 Earlier
this month, our "Windsor Daintree"
motorhome, ordered 14 months previously, was
finally produced and ready to be picked up!
So we went out to Somerton on the train,
and, after spending over 2 hours seeing it
and being told about all its features and
controls, we drove away; back up to
Castlemaine, in pouring rain. But it was
surprisingly easy to drive.
Also surprisingly, it was full of fuel and
of gas. We had expected that we would have
to fill it up with diesel at the first
service station we got to, but not so. 100
litres of diesel! And a full 9kg gas
cylinder!
Up in Castlemaine, another of my vague
background fears turned out  to
be unfounded - I was able to back it into
its parking spot, between the 2 new gate
posts, with little trouble. Despite setting
them what I thought was far enough apart, I
was a little afraid that in practice it
would not work. But it did!
What should we call it? We started out
saying "the van", but that really is a bit
ordinary; so we settled on "the white house"
- it's a sort of house, it's white, and we
call our other places the Castlemaine house
or the Melbourne house - but this one is
moveable.
But then - it just sat there. For over 2
weeks, because 1. we had too many things
happening to find the time to drive away in
it, and 2. the weather was dreadful, with
lots of heavy rain and cold weather. We did
spend some time sorting some of its features
out, and packing it with the basic
necessities of life. And finally, this
weekend, at last - despite it being an
extra-long long weekend, for the silly
"National Day of Mourning" for the queen,
following by the silly pre-Grand Final AFL
holiday - and being in the middle of the
school holidays, to boot - we opened the
newly-installed gates and drove away.
We headed for Paddy's Range State Park, just
beyond Maryborough - all of ~40km away; we
drove down to the campground. It was quite
full; we parked in the least densely
populated part, and looked around. There was
a 2-hour return walk over to the picnic
area, so off we went. A pleasant walk, to a
picnic area which was 1. a nicer spot than
the campground, 2. uninhabited, and 3.
lacking any signs prohibiting overnight
camping. So of course we walked back, and
drove over to the picnic area for a lovely
quiet night in the bush.
Next morning, we used the shower for the
first time - no problem at all, we just
needed to lie in bed for 15 minutes to  give
the water heater time to produce hot water.
Back into Maryborough for a walk around town
on Saturday morning. Despite being only 40km
from home, it felt to both of us that we
could have been away somewhere hundreds of
kilometres away, walking around an
unfamiliar town. After treating ourselves to
a coffee and cake, we drove down to Avoca
and had lunch by the river.
Where to now? Our camps book had a favourite
spot close by, at Waterfall Valley. So we
tried it out; it is a lovely green spot by a
creek, with some others camped but a fairly
large empty area at one edge. We sat outside
for a while - warmish when the sun shone,
but a cold wind as well - had a walk up to
and above the waterfall, and chatted to some
others when we returned. Then a dinner (a
roast) and we needed to use the diesel
heater for a while. It worked beautifully.
 Our
only problem? Despite being retired, and
theoretically able to go away whenever we
like, our lives are so full with things on,
that going away takes some pre-meditation.
We had thought of taking the vehicle to
Tasmania in February / March but the ferry
is all booked out. Next year.
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