Carnavon Gorge Holiday - Preparation

We borrowed a trailer from John and as with all borrowed trailers it had some issues with its lights.

Early in the week Chris and I attached a plug (7 pin round) and replaced one of the rear lights with a nice new LED assembly $20 from Super Cheap Auto.  A test drive to Paul's place on Thursday night to borrow and Esky and tent poles revealed that the other rear light showed a pitiful dull glow.

Friday 4-4-2014
Removing the cover explained the cause as the light was completely packed with mulch.  You know the chopped up compost that you put on your garden.  Half of this fell out when the cover was removed.  The other half was moist and jammed in.  Using a screwdriver to leaver some of it out revealed that the mechanism was very rusty.  I tried to remove the bulbs but one was jammed in.  I decided to replace the assembly.  A quick trip to Super Cheap.  They were out of the $20 lights so I had to settle for a $35 assembly.  The new light had a different mounting method and I had to drill a couple of new holes in the trailer.  The new light was attached using supplied self tapping screws.  One went in OK but the other did not and I wrecked the head.  Bunnings (Hardware) was now closed and I did not have a suitable spare so that job was put off till Saturday Morning.

Saturday 5-4-2014
The first day fit the theme of "a change is as good as a holiday" because although it was busy it was also a refreshing change.

The objective was to leave by 10 and drive to Roma.  I am a clock watcher by nature and so I mentally prepared myself for a late departure.  We eventually left at 1:30pm.

The drive to Roma was pretty calm and uneventful.  We had toyed with Dinner at Miles but blinked and missed it.

Afternoon tea was a stop at McDonalds Dalby.  I had my usual Latte with Chocolate Sprinkles and a hot apple pie and the the kids consumed ice creams of various types and chips.  It seem to recall that McDonalds chips have no sugar in them.  Gotta be good. :)

Ann Woodward Campbell had booked a number of the families into the caravan park at Roma.  Some of us had then upgraded those bookings to on site cabins.  We were in cabin #1.  Each cabin had a lean to carport and ours was long enough to back the trailer in as well as the Vito.  The cabin was clean and air conditioned and came with a TV.  Chris sat on the bed and I joined him and we watched something so memorable that I don't recall what it was.  



We un-hitched the trailer and chained it up.  Most of the families then drove in a convoy around Roma on a hunter gatherer expedition.  The White Bull was being renovated so we moved to other pastures.  Not sure where we ate but I had a very nice pork belly and was too full for dessert so skipped on that.


 We celebrated Felix's birthday



















Sunday 6-4-2014
The first religious observance of the day was church.  We arrived at where we thought the UC should be to find us across the road from the Anglicans. They have a big dark Gothic building with a bell tower. I hopped out of the car and went in.  The vibe inside felt good.  There were two video screens and a fair bit of chatter from kids.  The lady holding a baby at the back of the church explained that they were onto communion and that it would all be over in 10 minutes.  There were some in our car that would have figured that was a good thing.

None the less we drove further down the street and located the Uniting Church. It was much quieter and no video.  I was concerned.  The people were relaxed and friendly.  You know you are in the country when the children's story compares road kill to raising of Lazarus.

After church there was no traction to stay for morning tea.  Megan got chatting to someone so I opened the car to let it cool and so the kids could get in.  I wandered around and observed that morning tea included a very good looking chocolate cake.  Finally Megan completed her conversation and we all piled in.  I turned the key.... click click bzzz.

OK so we are staying for morning tea.  We had no jumper leads.  They normally live in the Vito but we had had battery issues with the Tiida a few weeks ago and they had moved to that vehicle and not come back.  I located the fellow with the two boys who had done the children's address on road kill.  He offered to go home and get some jumper leads.  He advised that Repco were open in the next street and Super Cheap were only a few streets away.  Eventually Megan called the RACQ.  The lady on the other end of the line said 3-4 hours but the locals suggested 5 minutes and the locals won out.  Chis missed out on a ride in the mans GTS Monaro which he had been admiring in the car park.

The RACQ fellow arrived and connected his jumper leads and we started the engine.  Along the way he attached a meter and pronounced that the battery needed replacing.  He did not have a suitable one on board and the closest he had was too small.  The battery has to be exactly the right length to be held in place securely.  As a reference I asked the price of his battery $255.

With the Vito running we drove off and looked at the worlds largest bottle tree.  As we took photos I mused that it does not take much to have more tourist attractions than Brisbane.  Keeping the engine running I then dropped Megan, Kate, Jemma and Dan at the Big Rig Tourist Info centre thingo.  This place has a slab hut and a rid on train.

Chris and I embarked on the second religious observance of the day - The quest for a new battery.  We went first to supercheap and easily located the battery at $275 and jumper leads were on offer in various price ranges.   Given the non insubstantial cost of the battery we went to Repco to compare prices.  That process is somewhat harder.  They did not have a book on display to browse through to find the battery and so into the clutches of the salesman we moved.  He looked in his computer and found the same number as we had located at Supercheap but alas he did not have one.  I asked how much it would have been and it came in at $305.  So I was kind of glad he did not have one as it made it easy to go back to supercheap.  Along the way we also observed that jumper leads seemed to be a bit more expensive for essentially the same the same thing.

We parked on the road outside SuperCheap.  The old battery was removed and I met Chris at the counter and paid for the battery and a new set of jumperleads.

Sean and family arrived to collect more stuff.

Then we all drove back to the tourist info park.  The little train had gone to sleep for the day so we looked at the slab hut and had a very nice lunch of hot chook & salad (provided by Sean) and sandwiches with various spreads.

We then parted company with the Mawhinney's taking Dan in exchange for Callan.  The logic being that a grumpy Dan would behave better in a new environment and a grumpy Chris would behave better in the presence of a friend.