Hasting Caves

This is a post without much writing as it is simply to show you some of what we saw of Hastings Caves in Tasmania.

All pictures taken by Dave - you’re welcome! 

Hobart

Friday morning, I worked an early Mackay and then sat around the airport for three hours until Dave arrived so we could start our trip together to Hobart.  I was lying on one of the couches in the Virgin terminal, after napping, when I decided to check the flight numbers... which had been fine the previous day!  To my surprise, the flight was completely full, and continuing to check, I realised that all of the Sydney flights were the same.  

Changing tack, I had a look at Melbourne flights and thankfully found one that would work - although it then meant we had to sit around in Melbourne for three hours before flying onwards to Hobart, landing at 2105.  Having left the house at 0400, I wasn’t particularly enamoured with the idea but at least it would get us there.  It was a bit hit and miss even getting on the flight to Melbourne due to a polar front, but make it we did, and finally found ourselves at our bed and breakfast.  

Orana House was a sprawling colonial style building with pretty gardens filled with daffodils.  I meant to take pictures but our plans changed quite drastically which didn’t give us any time for such niceties!  It was incredibly cold but our room had a decent little heater which kept us alive, at least.  

Saturday morning dawned bright and early - or rather, we woke early at our customary 0500, and it had not dawned, was not bright, and the chill outside took our breath away (or at least mine, because I am weak.). Four degrees is a little bit cold for me.  It wasn’t raining yet but the forecast looked terrible so we decided to make Indoor Plans for the day.

A river beside which we drove

C particularly wanted to go swimming, and when we picked the two of them up at 0730, she already had her swimmers on under her clothes ready to go.  The walk from the car to the Aquatic Centre was absolutely freezing and I began to wonder were we completely and utterly insane to consider this activity?  Thankfully, it was lovely and warm inside and we defrosted quickly.  Unfortunately, having come from Brisbane, neither Dave or I had towels, which we had been hoping to hire - no luck there, apparently the only option was to buy towels at a grandiose price of $35 each.  We settled on one towel to share!  The kids brought their towels from home but seriously seeing how they treated the things made us not want to share them!

For a venue with such a grand name as The Hobart Aquatic Centre, and from photos on google, it was a bit disappointing to find that it consisted of a main (cold) swimming pool with lanes, and a kiddies pool which was mostly thigh deep and full of small children.  This pool was pretty warm forever and C and M enjoyed themselves a lot - and we had fun splashing water at them, pretending to be sharks, and dragons, and generally rough housing around.  Two hours flew and it was time to get out (with C dragging her heels very sulkily!).  

After some biscuit fortification (that I had taken from breakfast) back at the car, we decided to stop at Coles to get Supplies for lunch and snacks, and then get on the road and head down to Hastings Caves.  It was a 1h40 trip one way, but out of the cold and rain and the Caves promised an adventure not yet experienced by C, M or Dave.  

Meanwhile, a new drama presented itself.  Dave’s ex unfortunately misunderstood our plans - although we had written the email together and specified that we were picking up the children at 0730 and dropping them after dinner, she thought that we were keeping them overnight!  We only realised this when she texted to ask could we drop them at her mum’s in the morning.  Um... we only had a small double room booked at the B&B.

We quickly rang the B&B to see if they had another room available, but they were full up.  After a lot of back and forth and trying to find babysitters etc, we eventually ended up booking a 2 bedroom apartment elsewhere for the night!

After this was sorted out, we headed off to Hastings Caves and arrived just in time for the afternoon tour.  Everyone seemed to enjoy theirselves - although C kept whispering to me “I think I might be getting a little scared now” and then got distracted and was fine again.  After this, we went on a quick walk to see if we could find the thermal springs advertised (a 1m round hole in the ground that was well fenced off and not very special) and then it was back to the car (C: I’ve got a stitch and my legs can’t walk any further.). Thankfully we did make it back to the car with mere minutes to spare before the gate was shut at 1600.    Nobody’s legs fell off, either, although by the sounds of things there could have been blood, gore and all out slaughter.

Dave has much nicer photos than me but I’ll post them separately.

The drive back was quieter than the drive there, due to sleepy children, although tempers did get a little frayed once or twice!  

