Entry 3 - Narooma NSW - Travelling south down the coastal regions

3 - Narooma NSW - travelling south March 2018

We spent 6 nights at the beautiful location of Lake Brou campground and needed to move on, looking for open skies to access solar power to boost our dwindling batteries power. About 35 kilometres along the road we propped at the township of Bermagui a vibrant fishing community, camping the night at a private property about 5 kilometres from town in a bush setting. Bermagui information centre was a hub of information for local and nearby locations, one of the better information centres we had experienced. This was another beautiful viewing region with a mixture of sandy beaches, rugged rocky coastline, a busy recreational fishing port with a constant stream of boats at the boat ramp. Our visit coincided with an outdoor sculpture exhibition.

Bermagui was another location one could consider as a retirement spot which was not on our agenda at that point in time, our preference to continue traveling in our caravan, seeking out Australian natural scenery and for this trip to experience Australia’s Coastal Wilderness along the lower N.S.W. coastal region. Our next stop was at Gillard’s Campground in the Mimosa Rocks National Park about 30 kilometres down the road.

The final 10 kilometres of road to Gillard’s Campground was along a dirt road winding through beautiful thick woodlands. We selected a spot, setting camp and found the need to speak quite loud with one another due to the loud background noise of crashing surf.

Gillard’s Campground was another beautiful special location. During our first night Mary was woken by some noise outside. She opened the caravan door to see some kangaroos munching on the grass under our awning with their heads under the table and chairs. We woke in the morning to discover it had been raining overnight which would normally sound quite loud on the caravan roof but at this location wasn’t heard due to the constant loud noise generated by the crashing ocean waves. We walked along a wooded track we located at the northern end of the campground and came across an inland lake with plenty of swans and pelicans. Of interest a conversation with the people camped next to us revealed one of them was an artist and had a couple of sculptures on display at the Bermagui sculpture display and was slowing making their way to Bermagui to retrieve their sculptures at the end of the show. Another different interesting conversation.

Gillard’s campground was another one of those locations you could keep on staying at, but we had a time frame to work to, which also required due consideration for the approaching Easter holiday period, a most busy time with crowded locations and a need to find a location to stay during this time line.

We continued south stopping to view some locations, missing so many other available spots. This was certainly a beautiful seaside strip of country. Tathra a typical location with below picture taken at Tathra showing a vibrant community.

(Five days after we were at Tathra the township was devastated by an out of control bush fire destroying 69 homes and leaving another 39 homes damaged. In addition to other structures damaged or destroyed were the loss of 30 caravans and cabins. How quickly can a beautiful setting change?)

The coastal regions along this spot of Australia are mostly controlled by commercial operations consisting of a mixture of luxury accommodation types and plenty of caravan parks with very limited freedom camping locations. Our preference to be amongst the true Australian bush with the best available locations in National Parks, unfortunately we skipped past many beautiful locations due to controls imposed by commercialised enterprises.

We spent two days driving to our next location about 120 kilometres down the road at Mallacoota in Victoria. The only camping area available was at one of the local caravan parks where we booked into the Foreshore Caravan Park. It was one big caravan park with 710 sites. We thought we had arrived during the non-peak season but found ourselves having a choice of only 4 available powered sites. It was crowded.

We were about 3/4 the way down the campground and as you can see there was a long way still to go till the end

We were very happy with our time at Mallacoota, in another magnificent setting, surrounded by the Croajingolong National Park. The township faces onto two large lakes which form the estuary of the Wallagaraugh and Genoa rivers with about 320 kilometres of shore line. There were many walking tracks and short drives available.

Hooded Plover with two young ones

Wombat Poo

On the drive out from Mallacoota we stopped for another walk amongst the bush at the Double Creek Nature Walk. The background chorus provided by the bell and whip birds were quite loud, tantalising our ears, the flora and fauna had our eyes dancing all over the place with the sweet smells of the bush like perfume for our noses. First, we spotted a Koala high up in the trees, then a first for us, a pair of Lyre Birds and one of the biggest Red Bellied Snakes we have ever seen at about 2 metres. We certainly departed Mallacoota in high spirits.

Our next planned destination was to stay on the banks of the Snowy River near where it enters the ocean. We were disappointed with the camp locations situated only a few metres from the edge of the main road and decided to continue to our next planned destination of Lakes Entrance, travelling a bit over 100 kilometres for the day. We set camp near the rear of the Water Wheel Tavern at Lake Tyer about 10 kilometres from Lakes Entrance, (no charge for the first night and $15 each other night). Another interesting location with time to see how this type of location affects us.

