Australia Day Long weekend at Coolendel

You will notice that my blog is somewhat late this week. We had a lovely long weekend with Australia Day falling on the Tuesday so we took Monday off as well and went down to Coolendel which, after 3 consecutive years, could I think be considered a tradition. This year we were accompanied by the Reids, Kellys, Sherries, Duthies and Diggins which meant we were 12 adults and 13 kids.

Emma and I arrived first on Friday lunchtime and put the tents up in about 35 degree heat. We wore our swimmers so that it wouldn't matter how hot we got with the plan to go for a dip in the river straight after to cool down. We had both brought water spray bottles so we filled those up and instructed the kids to take it in turns to spray us with water which worked very well for everyone. The Duthies arrived soon after us and once all the tents were up we headed down to the river for a long swim. We were surprised when we realised it was 6pm and time to head back to camp for some dinner.

The rest of our party arrived on Saturday which again was a hot day so after more tent construction we spent the morning at the river with all of the kids jumping off the rocks (notice Tom climbing up the rock all in blue and Tess mid jump). In the afternoon the older kids found a mud slide which was dry but undeterred they filled all the spray bottles and took them along to the slide to make some mud. Another trip to the river was required to wash off after that.

Sunday was a lot cooler which worked well for us as it allowed us to do a big bush walk which took about 2.5 hours and involved climbing a steep hill, descending the hill and then walking along a dry river bed. The kids were all fantastic but I was a bit disturbed when Tom said his best part of the day was "seeing the dead possum" on our walk! As the cool weather continued we braved a game of rounders which got really quite competitive with the adults wishing the children weren't around so that we could get serious!

On Monday it was warmer again and we took all the inflatables to the river for a 2 hour floatfrom one set of rapids to another. The younger kids got tired with all the paddling so we ended up making a massive boat train with poor Ben pulling all the children (and an embarassing number of adults) behind him.

As always on these weekends we ate incredibly well with fillet steak, baby roast potatoes and baked asparagus one day and lamb koftas with tzatziki, tomato salsa and rocket salad another night. Ken excelled himself and made a beautiful choc chip damper in the camp oven for breakfast one morning.

Tom was in his element this time now that he no longer needs his training wheels and there were hours during which he cycled around the camp site quite happily. Tess tried valiantly but still lacks the same level of confidence - it will come!

Rae arrived in Australia last Tuesday. It's been fantastic having her around and Tess has enjoyed spending time with her rather than going to vacation care. Rae stayed in Sydney for the long weekend and her friend Jenny moved into our house so that the two of them could hang out together which seemed to involve a bit of culture and lots of food and wine!

My blog will be late again next week as I'll be up at the sales conference which is the setting for the bands first performance!