Monday, 10 June 2013                                                                                              363.1kms

We woke up to find it raining on and off this morning. We decided we weren’t in a hurry so we would see if it would pass as we didn’t want to pack up in the rain, or have a wet pack up. We headed over to the camp kitchen as the kids needed space to move without getting wet. We had a great morning chatting away sitting in front of the ‘pig’ – which is a large gas bottle on its side on legs with a chimney on top that has a fire inside it. Lovely and warm.

When 11:30 rolled around and the rain had not eased, it had in fact got heavier, we decided it was the wrong choice to wait and now had to do it in the rain. When we got back to camp under the awning was flooded and everything that has to go back in the van was soaking wet! The kids stayed in the camp kitchen with a lovely couple from Brisbane that were there for the day fossicking.

It took us 2 ½ hours to be completely packed up and again be standing by the fire – to dry out. I attempted to get a photo of just how wet the camp was but as soon as I took the camera from the bag and the lens cap off, the lens fogged up and I had nothing to clean it off with.

We thawed out, dried and departed camp at 2:30pm. We stopped by the house to say goodbye and headed back out to the road. As we were pulling out of their driveway 4 messages and missed calls came flooding in from earlier in the day – as we had very limited and somewhat sketchy service at the camp. We were informed that Nathan’s Granddad had suffered a massive stroke earlier in the morning and was in hospital. By the time we had received this; Nathan’s mum had already landed at Coolangatta airport. So now we just had to wait for the latest news on his condition. We headed towards Glen Innes and then Tenterfield before we would work out whether to head to Burleigh Heads or Lennox Head.

It rained for our entire trip to Lennox Heads and finally stopped as we climbed the final hill towards Trish and Al’s house. We hadn’t heard any news on the way and decided the best way north would be the Pacific Hwy anyway. We arrived to a very warm and delicious chicken and vege soup that we ate in front of the fire. I found myself stripping off the layers rather quickly. It was so nice to finally have my feet out of socks!

We sat around catching up until almost midnight before calling it and heading to bed.

Until next time…. Happy and Safe Travels.