scenic route from Bellingen, heading through spectacular valley scenery towards Gleniffer, along the enchantingly named Never Never Creek towards Valery. The views through this area were amazing. The cloud cover may have even added to the view as it sat low, misty in the surrounding hills. The sometimes paved forest road, carved out of red earth, had occasional nausea inducing drop offs. But soon enough we were back to the Pacific Hwy and heading up to Coffs.

We headed straight for the beach and had a nice, if chilly and misty, play. We took advantage of the warm beach showers - Nate had a shower, but Eli and Maya needed a bit of a soak so we brought over our "bathtub":



Before we left Sydney, Nick just happened to hear a news story about residents of Bondi complaining to the council about people sleeping in their campervans on the street. Apparently there were no grounds for action because there is no law against sleeping in your vehicle. Good to know. So tonight we are parked on a quiet street with no signs posted anywhere about not stopping or staying overnight. We have all of our curtains closed and doors locked, and from the outside you would have no idea there was even anyone in here. There are a few other vans and even a motorhome parked along this long stretch of road, so I don't think we're the first ones to come up with this idea.

Christmas pictures

We had a treasure hunt for gingerbread houses, and here was the booty:



Eli with his new car:



Me and Nick enjoying the kids enjoying themselves:



New clothes, colourful kids (Nate reeeeally wanted "rainbow shorts"):



The kids were playing with Ariel and plasticine. Maya was doing Ariel's voice and we noticed from the other room that instead of speaking, Ariel had started mumbling "Mmm, mmm mmmm mmmmmm!" So we went to check it out, and this is what we found:



It was too funny.

Happy New Year!

Friday 1 January, 2010
Day 5

We considered going into Coffs Harbour for the fireworks on the jetty, but decided we would just have a quiet New Years Eve celebration here. We bought some sparklers for the kids, had a bonfire, watched the 9:00 Sydney fireworks show on TV, had some nibblies, and just hung out. It was really nice. Maya took a nap earlier in the day which was great because she then had plenty of steam.







I fell asleep with her around 10ish and missed the real party - the guys brought out the barbeque and some potatos for barbequed chips, yummmm.

But when Eli and Maya woke up at 6:30, I was glad I had had plenty of sleep. Knowing that everyone else had had a late night, I wanted to get Eli away as he tends to be loud in the morning. I put him on my back in the Ergo, and the three of us set off on a walk down the long gravel road. We were looking for wildlife but didn't spot much besides birds. There were a few big butterflies and a little mouse, and deafening cicadas in the background. Maya took her new mermaid, and we walked to where we could get to the river so "Shelly" (I think her name is currently "Pretty", but it was Shelly at the time) could spot some of her water friends. She didn't, but that was okay. We measured our walk later when I went into town with Michael (the internet cafe is still closed!! So we're still unable to sort out our wireless internet with 3!!) and had done 3 1/2 km. It's interesting how far kids will walk when it's for fun and not to reach a destination.

The sky cleared, the day was sunny, and in the afternoon we headed to the beach at Nambucca Heads. I am always surprised by just how much I love the ocean. I mean, I always know that I love going to the beach, but when I pull around that last bend and the ocean opens up wide in front of me, I always get an unexpected, exhilirated thrill. I had a hormonal headache all morning, so I was looking forward to submerging myself in the salt water. Of course, once we walked down onto the beach, the wind was blowing and the clouds had covered up the sun, but it's January so the ocean isn't freezing cold, and in we went. I had a lone dip before taking Eli with me, and then walked out deep with him until the waves were at our shoulders. I held him close in the water for a long time (until his shivers cued me to get him out) and we gently swayed with the waves. He was weightless and so easy to carry, and it was the longest milk-free cuddle we've had in a long time. I loved it.

Nate and Maya love the beach too. Maya isn't fussed about the water, but she'll play in the sand for hours. Growing up in Oregon, I know how it feels to just like to be near the ocean and not necessarily in it. Nate loves it all though, and spent some time swimming with Nick while I was back onshore with Eli.

It was sooo handy having the motorhome. The kids rinsed off in our own shower, dried off and got dressed inside, and we hadn't had to pack a bunch of stuff up to take with us in the car - it was already all there! I am so happy with the choice we made.

On the way back to the farm, Nate asked if we could leave tomorrow. I said we'd talk about it with Michael and Kathryn, who were sweetly not keen to have us leave. It's nice to feel wanted. Maya announced at dinner, out of the blue, "We're leaving tomorrow. Really we are." We talked to them though, and they are happy to stay one more day so that Nick has time to rearrange the motorhome a bit to make the beach stuff more accessible and put away the sleeping bags which we haven't needed yet (too warm, just sheets are fine). And so that Kathryn and I can go into Bellingen for a few hours which is just about 14 kilometres away.

Michael said to me, when I mentioned respecting the kids' wishes and leaving, with not a little sarcasm, "Gee, I wish I had a mum like you when I was a kid. My mum would just tell me to do what I was told." But shouldn't that be our goal as parents? To parent as we wish we had been, not just repeating the same patterns because that's what we know? To put a bit more thought into the thing? That's part of what this whole trip is about for me - for all of us to be equal partners in our lives. I don't want my kids growing up having been victims of a dictatorship. And that's my soapbox rant for the day.

