Happy_hallidays

Happy Hallidays!!

Wooohoo! two weeks off from classes for "midsemester" break...though anyone who can count would know that 10 weeks out of 14 is not, i repeat NOT, in the middle. Ah well, it couldn't have come soon enough for me and my flatmate Dave and his girlfriend Tania. We trekked our way 2 hours up the coast to Hallidays point to camp out for 2 nights at the one and only Happy Hallidays Caravan Park. mmmhm, that's right...here's our story

If you just shift those eyes of yours up a smidge you'll see our campsite - completely surrounded by families with small children. We all got along smashingly though, even if i did look enviously at their huge, multi-room tents. Our site was by far the best, though, so I'll give you a quick tour. The tent in front is the same as the one to your left, which housed Dave and Tania quite well i believe...once we figured out where all the pieces went and even after i tripped over that right rope protruding rudely into my walking space. The far tent is my own little house, shown on the right. Very nice, and very waterproof, and it only cost me $30. what a deal!

To say we ran into a bit of rain would be quite a big understatement - So let's just put it in real terms. After a lovely evening around our table we went to bed and woke up to clouds upon clouds full of rain that started before breakfast and ended well after the sun went down. As a result, our second day consisted of a bit of a road trip to Forster and then a loooooong afternoon nap followed by dinner at the local pub. When we returned, FINALLY, the rain had stopped and the stars were shining brightly all over the sky. It felt promising!! So we went to bed with high hopes and got up, went for a nice swim, and had breakfast with Dave eating straight off the bird, and Tania poaching us all some eggs ---------------->

With the sun finally came out on Thursday (mind you it didn't last for very long), we had a quick swim, packed up our tents and headed out for a drive to see the sites...On your left is the beach at Hallidays Point, and on your right are the ocean baths. Not too shabby of a view for a morning dip - quite stunning I might say. Both of these were taken from the "lookout" at the top of a ver ver steep hill. There was a sign promising more lookouts and a rainforest walk to boot - would these adventurers turn that down? I THINK NOT!!

As far as the weather went, though, let's all just take a minute to compare the 2 days:

Wednesday

Thursday!!

Ahhhh, now isn't that better?

...uhm, yes would be that answer.

...aaaaand the next lookout was quite nice in its own right.

Ahem, the walk started out a bit messy, but there WAS a cleared path to walk on...though i think we all agreed that the Landcare Group was going about things in an odd way.

We battled a bushturkey and silently stalked a goanna, but neither of them stuck around for pictures. This was the next lookout we came to - say it with me now...*sigh*

With our time we drove to Forster for better beaching, which required us to drive over that bridge over there ------------------------------>
again, a lovely bridge connecting Tuncurry to Forster. We had a nice spin around the town, getting out to mingle with the locals (see below) and then, of course, heading to the ocean!

When we pulled into the beach at Forster the weather looked divine. In fact, it looked exactly like that photo just there. See, that one right there...NO! THERE! THE ONE ON YOUR RIGHT! yeah. see, doesn't that look pretty good? would you want to kick off your shoes and run down to the sand, hop into that warm inviting water and spend the day soaking up powerful sunrays? Well, we sure did. But by the time we got our swimmers on and something to drink the rain had come back. Geez the weather moves fast these days. So, we had a quick trip down to the sand, and hoped it would go away...

it didn't. At that point we decided perhaps that should be the end of our happy hallidays and we should spend our second rainy day making our way back down to Cameron Street in good old Hamilton. So, we got in the car and took the scenic route home...

I would like to assure the folks at home that NO, this is not nemo...but we found this little guy anyway and borrowed a small child's spade to safely place him back in the ocean (safely for us, because these things are poisonous). I am sad to say that he came back to the shore and laid much in the same way as he is posed in this picture.

Now, i've driven/ridden in some bad weather in my days. While this is NOT the worst i've driven it, it was quite a shocking ride home. The rain poured down and all of a sudden i looked out the window to see this crazy scene. I'm no expert, but i have seen a funnel cloud before, and no matter what anyone says THIS is the makings for a tornado. To back up my little hypothesis just after we passed this site the winds picked up and branches started flying off of trees and into our little car and the rain came down in sheets so thick it was quite hard to see out of the car window.

"My my", we thought, "this is quite bad weather"...

Happy Hallidays indeed.

Despite it all, though, we had an excellent time in spite of the weather. The lesson to learn here is that it's not WHAT you do as much as it is WHO you are with while you do it. It was quite nice to get out of Newcastle for a few days and just relax!! yay! Thanks SO much Dave and Tania!!