I can’t erase Megan Backhouse’ crackling voice from my head.
“The party’s o-wo-wo-ver” she warbles incessantly. Our party’s not over, but it
is heart breakingly close. Scoring a rodeo with a final throw of the dice
underlined that our trip has only a couple of weeks to run. A brief stop with
Tim and Pem (Mum’s brother and wife) and a bbq with cousins in Werri Beach
south of Woollongong. As fun as that was, surely we could end this trip on a
high.
True to form, pieces fell into place, and on the horizon
there was a vision. “We must go there, it is our destiny” said the oracle in the
back seat (Oliver). And so we pointed Priscilla towards our nation’s capital, a
place that as Australians we should revere, but instead choose to mock. In
keeping with this, we parked Kimmy in one of the dodgiest caravan parks we have
ever stayed in. Home of the Fyshwick tavern, the “pub in the park” with its’
$10 Tuesday chicken schnitzel night. Lovely, what’s not to like? Well maybe
management could have done something about the blokes drinking around the
playground from 3 o’clock, and maybe they could have addressed the explicit
language lessons our kids received as the permanents cased our caravans whilst
carrying their six packs of premix back to their on-site dongas. We dealt with
it, and buried our heads in the sand all day at the museums.
And they were fantastic, although Sara did fatigue early. Pick
of the bunch, surprisingly, was the old Parliament House, Australia’s forbiddingly
Sovietishly titled, Museum of Democracy. The kids do love a treasure hunt, and
winning a magnet at the end, well, could it get any better? In six days we went
almost everywhere. The Australia Museum was brilliant; we placed a poppy by
Great Uncle Archie’s (see Darwin blog) name at the War Memorial, compared the
movement patterns of Bracks’ pencils and dancers at the gallery, and pushed
buttons at the Questacon. We didn’t see Julia or Tony, but the kids did engage
in spirited debating on the hill behind the caravan the evening after our visit
to Parliament House. I was tempted to stay another night, after all, every
seventh night in Fyshwick is free, but Sara had had a gutful, so we left.
Our only problems were the bushfires. It had been obscenely
hot, and we wanted to go to Kosciuszko National Park. No fires there, yet.
Laughing in the face of sensibility, I had my way. We drove to the not much
town of Bombala, in the rain. There, Sara established a relationship in the
flesh with Dale, a man she had only experienced over the phone up until then. Safe
to say, I’m still in the game, if only because I have never called Sara “love”,
or “darl”, or “pet”. Poor old Dale. Tries so hard, but has so much against him.
Despite remarkably ordinary dental hygiene, and over-hyped pride in his full
head of non-dyed, Beatle-esque hair, Dale manages to run one of the cleanest
and nicest parks we have been to. Fyshwick park persons take note.
We left Kimmy there, then drove into Kosciuszko, and camped
at Thredbo Diggings, which was pretty busy. After a night interrupted by
carousing neighbours, and snoring on a scale that we’ve never experienced, we
drove into Thredbo, and climbed to the highest point in Australia. Sounds far
more impressive than it was. A long walk sure, but mostly flat and apparently
within the reach of every Australian be they fat or old or in a pram. Which is,
actually, exactly the way it should be. The campsite itself was beautiful and
overlooked the river. It became even more special, when we returned from our
epic day to find that our rude neighbours had scuttled off at some stage during
the day. We had an evening by the fire, we hiked in the early morning, lost Oli
mid-morning, packed in the late morning, and left in the afternoon after coffee
and a swim.
Dale wasn’t overjoyed to see us. I mean, he may have been,
but he didn’t make himself known until later that evening. Leaving the van in
Bombala was a sensible plan as the roads down to Pambula are horrid, and we
wouldn’t have been able to afford to park Kimmy at the Holiday Hub for the
three days we had prior to slumming it with Mum and Dad in their rental house.
As it was, we scored another first, with the Holiday Hub becoming our most
expensive stay at $123 a night for an unpowered tent site!! Lord knows how the
bogans who stole Ned’s scooter afford to stay there. Maybe eBay has something
to do with it. In any case, the kids had a ball what with activities and minigolf and Isabella and movies
and a beach on their doorstep. I surfed every morning, and picked up the paper with an occasional doughnut
on the way back. A lovely, lazy three days.
And then it ended. No more camping, no more Kimmy. We drove up
to the house on Taleban Street and set up shop before Mum and Dad arrived. It
was beautiful to see them. The kids were jumping out of their skins as the
Subaru strained up the driveway. I’m sure I hugged Mum for half an hour. Family’s
back. We leave in two days, and will tear Kimmy from Dale's loving embrace. We see Barney and our mates in two days. We’ll see Joc and Tony in three days. We have a place to live in
Melbourne. Things are falling into place and it all seems perfect… except for
that bloody song. She’s right of course, and not just because she’s my
sister-in-law, but because she’s right...again. “The party’s o-wo-wo-ver”.
H