Time is on our side

Thursday 31 December, 2009
Day4

I have hardly left the farm since we've been here. I did pop out this morning to meet my friend Marnie in town as she and the girls were passing through on their way back to Sydney. It was uncanny timing - she was 3 minutes from Urunga when we finally got in touch (hard with no mobile reception or internet), so she stopped at the tourist centre and Michael's cousin drove me in to meet her to pick up the mermaid she made for Maya - Nate had it commissioned for Christmas. Thanks Marnie!

When we got back to the farm, someone was going into Coffs Harbour and had waited in case I wanted to go with her, and the men were going fishing. I didn't feel like fussing with carseats, and really I found myself completely unanxious to go anywhere. I have no time constraints, no deadlines, nothing else I "should" be doing. I'm sitting on the veranda, watching the cows grazing near the pumpkin patch, while Eli snoozes in the motorhome and the kids play with their friends. If this "holiday" had a finish date, I know I'd be feeling a lot more anxious to DO MORE, SEE MORE, EXPERIENCE MORE. As it is, we have all the time in the world! I do hope to get down the road to Bellingen soon though. I hear the markets are great.

A few of us women went for a 3 km walk this morning which was really nice - fresh air, beautiful country views along the river. I hope to do a bit more of that.

At the farm

Wednesday 30 December, 2009
Day 3

We spoke to Michael as we were getting close to the farm and he told us that he was making curry for dinner. Nick and I were both looking forward to getting off of the road and relaxing with curries and beers, and hoping that the kids wouldn't be too high maintenance for any relaxation to actually happen.

We were pleasantly surprised to find that besides our friends and us, Michael's cousin's family is also staying here at the farm, and that family includes two kids - D is 5 and C just turned 8. The kids all hit it off right away.

It has been raining since we left Sydney, with only a few short breaks here and there. This is great news for the farms as the rain hasn't been too heavy to be absorbed by the land. There have been flood warnings, but no major floods. And the rain is still falling.

So what do you do at a farm in the rain? It's a fairly warm rain, so Michael's uncle Morris and one of the cousins set up a long sheet of plastic, the kids and dads soaped themselves up with dishwashing liquid, and down the water slide they went!

Wishing we had opted for the camera with a better zoom...



Later in the afternoon, a couple more cousins and their families came over for a barbeque, and by then the rain was really coming down. They had another go on the water slide. I'm not sure who had more fun, the kids or the men. I didn't go down although I was tossing up about it, but this morning everyone is covered with bruises and scratches, and I don't feel like I missed out.

We are underway!

Odometer reading: 203045
Monday 28 December, 2009
Day 1

After a stressful day yesterday of cleaning the house we have been staying at, doing lots of laundry, and packing everything up, we are now on the road.

Well okay, it wasn't that stressful. Not so stressful that we couldn't take a break to see Sherlock Holmes. I love me some Robert Downey Jr. But that last foray ended up being a bit less stress-relieving than we intended because of the thousands of people out doing their post Christmas bargain shopping. Parking was a nightmare, there were angry parents and crying children everywhere, and we ended up having to see a later show because the lines were so long And then Nick fell asleep during the movie. But I liked it, and I felt relaxed afterwards.

While we were at the movie, the kids had a few fun hours with their grandmother, auntie, uncle and niece. They played their cousin's new Wii and had a blast, and we had a lovely send-off with all of the family waving from the veranda while we drove the motorhome away for the last time. Eli was still waving and calling, "Byeeeee!" 10 minutes later.

This morning we finished everything up, carted all of the last things out to our "home on wheels" as the kids like to refer to it, and set off.

As I type, we are on Pennant Hills Rd heading towards the F3 which will take us north. We're skipping all of the sights between here and Urunga since we are heading straight to the farm. We intend to hit them up at the other end of our trip. We've never been to the Central Coast or spent any time just north of Sydney, so we're keen to do that as well. But today we're going straight to the farm.

Christmas

Here is a lovely Christmas wish from an online friend named Ariad:

This Christmas I wish for you that all the wrapping paper you receive is old newspaper or recycled kids art-works and that it ends up mulching your gardens.
I hope everyone appreciates the effort you've put into your hand-made gifts.
Hoping your children don't receive any presents made with poisonous plastics or lead paint.
May your in-laws NOT feed the kids too many artificial food additives.
I wish for you that you don't receive too much crap that you will have to keep because you'd feel too guilty to give it straight to good-will.
I hope that none of your friends or relatives argue or get too drunk and obnoxious.
I hope you get as much from giving as receiving.

BUT most of all have FUN and remember to LOVE
It's only one day after all. See you the other side of Christmas.

As for us, we have had a wonderful morning. Since we are soon departing with limited space, our families didn't want to buy us things we didn't need and instead gave us money for us to buy presents on their behalf. And we did! Woo hoo! Sleeping bags, new stainless steel water bottles, a few books and arty things, a few items of clothing, some edible things, etc. It was a lot of organisation, but definitely worth it since we'll have everything we need and nothing we don't want.

We're off to Nick's mum's house in a couple of hours for the Christmas feast and more presents.

We have been watching a few of the old Christmas classics like the 1969 Frosty the Snowman and the 1964 Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer. The latter is laughably sexist and has been fodder for conversation on how attitudes change over time. Seems like we're heading for equality. I hope so.