we went and we survived…… I am begining to wonder if it is possible for a member of my family to go camping without having to set the tent up to dry out the next day but it wasn’t too bad
the lovely saturday morning very quickly got very cold,at katoomba we got hit with icy stuf there is debat as to wether it was snow or hail possibly sleet, our first stop was at the top of mount victoria, for those who have never been mount vic was the boy’s fear with the sidecar, it is a very steep road snaking down the side of the mountain I can’t remember the exact directions but it is a little like, a sweeping left folowed by a sweeping right and a sweeping left which tightens to a tight right a few more tightish sweepers then one last one and before you know it you are back on straight road at a comfortable 80km/h most of the corners are 45km/h and all of the ones heading towards the mountain side have stopping ramps which imagine once got a lot of use… anyway the servo at the top which hasn’t been there any more than 8 years or was refurbished that long ago because I don’t remember seeing it before we had sausage rolls and coffee and got hit with more icy stuff (snow dosen’t bounce I’m sure) and rugged up more nd headed on our way
we went camping along the bridal trail which is a road from bathurst to sydney and trail is a very good description of it as this article describes a narrow ribbon of bitumen that later becomes dirt …. the flyer we were given about the sidecar rally (which was why we were camping) stated that the road from hillend is unsuitable for motorcycles ….. if the part of the trail that we went along is suitable for motorcycles I’d hate to see what a road that isn’t is like, this road had tyre ruts that I was certain I was going to get caught in then uphill corners coated in lose gravel, I though the boy must be having a great run on this road with an extra wheel to keep him upright garrunteed but he told me today he was freaking out just as much as I was and a few times found himself closer to the edge than he was comfortable with I found it much better on the way back but that could have been my imagination blowing things out just a little I am glad that we didn’t come across any traffic coming the other way that would have been scary there was no way I was turning around anywhere on that road
I have discovered the boy has no idea on what is helpful and I am doubting his camping abilities I let him pick the spot just cause I didn’t want him whinging about this that or the other and I was left to put the tent up and juggle the baby while he wandered off doing something else entirely….. I will admit this may have been caused by me yelling at him for his inability to put the peg in at an angle away from the tent and his insistance that we needed to hammer the pegs in with a rock because the ground was so hard (problem solved with pegs going at and angle) these are pretty skinny pegs designed for very lightweight camping any hammering of them bends them pretty quickly… hey its a $50 tent what do you expect….. anyway it eventually went up and he helped put the fly on just as the rain started which then stopped so we pumped up the air bed, I recently go an attachment for my bike which has a socket a bit smaller than the cigarette lighter ones in cars the attachment has the plug that fits the socket and the cigarette lighter socket on the other end we also got a hiflow air pump….. one word… magic….. once we got set up we had a great time wandering from fire to fire and bike to bike one couple had a bike sized camper trailer along with an almost car sized outfit complete with glove box and ipod jack very niyce,we bought two trangia one was a gift from the boy’s mum when he came to sydney (across the nullabor) many years ago, the other we bought a week ago because we decided two would be more usefull for cooking for 3 (beans in one sausages and eggs in the other that sort of thing) and didn’t fancy carrying gas cylinders on bikes metho dosen’t explode so much as catch fire
anyway we only got one out to reheat dinner (mmmm satay stirfry and hokien noodle) but should have had both on the go for a quicker dinner and more evenly heated one too because I had kept the shelf fresh noodles in their pack ratherthand throwing them in the container with the stirfry all lessons learnt
the raffle was on it was pretty good fun really, the type where there is a table full of stuff and when your ticket is called you go and choose something, we didn’t have any tickets but the boy donated some books and somebody picked a doll off the table and gave her to him for miss, who I was putting to bed because she was falling asleep in his arms she is our new “sidecar sally” who is only allowed in the side car when the roof is on, she is a little freaky her head is a different colour to her eyes and they are of the opening and closing kind, but miss really likes her and carrys her around making her jump and checking out her panties and naming the various parts of her body (who would have thought a child would get such entertainment from naming body parts)
