GREGORY RIVER
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THANK YOU FOR BEING PATIENT WHILE THE PICTURES LOAD |
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Day 15
Wednesday 24th August 2005 Click on the pictures for larger versions
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| This day was a "rest day". Mum did some washing while we looked after little jobs that needed doing. | ||
| A Kiwi neighbour above
our spot pointed out a
wire under our caravan. It was part of the electric brake wiring.
Whoever wired it, supported it with just one cable tie, which had
snapped open and allowed the cable to hang low to the road. I
refitted the cable with a lot more ties. I thanked him very much for
telling me as it could have caused a lot of problems, left hanging. Judy got along well with Kiwis but the wife was not impressed with me. I gathered she took a dislike to me because I parked the van close to the river and also swam in the river. She was very arrogant and if she could have, she would have banned me from swimming in the river. She would have been pissed off to find campers from upstream swimming downstream and exiting right there in front of her! While I was fixing the wiring, Judy got chatting to her. She was making scones in the Camp Oven. She showed Judy how to make them without burning them, by using a thing I had never heard of, called a "trivet". Judy thought it was a great idea, so we bought one just recently. I'm really looking forward to our next trip to sample some of Judy's scones, cooked how she was shown. :) |
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| Our closest neighbours were
very friendly ( to me as well ) and invited us over for a cuppa. They told us they had
been camping there for over 8 weeks. They showed us their electrical setup.
Electrical power is always a problem when camping for long periods of time. They
had enough energy stored in batteries charged from solar cells to supply
most of their needs, including a microwave. While we were there chatting, a Honda generator was purring very quietly in the background beside a tree. It was supplying the power that the batteries couldn't handle - for a Bread Maker. ( I had always wanted one of those generators. They are so quiet and from what I've read and heard from users, very reliable. So, since about May 2006, I am now the proud owner of one, the Honda EU20i. Very nice! ) They were a very interesting couple from Western Australia who had been bankrupted by a business partner. Instead of going into business again, the money they managed to earn trying to restart their business was diverted into their needs to allow them to live on the road and see Australia. And it showed. They had all the necessities without having gadgets for gadgets sake. Talking to them took up a fair chunk of the day. |
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| After visiting the pub to fuel up I found a good reason not to swim in the river but not a very logical one. While there I was told that the water used for drinking at the pub was drawn directly from the river. To me that was a pretty dicey idea. Even if you could prevent campers from staying there every day - campers came and went each day we were there - something or someone would swim, pee, shit or whatever upstream at some stage. I would have thought some sort of filtering and bug removal system would be sensible but apparently that's how it works and nobody has suffered and problems. Probably because the volume that flows past every minute is very high and therefore would be "new" water very quickly. | ||
| During the afternoon Muffy,
one of the Corgis, saw a Wallaby on the other side of the river and went
silly and swam across to chase it. Some chance! Just the same he created
havoc as he ran barking through the undergrowth. Judy and I had to go
fetch him as the silly bugger got lost. While we were across the other
side rounding him up, Chips, the other Corgi heard the ruckus and ran
upstream on the caravan side to where he heard Muffy barking. He then
attempted to swim across. He has a very heavy coat and of course it
absorbed water and he started to sink. The first we knew of all of this
was when the male Kiwi camper from above us, walked up to us with a nearly drowned, miserable
Chips. He had noticed what he thought was debris rolling down the river.
It turned out to be Chips rolling over and over and over as the current
forced him downstream. Chips was very lucky that he jumped in and
saved him or he could have drowned and been long gone downstream before
we even knew he was missing. Judy thanked him profusely for his
good work of course. After that Chips wasn't interested at all in going near the water! |
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So, for a "rest day" it turned out to be a bit unrestful at times.
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