So, on the morning of the 24^th, we took off not quite as early as we’d hoped and arrived 10 hours later. We were too tired to examine the beach after setting up our tent, but we made that our first priority (after coffee and a visit from Santa) on Christmas morning. It was definitely worth the drive! Barlings is a long calm beach with more beaches either side of it and mountains in the background. Can’t complain.

Employing the “when in Rome” approach, we celebrated Christmas Ozzie style and threw some sausages on the communal barbie for Christmas dinner. It was a bit less crowded than we’d expected and everyone seemed to have brought their own equipment, so again we lucked out with access to the BBQ.

By New Year’s Eve we were feeling pretty relaxed and getting the hang of slathering up in sunscreen and spending the day on the beach. We were so relaxed that we may have been in bed by 9:30pm on NYE. We didn’t completely neglect our celebratory duties though. NYE was spent on the beach (where else?) with a bottle of bubbly, some cheese, and some grapes taking in the sunset and saying goodbye to 2011.

The rest of the holiday comprised of sitting on the beach, swimming at the beach, walking along the beach, and visiting other beaches. The exception was a day out to a little former gold mining village to check out the wares and legendary fudge.

Probably the most excitement came from our few encounters with the wildlife. Steve evicted a huge spider from the car one night and a Goanna (a very big lizard – 2 meters) visited the campsite another day. We watched a commotion heading our way across the campsite as the big guy did his rounds. We found out he is a local, and is called Stumpy after losing his tail to a car, poor thing.

Meg also found excitement in watching the neighboring campers set up all their crazy gear, but that’s another post coming soon.

All in all, it was a great holiday and we came back feeling much more relaxed and refreshed.

Poor Meg was the only one in our group (possibly all of OZ) who had never seen Neighbours and was bemused by the whole thing. At the end of the night Dr. Karl dedicated a song to “the only person he had ever met not to have seen the show” (who could that be?). All in all it was cringe worthy, but good fun all the same.

We ended up stopping halfway between Lorne and Apollo Bay at the Kennett River Holiday Park, where the koalas are – not a bad place to spend a couple of days. Our little tent proved to be an excellent purchase and I think it will see many more adventures.

While there, we took a walk up a river and I got the opportunity to discover the joy of leeches… Let’s just say they freaked me out enough to drop my pants while standing on a boulder in the middle of the river to be sure I’d gotten them all off. Seriously, yuck. At least I got a nice picture of Steve sitting on the boulder while they were stealthily crawling up my pants. (The boulder was thankfully leech free. – Steve)

There’s a video of the storm on YouTube here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjiW0ZTPvCg&feature=related

The return leg of our journey took us through the Great Dividing Range of NSW and into a national park where we stopped for the night in Thredbo, a ski resort on the highest mountain in OZ. As it was out of season, the place was deserted, but we managed to find the one bar that was open and had a beer whilst taking it all in. It was cold up there and there was still snow on the peaks – not something I’d ever associated with Australia. The last day was a long, hot drive through the winding mountain roads and down into alpine farming country before hitting the highway for a straight shot home. We got some funny looks from the 4×4 drivers as we traversed the mountains in our little city car!!

Conveniently, she was headed for Government House, which is in our classy neighborhood and has been inspected carefully by our very own conservation star (bet you didn’t know you were participating in important preparations for The Queen, Steve!), so I took a little walk over to join the crowds in the sunshine. The following is a selection of terrible phone pictures to illustrate my experience.

One of the first things I noticed as we all waited patiently was this guy:

Now, if he hadn’t turned away as I discreetly took his picture, you would see that he was carrying a large camera and had a clear wire earpiece. He was mostly scanning the crowd and occasionally using his zoom lens to “take a picture” of Queen fanatics.

When she finally did arrive by royal tram, it was in fact behind schedule. We all know that The Queen is never late, but it seems that not even Her Royal Highness can make the trams run on time.

After a dignified dismount came the moment we were all waiting for: The Queen’s quick trip up to Government House in a royal SUV past her admiring public.

She was only meters away and waved her little gloved hand kindly at me. If you look closely, you can just make out her “shocking pink” (that’s the official description) hat in the back of the car.

Of course, she was followed by about twenty cars full of flowers, attendants, police, secret security muscle men, etc. and then twenty motorcycle police.

Then, after about thirty seconds of excitement following the hours of anticipation, The Queen was gone and the crowd dispersed.

On my way home, I noticed that the flag at Government House had been changed from the usual yellow to a blue flag, thus answering a question that has plagued me for some time now.

That’s a tiny blue flag up there in the distance, in case  you are having trouble making it out.

And thus concludes my afternoon with The Queen. I hope she’s enjoying a nice cup of tea before she has to head to Perth.

This weekend the Gran Barina took us up to Warburton in the lush green mountains. We had a look around the little town, which is full of yummy looking cafes, and then took a walk up the hill and through tropical greenery and spring flowers.

I really enjoyed the walk and am thinking it would be nice to return when we can do a long walk. Although, after being startled by tiny leeches dropping out of the trees and attacking his hand, Steve might need a bit of convincing. How come nobody tells you about these things beforehand…?

When we got to the parking lot, there was a paraglider flying around just above our heads. We watched him for a bit and then attempted to follow a trail that led us down along the beach and disappeared until we tried again going the other direction along the cliff tops.

It was bright and beautiful out, but it was mighty breezy up there!