A Visit from Gran

Mum/Gran comes to visit for a few days. We pick her up at Mackay airport and drive to our campspot north of Mackay at Seaforth. We celebrate her birthday and have heaps of fun over a busy, jam packed four days!

Finch Hatton Gorge

We take a day trip out to Eungella National Park. On the way we stop at Finch Hatton Gorge. It was spectacular!

Such a beautiful spot. Chris and the girls were brave enough to swim in the cold water . It was also a lovely walk in through the rainforest.

Can you spot him?? We spent a good hour and a half waiting to spot this shy little platypus at Broken River. We had just about given up and were walking back to the car when we saw him.

This is Seaforth where we camped for 5 days. Our van was just back from the beach. We enjoyed walks in the morning and cheese and wine in the evening as we watched the sunset!!! The only negative was the sandflys. The girls were attacked by these horrible things.

Cape Hillsborough

Cape Hillsborough. We decide to do this walk up to the lookout. It was a pretty hard walk up a steep, rocky mountain and then we had to trudge through mud to get back down.

WooHoo!! There's a quick way back along the beach. We were glad not to have to go back through the mud and up and down the mountain again!

We were treated to a day out at the reef by friends of ours. We were so grateful and had a wonderful day. We cruised from Airlie beach to Hamilton Island. At Hamilton Island it started to pour with rain and our hearts sank. Thankfully it was short lived and the sun came out and shone for the rest of the day. We cruised the Whitsundays before heading to the open water. As we hit the open water the staff started bringing 'round vomit bags...not a good sign. Within minutes there was vomiting going on all around us. Only one out of six of us was sick (thankfully)

Bridget looking over the gorgeous water of the Great Barrier Reef.

Hardy Reef

This is where we spent our day- Hardy Reef. It's one of the many reefs that make up The Great Barrier Reef.

Even Lucy had a go at snorkelling . She wouldn't breathe through the snorkel, so looked underwater with her mask on and then came back up and excitedly told me what fish she just saw. We all wore these very attractive stingersuits as it's still in stinger season.

Chris gives Bridget a last word of advice before they head out snorkelling.

The girls had a great day. As well as snorkelling, we got to go on a semi submersible boat and view the coral and watch the fish from the underwater chamber. Bridget and I were also lucky enough to spot a sea turtle and swim with him. Very special!

Heading back to Airle Beach after a great day out on the reef. I loved having mum stay with us for 4 days.

We are now in the heart of sugarcane country so visit Sarina Sugar Shed where we take a tour and learn all about the process of how sugar gets from sugarcane in the paddock to in our sugarbowl.
Here the sugarcane is being crushed and we get to taste the juice.

The girls enjoy some fairy floss and get to taste some ginger beer, while the adults taste test their rum and liqueurs..mmmm.

After 4 great days with Gran, it's time to say goodbye. Gran has to hop back on the plane and fly to Sydney

Camping at Cania Gorge

These are the families we met in Childers. We all went camping together at Cania Gorge. We had a great time. The girls loved having so many other kids around and even decided to put the tents up and 'camp out'. There's just nothing like sitting around a bonfire in the bush with friends!

'The Overhang', one of the nice spots to stop while exploring Cania Gorge

The girls enjoyed having some other kids to go bushwalking with. There were some great walks in the national park.

Each afternoon the caravan park had bird feeding. King Parrots and rainbow lorikeets came from everywhere. They girls had a great time feeding them and even coped with a few scratches and birds landing on their heads!

We took a drive out to Lake Cania and Cania dam. Not long ago this dam was only 3%. Now it's full to overflowing!

Cania Gorge. There were lots of lovely lookouts like this one.

At night these cute bettongs came out. We'd never seen one before. Sitting 'round the campfire, it was fun to watch them play and hop around.

On our way out we decided to do one more walk. It was 5.6kms. The girls did really well and were ready to sit in the car and travel for the rest of the afternoon!!

From Gayndah, we travelled to Childers and stayed with a family we met at church in Maryborough. They offered for us to stop in at their place and we took them up on it! They have 5 children and our girls had a great time playing with them! The photo here is in front of a crop of sugarcane and the girls are eating yummy homemade icecream made right here in Childers. We also did daytrips to Hervey Bay and Bundaberg.

'Penwhaupell' Gayndah

This is Arthur, Vanessa, Zara and Clancey. We stayed at their beautiful property just out of Gayndah. Chris and Vanessa have a mutual cousin and apart from seeing each other a few times growing up, we didn't really know them. After spending 12 days with them, we now have made some new friends. We all got on so well and had lots of fun together!!

We parked our van outside this slab house. It was so gorgeous. It reminded us of 'Man from Snowy River' (which we watched while we were there). We used the bathroom and the girls did their schoolwork in there and we enjoyed sitting on the verandah having a cuppa and taking in the beautiful view!

While we were there Chris and Arthur knocked down a shed that had been damaged in a storm and rebuilt it.

We were keen to explore 'The Bamblings' property, so they took us for a drive/bushwalk/picnic. The kids were comfortable on the back of the ute. They needed the padding underneath them as there was some rough terrain to drive over. It was a great day out.

We were all puffed after climbing this really steep hill. At the top was a cave. We crawled in on our hands and knees to have a look. There were lots of bats and we realised we were crawling on bat poo. Eeeww!!

We enjoyed a well earned break for morning tea after the steep climb and descent!

On our way back we followed the creek. It was very pretty and the kids loved jumping all the rocks.

The kids had a great time sliding down this rock. It doesn't take them long to entertain themsleves out in the bush!

We pulled up for lunch by the creek. Arthur got a fire going and we enjoyed snags for lunch as well as some marshmallows, damper and billy tea. Vanessa must have done this many times before. I couldn't believe how organised she was out in the bush!

We took a day trip to 'Baramba' and canoed up the river for nearly an hour before bushwalking to the waterfall. It was so peaceful. What a great way to spend a Saturday!

After a 40min walk we arrived at the waterfall and climbed to the top. The girls loved swimming in the 'lap pool' at the top of the waterfall. The lookout from here was beautiful.