Day 1 - To Grampians Edge

I fought against others in attempting a marathon 1 day drive directly to Melbourne, and as a result, we headed off 2 days earlier (Tracy's sister, Nicole, and family are travelling with us). We left at a respectable time of 9:30 this morning and after a quick tyre pressure adjustment on the van at the local servo, we were off.

We managed to get all the way to Keith without a toilet stop (trust me - this is a major achievement with the 3 kids and Tracy travelling). This is about 2 1/2 hours from home when towing, and is one of our favourite travelling stops. The kids love the rail car at the back of the park, and of course Dylan took great delight in scaring the bejeebers out of all the other parents by standing up on it and surfing along and somehow not coming off and breaking his neck. Which was lucky, cos I was continuing on this holiday with or without him!

We had some lunch, a drink and a quick walk, before setting off again with every intent to get to Grampians Edge caravan park by about 2:30........ Hah. As if. According to Google maps, we managed to get 125km further to Nhill before another toilet stop and playground break. I then chose to stop at Horsham for some more fuel so we didn't have to do it in the morning. 

Eventually we arrived at the park, which is a great bush setting with none of the modern conveniences other than a pool (that we told the kids was closed), but was one of those great country laid back places that makes travelling all worthwhile. On our walk around the park we found a decent sized lizard that I intending on getting onto the BBQ for breaky, but it turns out these little reptiles can run faster than my lightning fast grabs, and he scampered up the closest tree stump and glared at me with a smile that only a frill neck lizard can give. Next time maybe. 

There was no unhitching of the van tonight and Tracy had thought a little more than I had about tea tonight, and served up a dish of lasagne that was made a few days ago, and somehow got into the van defrosting ready for tonight. 

I knew there was more than one reason for bringing her and the kids along.....

Tomorrow we are off to Melbourne via Ballarat, where we have heard there is a mountain of roadworks to annoy all those travelling between the states. Who would have thought that our local governments would have chosen the busiest holiday periods to do major roadworks on the busiest tourist roads......(insert sarcasm here).