March 7 - back in the burbs!

We’re home after almost 7 weeks on the road - hard to believe, but we travelled over 9000 km. Lindsay counted many hundreds of birds while I peered at plants and rocks and, like a Tricoteuse, knitted as kilometre after kilometre crunched under our wheels - 14 beanies to show for those many Kms!

Such a wonderful country - in spite of the heat.  We feel so lucky to be able to travel like this. Doesn’t cost much - around $100 a day for fuel and camping fees.  so it’s affordable, relatively speaking.

For 5 of those 7 weeks the temperatures were close to, or over, 40C so staying cool and hydrated was a high priority. The body breathed a sigh of relief when we hit temps in the 30s as we travelled ‘closer’ to home. After such desiccating heat for so much of our trip, our last day of travel was a bit of a shock. It began with gale force winds, beating rain and hail and didn’t get much above 20C. What amazing contrasts!

Our mini garden welcomed us with the last of its summer fruit - half kg of tomatoes some of which were almost liquid, but others green (fried green tomatoes for breakfast this morning - yum!), and a basin of juicy, almost melting, figs oozing sweet bubbles of syrup. Thank goodness for irrigation - on a minor home-front scale of course!!! 

After a day, the birds returned and have been buzzing around since keeping a watchful eye on our movements in case we escape too soon. I reckon they do a fly passed every day when we’re away to see if we’re there. Our ‘resident’ doves arrived back and walked up and down pretending to forage on the front terrace in a little welcome home ‘now you’re back, feed me’ display, the mynas came warily back a day later and patiently took their turn at the water bath.  A female black bird picked up the scent of disturbed soil as we repositioned pots from under the tree and for the last couple of days has been pecking about looking for goodies. And we got a surprise visit from a pied currawong and a young grey butcher bird both  heralding their presence with glorious melodic song. I know lots of people don’t like butcher birds, but their song is beautiful and in the end all the birds seem to know they’ve got to get along if they want to hang around our place. Wonderful to come home to our little garden and birds!

So now clearing away and sorting, repairs etc etc and then on to .......... 

Thanks for sharing our journey. Next up the Arctic! Boy talk about extremes!  A bientot .....

On the road. We’ve had a little sponge bath since then!

I like!

But there again I love the water - tranquil Port Welshpool on the way home

This is just to show Lindsay’s newest toy (the blue thing)  - a motorised thingo to make parking the van easier. It works like a dream - once you’ve got it going in the right direction!

Road Beanies