the raffel was followed by much sitting around fires and general banter mostly about bikes and sidecars and where is good and what is good and how is good…. next time we will take marshmallows….. at around 10 30 the boy suggested we go to bed, I was keen to “party on” but we later discussed that at the time we left everyone (including us) was quite merry another half hr later and it may have been a different story with someone bringing out a bottle of something or other to share ….. as it was between us we went through a little over a bottle of scotch which did a very nice job of warming us but I really didn’t much like the idea of co-sleeping after drinking so much…. but then miss is old enough now that she kicks,grunts and shoves if either of us snuggle her too closely
I actually felt pretty good in the morning set our little kettle on to boil and found myself a spot at the nearest fire to thaw….. did I mention the boy picked us an aweful spot on a hill and we were constantly sliding towards the door and losing the blanket (which we must take more of in future) then camethe fun of packing up being a middle of nowhere camp ground there were no bins (just a composting toilet) so we had to find someplace for all of our rubbish the esky was a good spot, I think in future we will take a woolies insulated shopping bag instead because it is squishy and takes up less room by the time the tent was down the kettle had boiled and I made coffee and gave miss the rest of the milk (gotta love uht “poppas” of milk) we finnished packing said our farewells and headed off getting out of the campground was ….. interesting, the boy later told me he hit gravel and started sliding which was why he stopped at the top of the hill…. right in my way, I was planning a dirtbike style manouver… in otherwords shut off you mind gunn it and hope for the best bt that didn’t quite work out as planned because he stopped so I had to and I started sliding so had to re asses my plan with more of a feet down approach, it did all work out in the end
on the way back we stopped a raglan, just out of bathurst once famous for it steak sandwiches and big breakfast…. the good old fashioned truck stop…. it isnt anymore, the lovey darl waitress is gone and the chicky who servsyou for fuel cooks your breaky, I think they were busy cause everything was over done and the coffee was awefull, the boy reckons they used international roast or caterers blend for it still a big breakfast it was and with full bellies off we went
next stop lithgow, the boy only had riggers gloves on so his hands were almost frostbitten, we had maccafe coffee and asked a local where a shop was, it turned out a shopping center with coles and target open 7 days was just around the corner miss needed changing so I delt with that while the boy ducked in an bought us both scarves and himself some wooly gloves for under his riggers gloves, we decided to stop at echo point for more coffee perhaps because we had heard it was snowing a katoomba and didn’t want to ride on through, the scarf created bliss for me, we were able to travel a touch over the limit with out freezing too much and occasionally admire the view little heartly has an aweful lot of galleries, I kinda expect that in the mountains because it just has that arty crafty feel about it but this is just before the mountains after that is back up mount vic and through along the highway which is slowly being straightened there used to be many bridges over the train line that were right angled corners and are now gentle sweeps the most notable is a medlow bath near the hydro majestic, I haven’t noticedif the original bridge is still there but the new one has really changed the road all theway through the mountains you notice sections where the road once went left but now goes right or was once a little wiggly but is now dead straight it is all changing very quickly after years of nothing….. anyone in NSW wondering why your road isn’t being worked on needs to check out whats going on up there….. at echo point , one of the big tourist attractions, it was so windy we couldn’t let miss walk by herself because she kept getting blown over, we looked at the rocks
and stopped at a cafe where miss and I learnt a little about the explorers (I don’t think she really cared) and she was given a timtam by the cafe owner we has nuggets and chips between us … then we went for a bit more of a walk before heading on our way through the mountains some more all of the tourist drives, I’d really love to just go and do the tourist thing oneday its sad that we have so many great things at our door step but have never been to see them
once we got home I was so tired I was ready to sleep, I got off my bike, shut the front gate and lay down on the grass in the sunshine for quite a while before miss came and started climbing all over me I’m glad we went but I’m also glad I had today off next sidecar camping trip … november but the boy has also discovered NSW State Parks so it looks like some more just us camping is on the cards
now I’m off to bed its been a big couple of days
p.s Wordless weekenders, don’t worry I haven’t forgotten next week I’m in for sure