Entry 2 - Canberra & Onwards

Entry 2 - March 2018

As always it was good catching up with Canberra based son Tim and his wife Penny. There was the constant chatter, sharing one another’s news, thoughts and plans. Tim showed his appreciation for his dad’s presence with a wish list of things to do around the house. Tim and Steve spent time at the shops purchasing an internal ceiling fan, an external roof mounted solar powered air vent, some new sink taps, locks for the house windows, a new stove range hood along with various tools and materials to assist with fitment.

Penny and Mary enjoyed time together cooking up some feasts for their hard-working men.

Our tow tugs recent fitment of a bull bar and suspension upgrade was booked in for the required 1000-kilometre inspection and tightening at the Canberra based TJM shop. Naturally this required us to arrive across Canberra at 8.30am with peak hour traffic. A nearby café provided us with a delicious bacon & egg roll with a pot of tea for breakfast while we waited for the job to be completed.

We spent 7 nights at Tim’s home, occupied most days attending to Tim’s wish list and enjoying their company.

Leaving Canberra, we travelled nearly 100 kilometres before calling stumps for the day camping overnight on the bitumen carpark of the Servicemen’s Club at Braidwood. We enjoyed walking around the town viewing many different 18^th & early 19^th century building architecture. The National Trust had classified the whole town as an urban conservation area.

About another 60 kilometres down the road we stopped at the visitor’s information centre at the coastal town of Batemans Bay obtaining some local information for our interests. We topped up the pantry and travelled about 10 kilometres north to the North Head campground in the Murramarang National Park. It was in a magnificent bush setting with the constant soothing background sound of crashing waves, with a lovely beach located about 150 metres away and it was a no cost camp ground. In the morning we woke to the sound of the surf, the singing of lyre birds, kookaburra’s and magpies. Monitor lizards wandered about the campground with kangaroos present evening and morning. We walked along the beach and along the walking trails. Unfortunately, the sky was blocked by a beautiful tree canopy which impacted our need for solar power and we had to move on after 3 days to find open skies due to low battery power. It had rained during the night and we appreciated our tow tugs 4wd capabilities for the 10 kilometres of driving on hilly wet tracks back to the bitumen road. On a down side our tow tug and caravan lost their shine, covered by a coating of dirt.

Route to campground

About 40 kilometres down the road was our next destination, Congo camp ground in Eurobodalla National Park. On one side we had a lovely bush setting with the other side having beach and ocean views. It was a superb setting and would have held us captive for many days if it hadn’t been for the grey skies and several showers of rain over the day. We still managed to squeeze in a couple of lovely beach rambles. However, with a dull weather forecast for the next few days we decided to seek out a caravan park to obtain access to electricity and fully recharge our caravan batteries.

Congo campground

We stayed a night at Tuross Beach caravan park about 22 kilometres down the road where our batteries obtained a good charging. This is a lovely secluded little township, we walked to the boatshed to have fish and chips overlooking the water. Unfortunately, this establishment was not open, so on we went to the town centre. We had a very pleasant shared Asian meal instead. We were travelling in the most populated state of Australia and with a long holiday weekend approaching we needed to find a location to set camp before being inundated with people crowding the coastal regions of our present location for a getaway. About 20 kilometres down the road was Lake Brou a free campground still in Eurobodalla National Park. We were lucky to obtain a spot with a small hole in the overhead tree canopy where we were exposed to full sun for about 1 ½ hours in the day providing our batteries with the required daily dose of solar power charge. This was another beautiful location with the lake located about 200 metres away on one side and a lovely sandy beach on the ocean about 200 metres on the other side.

Jelly fish in lake

We enjoyed walking along the beach, swimming in the ocean, walking along bush tracks and chatting with other happy campers.

Steve attempting to bogy board on the waves

An outing for the day involved a small drive to the small township of Dalmeny, about 5 kilometres down the road, where we followed the coastline. Stopping and viewing many beautiful bays with surfers riding the rolling waves. We continued to the township of Narooma another interesting location. On the northern side of Wagonga Inlet bridge we stopped to view the constant stream of returning fishing boats at the boat ramp and were mesmerised by three playful seals floating in the water next to the boat ramp. With the arrival of each new boat a large stingray would swim up for a look, then disappear back into the waters depths.

We obtained some provisions in town, continued through town to the breakwater for boats entering from the ocean into the inlet. At this location was a rock with a hole resembling the shape of the Australian coast line. We walked out to the end of the breakwater and were entertained by another seven seals. Continuing along the coast we travelled past a magnificent looking golf course with uninterrupted views of the ocean. This area of coastline provided brilliant viewing with wonderful scenery which also came with plenty of people about, either living there or visiting.

For us Lake Brou was one of those special locations in a great setting providing positive thoughts, for good well-being. Every night we participated in happy hour with other campers and the below photo shows the effect of Lake Brou on sun set with happy hour still going strong 3 ½ hours on.