So after a chilly night (actually felt lovely to snuggle under a duvet - first time in months!), we woke to a dry but overcast morning. Pie and Crack have both been suffering with my head cold, so weren't feeling up to a very strenuous day. So we enjoyed breakfast with King Parrots and Rainbow Lorikeets (they loved our muesli!), before saying goodbye to the kangaroos and checking out.
This is what we saw when we opened the curtains! A King parrot! And this is what happened when Pie went out with a handful of muesli!
Crack tried to "pat pat birdies" but they weren't having any of it! Eventually he lost interest, here's a video if you're interested!
Gorgeous Rainbow Lorikeets
Crack was pretty persistent! It must have been great muesli for them to bother sticking around!
Pie the Parrot Whisperer, charming the birds from the trees!
Just a few kangaroos to say goodbye to.....
Love how this Joey's tail is curled over his head! Clearly it's getting a bit cramped in there!
Here's a quick video Pie took. Lovely! but there is a downside to sharing a site with the Roos:
Some friendly Australian Wood Ducks came to see us off!
We took a gentle 4 km bush walk around Durras Lake and through several types of forest, along an enormous log and past lots of (Burrawang?) Palms, one of which had some cones on it. We also saw our biggest termite mound yet!
Afterwards we drove through another part of Murramarang National Park, to Pebbly Beach - a spot I had visited as a child. In fact I recognised it as the place I saw a huge Goanna come out of the ladies loo, just as I was about to go in! No Goannas today though, I think it wasn't warm and/or sunny enough! We enjoyed our time on the beautiful, not at all pebbly, Pebbly Beach and Crack made good use of his new bucket and spade set!
After lunch we hit the road for a two and a half hour drive south to Eden, our overnight stop. We arrived to a beautiful location, perched between a lake and a long beach and checked into the most luxurious cabin so far! It was lovely and so close to the ocean that we could hear the surf as we went to sleep! We didn't see a great deal of Eden as Pie had emails to catch up on and I had laundry to do. But Crack made full use of the playground, and had his first go on a big boy swing! And I thought I'd managed to extract the world's oldest soda from the vending machine, before realising it was a retro edition!
Eden has some high cliff lookouts in between the beaches and the bays, and they are a prime whale watching spot! The town used to be famous for its whaling fleet and the numerous towers and light houses were used to spot the humpbacks and southern right whales as they passed on their migration back to Antarctic waters. They also have killer whales, who apparently used to help the whalers by chasing the bigger whales towards the harpoon boats. Thank goodness whaling no long happens here! We had our morning coffee at the lookout hoping to catch a glimpse of a whale before we set off again, but although the conditions were good, we didn't see any.
Pie and Crack had a quick go on the swings and then we were off!
A three hour drive south (on which we narrowly avoided running over a huge Goanna who was sunbathing in the road), brought us over the border from New South Wales, into Victoria (our 4th, and last, Australian state!) and Lakes Entrance.
Crack had a proper nap in his bed, rather than his car seat! And then he and I hit the playground and all 3 swimming pools whilst Pie napped, trying to keep the cold under control!
We headed into town for an early dinner and hit the jackpot! Fresh seafood in a floating restaurant! Crack ate loads of spaghetti bolognaise followed by ice cream, whilst Pie and I started with oysters. Pie followed it up with a scrummy seafood platter and I had flake and chips, then we shared a melting chocolate pudding with macadamia ice cream.
Yummy!
After that, we dashed up the hill (in the car...too full to walk!) to the lookout to watch the sunset over Lakes Entrance
And that brings you bang up to date!
Night night x
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