Walkerville–21 to 24 February 2012

There really is no Walkerville as such, rather North Walkerville and South Walkerville.  Tricia has been coming here since she was nine and remembers driving on the sand between the two, now forbidden for cars, with the road being the only and the long way round.  The walk however, either on the sand at low tide past the lime kilns or by the headland with its cemetery is well worth it.

South Walkerville is the remains of a Village established to support a Lime Burning Industry which ran from 1875 till 1926. There were six kilns and the town supported about 50 families at its peak. The kilns and a few rock walls are all that remains, the kilns closed when David Mitchell opened his lime quarry at Lilydale.

There is a very nice Camping Park on the foreshore at North Walkerville. We had a lovely beach front site in amongst the tea tree with a good view of the swimming beach. Walkerville has a very rocky foreshore but it has a safe beach and is a wonderful place for children.

 

Bairnsdale – 20 to 21 February

 

 

 

 

 

 

We stayed at the Mitchell Gardens Caravan Park in Bairnsdale.

We had a good pull through site which makes onward travel easy as John doesn't have to hitch up in the morning.

It was a very quiet park which was surprising as it is on the Princes Highway.  We did the Riverwalk beside the Mitchell River which is lovely.

[Eden] & Mallacoota–18 to 20 February 2012

We drove from Pambula via Eden to Mallacoota.

Eden is an old whaling town on Twofold Bay, one of the deepest harbours in the world.  It is now a good place to go to whale spotting and still has a local fishing fleet.

It is caravan friendly having large amounts of caravan parking available behind Main Street. We we enjoyed a pleasant walk down to the Harbour past a number of historic buildings and had a good coffee in a cafe on the wharf.  We liked the sign in the local shop reading “God put me on Earth to accomplish a certain number of things .. right now I am so far behind I will never die….”

Mallacoota a little further South and off the main highway is a magnificent fishing village and holiday spot on the Mallacoota Estuary called by  the locals “Victoria’s best kept secret”.  It is very caravan friendly. The caravan Park runs along the foreshore for a long way and everyone can have a great site with a view of the water.  The local council runs the park and offers hefty discounts to people staying a full month, so all 200 powered sites were taken.  This is a great idea for the town as it keeps the locals employed and the shops busy.  Because we are self sufficient with power and water we had the pick of 400 unpowered sites, and got a great location with a perfect water view.

One can walk on the sand islands which are great bird habitats, and which protect the birds against predators. There are thousands of Hermit Crabs in the deep pools. There are a lot of water birds including pelicans and sea eagles fishing in the lakes.

John did a boat trip on the Loch Ard around the Estuary.

The place to eat is Lucy's Home Made Rice Noodles. It is a real demographic change as the once ubiquitous Fish and Chip shop is replaced with Rice Noodles with Abalone and Sea Urchin. There are also less challenging sauces. Lucy's sells great coffee and as one leaves all the caravans are lined up for that final cup of coffee to go.

Bawley Point, Batemans Bay & Pambula–15 to 18 February 2012

Having travelled with what felt like our own personal rain cloud since leaving Mooloolaba, Racecourse Beach at Bawley Point was beautiful and sunny.

It is very quiet at this time of year, there was only us and one other caravan.  A walk over the headlands takes you through an Aboriginal heritage area and one of the largest midden sites in Australia.

There is only dam and bore water to drink, we used our tanks. Showers cost 20 cents for three minutes.

From Bawley Point we drove to Pambula via Batemans Bay.

Batemans Bay is very caravan friendly. It has specific caravan parking near the McDonald's which encouraged us to do our shopping then relax and enjoy the town.

We had a lovely walk along the river front, including the day’s drama of a sunken yacht which had brought out the Hazard Recovery Team to contain any diesel from the engine.  They made it clear they were not going to refloat the yacht.  We followed this with a relaxing lunch on the River Clyde with Fresh Oysters straight out of the Clyde river Estuary.

Our next stop was Pambula which has a campsite right on a wonderful swimming beach with resident Kangaroos who are exceptionally trusting.  Tricia even saw kangaroos going under vans to shelter from the sun.

Kiama [Berry & Kangaroo Valley] – 12 to 15 February 2012

We drove to Easts Beach Camping Park in Kiama. Tricia had a sore back and was glad to find a very good masseur as part of the spa complex at the caravan park.  The beach at the caravan park is lovely and very safe.

We took the coastal walk North from the campsite to the little Blowhole and South from the campsite along the headlands.  We also visited The Blowhole which is right by the town of Kiama.

We drove to Berry an historic town which has a lovely deli Cafe with great coffee. From there we drove up to Kangaroo Valley, a very popular, scenic holiday destination.

We both got leeches on our feet walking through the rainforest to see an old cemetery.

Alongside the road on the verge there are masses of lilies in flower. They seem to grow the whole length of the Princes Highway in New South Wales.
We visited the Cambewarra Mountain Lookout with a magnificent vista of the coast towards the Shoalhaven River.

Sydney [Narrabeen] – 1 to 12 February 2012

From Anna Bay we drove to Sydney for meetings and to visit friends.  Our campsite was at Narrabeen. This council camping park was an unexpected delight on the mouth of the Narrabeen lagoon in Sydney's Northern Beaches.

Our first trip into Sydney was by car, but it is a challenge to find parking for our 4WD.  With the spare tyres on its roof it exceeded most of the height restrictions in city  parking lots. Thereafter our trips to Sydney were by bus and Manly Ferry, a much more relaxing trip of about an hour and a half.  The view from the ferry is an added bonus.

In between times we walked around the locality which is beautiful and swam in the ocean pool built on the rock ledge at the edge of the surf.

We have two favorite Restaurants, the Ocean Bay Café and Restaurant, which was opposite the campsite, and the Narrow Bean in Narrabeen itself. We both enjoyed rejoining café society.