Signing Off!!!!!

This is it......the final blog from Smith's Aussie Adventures. We arrived back at our house on Friday 2nd December. After two years on the road, it's time to settle back into life at Yeoval.
We feel so blessed to have had the most amazing experience travelling this beautiful country and meeting some very special people. It's a little daunting being back, but we know how God supplied for all our needs travelling and are certain, he'll provide for us now at home. Praise God!!

Two years on....

From this...to this..... The first photo was taken the day we left on our trip, and the other photo two years later on the day we arrived home. Wow!! The girls have grown up so much!! Not only are they taller and older, but they have had the most amazing experience and grown in so many other ways!!

Caravan to House

AND from this to this.....After 2 years in the caravan, our house feels sooooo big!! When we first walked into our house, we just wandered in a daze for an hour wondering where to start and what to do with all this room. Wow!! We will never think our house is small again!! The caravan is now empty and clean and down in the shed. I was amazed how much stuff came out of the caravan and also how long it took me to clean it! There are endless little nooks and crannies in there!! Some wonderful, wonderful memories in there too! I got a little sad cleaning it out for the final time.

Presentation Day at Dubbo

We arrive home in time to make it to the Dubbo School of Distance Education Presentation Day. It was lovely for the girls to receive recognition for all the hard work they'd put into school. They each received a class certificate and Claire was also presented with a special award for Literacy Achievement.
We were excited to catch up with The Parkers again and we got to meet the girl's teachers. It was a strange experience meeting the teachers as we had only ever spoken to them over the phone and never met them. Once we worked out who they were, we had a great chat and it meant a lot to the girls and I to connect with who we'd been speaking to each week. They were lovely teachers and really cared about the girls. Claire is with Mrs White, Lucy with Ms Dwarte and Bridget with Mrs Dugan.

Menindee

From Broken Hill we travel south east to Menindee. What a beautilful spot to camp for the night- right beside the lake. We toast marshmallows around the campfire and reflect on our last two years. Smiths Aussie Adventures is coming to an end and we chat about what we've loved, what we learnt, what we'll miss (as well as what we won't miss!), what we're looking forward to at home and what we're worried about. Such a great night praising God for all that's happened in the last two years!! From here......we head towards YEOVAL!!!

Broken Hill

We have crossed our last border and are now in NSW!!! First stop is Broken Hill. We stay here for a few days and have a look around. Broken Hill is full of art galleries and we visit 4 different ones including Pro Hart. It is a much bigger town than I thought!!
We'll be back sometime in the near future as good friends of ours move here next year to lead a church.

Silverton

We go for a morning drive 25kms out of Broken Hill to Silverton. Silverton was a bustling silver mining town in the 1880's. Today, the area is best known as the iconic outback base of this country's movie industry. Many movies have been filmed here including Mad Max 2, A Town Like Alice and Priscella Queen of the desert.

We took a picnic dinner out and enjoyed the outback sunset at the desert sculptures. They are huge sandstone sculptures sitting up on top of a hill with great views all around.

Happy 6th Birthday Lucy!!!

Happy 6th Birthday to our baby girl!! She's been counting down the days for a month now. What a blessing she is to us! Love you sweet girl.

Lucy was so looking forward to this day and she had a ball!!! She really wanted to play pass the parcel, so we had a mini game with her sisters. It was a no schoolwork day for her so we went to the park and had a look around Port Augusta.

While in Kings Canyon we were given a ripstick by the people who were camping next to us. We haven't had a concrete path for a while, so Bridget takes the chance when we get to Port Augusta. She has great balance, so has got the hang of it pretty quickly.

Lake Hart

Snow in Outback SA????? No, of course not! It may look like it, but the girls are actually riding on a salt lake. It was so cool!!!

This was at a free camp where we stayed the night somewhere between Coober Pedy and Port Augusta.

Coober Pedy

We really enjoyed Coober Pedy. So different from where we've been and what we've seen before. Lucy even cried the night before we left saying that she didn't want to leave.

Coober Pedy

Coober Pedy is such a different and interesting town. Our first 2 days were extremely hot and then we got 2 cooler ones. We were prepared for the heat, although the cool change was nice. The outskirts of town are surrounded by mounds of rock and dirt and these danger signs as people are hoping to strike it lucky by finding opal. Chris rests up and has daily visits to the hosptial to monitor how his spider bite is going.

As Coober Pedy is all about opal mining and underground living, we decide to head underground and see what it's like. It was fascinating!! 70% of people here live underground, and with temperatures in the high 40's in Summer, I don't blame them. It was so much cooler down there. We also went to the Anglican Catacomb church on Sunday.

Around town we visit a kangaroo orphanage. Claire is excited to see some red kangaroos here as she has a little red kangaroo figurine called Ruby. The girls enjoy patting and feeding the kangaroos. We also get to see a demonstration of some mining machinery. Here the girls are holding rocks to see how they are sucked up through the blower. That is one powerful vacuum cleaner!!

We go for an afternoon drive just out of Coober Pedy to see The Breakaways and the Dog Fence. The Breakaways are colourful low hills which have 'broken away' from the Stuart Range. The Dog Fence or Dingo Fence is the longest fence in the world. It was built to protect sheep in the south from the dingo and is 5614km long.

Goodbye NT Hello SA

Aaahhhh! We really are getting closer to home. We have now crossed yet another border and are in SA. We are moving quickly today as Chris has some kind of bad infection on his leg and we need to get to a hospital. Today we drove 600kms to Coober Pedy.

Outback Sunset

From Kings Canyon, we are now heading South and East on our way towards home. We stop at a roadside rest area for the night and are reminded of God's majesty as we enjoy this sunset!

Kings Canyon!!!!!!!

From Uluru, we travel to Kings Canyon. WOW!!!! This place is amazing!! Our first afternoon we look at the canyon from ground level and the following day we do the 6km rim walk. It's a steep climb up, but absolutely worth it!!! As with Uluru, a real highlight for us.

Soooooo beautiful!! I was going crazy with the camera. I couldn't put it away, around every corner was another spectacular view!

Bridget is looking over what's called 'The Lost City' The rock formations really do look like the Bungle Bungles. We also have morning tea down in the Garden of Eden. It is a little oasis amongst all the bare, dry rock.

I think we're rating this as one of the best walks we've done around Australia ( and we've done quite a few!) The whole three hours was just spectacular! Everywhere we looked was such an amazing view.

Ayers Rock - Uluru

We are so excited to be here at Uluru. We spend 4 fabulous days exploring the area and enjoying all it has to offer. It was a real highlight for us!!