Wonderful Winton

 
 
 

Melanie Hall is a poet who tours around Australia – she is wonderful! For the two nights that we were at Winton, we went and watched Melanie perform. I was in two plays – the first night I was dressed up as the boy from the Bush Christening and got wet by her drink bottle as she ‘Christened’ me.

On the second night I was a red back spider and bit Dad (who was a sheila) on the bottom !!!

Banjo Patterson wrote “Waltzing Matilda” in the Winton area and there is a statue of him in the main street as well as monuments about the actual song.

The musical fence was interesting as you could grab a stick, a hose or a piece of pipe to bang on the fence wire. The sound boxes above the fence made the sound louder.

Dad found a green tree frog in the power connection box and he was cute. Dad wanted to name him Fredrick or Fredo, but I chose Fred. I wanted to bring him home as a pet, but Mum and Dad didn’t think this was a good idea, so he stayed in Winton. On the day we packed up, he was no longer in the power connection box. James and I looked everywhere for him, but we couldn’t find him anywhere.

There was a crazy man named Arno who had made a crazy wall out of junk !!! We had quick look at it, but couldn’t quite work out why it was on the “must see” list of things to do in Winton.

We had a great time in Winton and have just arrived in Mount Isa for a bit of a rest before we travel to the Northern Territory (Tennant Creek).

The Stockman's Hall of Fame

 
 

So far we have been looking at everything BIG but today we have been looking at things that are so OLD! First, we saw a cart that sold things to people living in the outback. Outback people had animals such as cows, horses, sheep, camels and much, much more.

They lived in house made of wood (not quite like the three little pigs) which had hard chairs, an open fire place for cooking their food, hard wooden beds which had no mattress, some glass bottles and it was very dirty and dusty. I don’t think I would like to live in it at all. It makes me thank God for all that I have.

I saw lots of maps – my favourite was one where you could push a button and it would light up where the explorer went throughout Australia. It was COOL!

Life was hard because they had to work on the land from when the sun came up, until the sun went down. They had problems with mice, locusts, drought, floods and rabbits.

I liked this place a lot.

LONGREACH

 
 

On Thursday, we drove to Longreach. It only took 2 hours. When we got there we unpacked – my job is to put the stabilisers down and up each time we move and to turn on the tap to make sure it is coming through the pipes.

Then we went to the QANTAS Museum to see some planes – it was cool. After that my family and I went to the shops but it wasn’t as fun as the planes! We bought lettuce, tomatoes, apples, mandarins and much, much more.

After that we had a shower (I haven’t had one in three days, so now Mum thinks I smell fantastic!) and got ready for dinner. We went to a place called ‘The Woolshed’. I thought it would have heaps of sheep wool in it! Instead we had our dinner. I had lasagne, salad and chips.

Blackall

 
 

On Wednesday, I went to Tambo teddies. I bought a mouse called ‘Mousey’. There wasn’t really anything else in Tambo – a few shop and some play equipment. After that we went to Blackall.

Firstly, we went to the Wool Scour where they use to shear sheep, take their wool and wash it and put it into bags ready to sell to other countries.

Then we went to the Black Stump – although it looks brown to me!  

We finished the afternoon with a spa and a swim in the 50 m pool where some local kids were training and grey nomads were soaking. The water temperature in the spa was 36 degrees and the pool was 32. This was the cool temperature as it comes up from the Artesian basin at 58 degrees!

On the road again !!!!

We have driven off to Mitchell and are on to Blackall tomorrow. Sorry we haven't blogged for a while (too tired and no internet here).

This is where we are travelling


View Larger Map

Australia Zoo Fun

Yesterday we went to Australia Zoo and saw a komodo dragon, turtles, crocodiles, tigers and elephants (plus much more). At the end of the trip, we went to a gift shop and bought a tiger toy in a little bag – I named him stripes (he is so cute !!!).

During the day it rained a bit, but we wore our raincoats and it didn’t stop us at all. One of the coolest things we did was hand feed the elephants. The one I fed was named Bimbo. He ate sweet potato off my hand and he was the smallest of the three – only young at 50 years old.

Moved to Dicky Beach

Today we moved up the coast to Dicky Beach. Do you want to know why it is called Dicky Beach? Here's the answer: because the ship S.S. Dicky ran aground on this beach. The picture of the shipwreck is behind where James, Dad and I were building a bird bath.

We spent the afternoon playing on the beach: playing in the sand, walking on the rock pools and rolling down the sand hills.

After we came back and had a shower, we went for a 4 km walk along the winding path up the coast. It was really cool. They have beaches especially for dogs to play on. I called it 'Dog Heaven'.

Our caravan site is right next to the entrance of the beach which is great.

Quiet Day

Today we had a fun morning playing in the park opposite Australia Fair. It was a fantastic park which had swings, slides, a flying fox, a pedal monorail and lots of equipment that we have never seen in Sydney. It is right next to the beach, so after we had finished in the playground, we ran down to the beach and drew pictures and wrote words in the sand.

Sea World

We had a great day at Sea World today! We saw lots of different animals which included: Dolphins, Polar Bears (who were playing the water and hugging each other), Penguins, Seals, Sharks, Sting Rays, Sea stars, Pelicans and Sea Cucumbers. We saw a water ski show, but the best show was the Dolphin show, closely followed the Elmo Show. I’ve decided that when I grow up I want to be a Dolphin trainer so that I can swim with the Dolphins.

The weather was fab – very sunny and no wind. We are enjoying being back in shorts and t-shirts again.

I also bought a large container of fairy floss which I think will last me a few days! The fairy floss was blue and pink – it gave me lots of energy for the day! Also I got a picture taken with Elmo and Cookie Monster – wow, what a fun day I had!

My new home

Today I left Nambucca and went to Queensland. On the way we passed the Big Banana, the Big Knight and the Big Prawn. For lunch we stopped at a park in Ballina and also played Vortex. I took my pink teddy with me for our picnic. After the picnic, we hopped in the car and drove to the caravan park in Southport Queensland (on the Gold Coast). We parked at our spot in the caravan park and went to the toilets to make sure our security password worked - it did !!! Then it was on to the jumping pillows - it was so fun :-)

Hope you are all having fun at home. I miss you lots :-( Love Lauren.

The Day at Nambucca

 
 
 
We got up quite early, which was really no trouble for me - but it is was still very dark and freezing when we got in the car. We couldn't do many activities because we couldn't see. On the way we stopped at a park at Bulahdelah and played on the equipment. Then we hopped into the car and drove a few more hours to Nambucca. When we arrived, we quickly got ourselves ready to go fishing. During our fishing, we had a sun shower and God sent an insipring rainbow. I am tired and ready for bed now, so until next time I hope all of 1R have a great excursion to the Aquarium.

My first Post

Hi everyone - this is my BLOG !!! As we travel, I will use this blog to write about all the fun things we have been doing. Please look back here and I will post up some photos and we can keep in touch. Please leave comments (click on "comment" under each post) and we can keep up to date with what we are all doing.

Hope to hear from you soon :-)

Lauren