Ballina to the Gold Coast

I'm getting a bit behind, so less talk and more photos.

The site at Ballina was 5 mins from the beach. Here it is with the boys mucking about on a bench.

We spent a wonderful day with friends at the nearby and very popular Byron Bay.

Whilst the children were having a butty, I made a sandcastle.

Okay, you guessed it. It wasn't my masterpiece, but it was impressive. It took the builder 5 hours to make.

Later in the day, we went up to the Byron Bay lighthouse. The children ran on ahead and are silhouetted on the photo waving.

and there was a lovely sunset.

The following day, we travelled from the Sugar Cane area of Northern NSW

further up the coast and into Queensland. Yippeeee !!

We stayed at a site in the hills which was the recreation ground of the local village, called Canungra.

Canungra is an olde logging village and the tunnel below was made to transport logs from it.

Later in the afternoon we went up to Tamborine Mountain which has some great views

and it's popular with hang gliders.

Then continuing our tour past "Witchs Fall Cottage"

("what's for tea mum?")

to O'Reilly's lookout.

On the treetop walk

there were twisted trees

and a viewpoint only reachable by a vertical climb by ladder. Most people skipped this, but by the time we arrived, the boys were up there and Rosie was already on her way up!

There she goes. Can you see the boys leaning over the edge?

Rock wallabies are creatures that we'd never seen before, but there were several up on this hill...

Then it was back to the village to pick up some food before the shops shut at 7pm. Another busy and fun day.

The following day, we were heading over to a site on the Gold Coast - only

These tree roots are massive - just look at the size of Kaya (with the 2 scary glowing eyes to the right of the photo).

View of the river

Cars, trailers, horses were arriving 10 to the down at the camp site early on the Saturday. After talking to various people, it turned out they had a horse racing competition every other Saturday.

A wee lassie there spectating was holding a joey. It's mum had been killed in a car accident, they'd seen the dead roo by the side of the road and checked it's pouch and found the joey. So they took it home and had been hand rearing it ever since,

Then we travelled to a different site, nearer to the coast, but still on the Gold Coast for three nights before heading North to the Sunshine Coast.

We now have a bit of a routine when we are leaving a site. The girls are inside the caravan, tidying, locking cupboards and making everything secure. Us boys are outside, taking down the awning, annex, I leave the boys to hitch up whilst I do car stuff.

Then we head off.

We arrived at the next site at Helensvale, on the Gold Coast to find the site choc-a-block with buses and a whole range of transport.

We got the caravan sorted and then went out for the afty. The girls to the shops and we got thrown about in the sea at Surfers Paradise.

The lads lasted in the sea an hour and a half longer than Kaya and I! Brrrrrr.