We had to stop by Orana House to let C change her clothes before dinner, as she had unfortunately Sat On Something.  We decided to take all of our things with us and check out (although sadly I left my PJs in the bed!) before going to dinner.  Dinner was at the Irish Pub which is also where we went last time we went to Hobart - a favourite with the children.  I was less than enamoured with my choice of fish and chips (soggy fish), and also didn’t particularly like Dave’s steak and Guinness pie (inside cooked separately to the pastry and placed inside to serve) and C’s rare steak was medium at best!  

Our new abode was a basic apartment, but it had everything we needed - warmth, beds and a hot shower.  In fact, after the children went to bed, we thought next time we might just book something similar and keep the kids all weekend and also having an apartment would mean we could cook dinner and spend $30 on something really nice instead of spending over $100 on almost inedible fare!  Despite having been looking forward to a quiet romantic morning before flying back to Brisbane, it really was nice having the kids with us overnight and they were quiet sad when we dropped them home.  

Thankfully, our flight back to Brisbane had plenty of seats and was on time - in fact, I am writing this from the aeroplane which is why it is so very long winded - you’re welcome.  

This boy

We have finally booked everything for our trip to the UK and Ireland and I couldn’t be more excited!  It is just a few weeks away now and I can’t wait to introduce my amazing David to my family - and of course meet his.

And here’s a very early almost-dawn photo over Brisbane airport a couple of mornings ago.  Not completely in focus but we were travelling at 300kts and it was taken on an iPhone in low light!

It is absolutely freezing!  I am wrapped in blankets on the couch waiting for it to get warmer... and it probably doesn’t help that I have frozen fruit in my breakfast muesli which is cooling me from the inside out. 

David and I have only done a couple of climbs recently as my roster has been very busy and I have been very very tired.  We did have a lovely climb up Beerwah in the semi wet and got some nice photos.

 

It was good fun although I do prefer climbing when it is dry.

We also saw a beautiful Beerwah sunset

This photo is looking East back towards Coonowrin (left) and Tibrogargan just right of the shadow of Beerwah.

We also went flying with Lily, in the 172RG and she wasn’t terrified all of the time ... she didn’t like full power but seemed to like Dave’s practice forced landing!  

Here’s a nice shadow of the aeroplane, coming in to land

We also got Dave a new car!  Very exciting, and we pick it up in a week or two after finance is approved 

Doesn’t he look smart?  He had just completed a job interview to be an engineering instructor, which went really well and we are really hoping he gets.  It would be initially a casual position but potentially with a full time position available in the future.  Either way, a government job that would be much more reliable than his current company!  It’s not the BEST time to be buying a new car, with so much uncertainty, but he needs a vehicle to be able to get to work, and his old Camry is so dodgy now, I’m worried for him every time he drives it.  Not only does it have 350,000km on it, but it also steers left dramatically, the steering vibrates through the steering wheel, and two out of four wheels wobble alarmingly as you drive... so we didn’t have much of an option other than to replace it!

Anyway that’s about it for now - I’ll try to make the next post sooner!

It’s hard to explain why I haven’t blogged lately.  It’s not like I don’t have down time, I do, but it’s more like I don’t really think about it any more.  And when I do, no words really come to me. 

Just a random cute picture of my child

And now to recap on June...  it was an insanely busy month from a work point of view, and my only weekend off was the very last weekend of the month, so by then I felt like I was beginning to forget what D looked like!  This last weekend was D’s birthday, and I managed to get 3 days off to spend with him - unfortunately on the very first day I got a head cold so we had a quiet few days.  Even so, it was so nice just to be together.  

We have got a few climbs in but not as many as I was hoping - that weekend off we had planned to climb every day but being sick, I didn’t have the energy.

Us on Beerwah for a VERY cold sunset

Said sunset

There has been lots of uncertainty with D’s job over the past few weeks.  Even now, the company is technically closing down but D is keeping it ticking over enough to keep him and one other guy employed. It is very stressful for him though, and we were hopeful last week when he got a job interview - but that was then cancelled a couple of days before.

We were hoping that D’s daughter would be able to visit us during the July school holidays but unfortunately this didn’t happen (again) so we are travelling down to Hobart next weekend for a couple of days.  That will hopefully go as well as it did last time... maybe better!  D will go for four days and I will join him halfway through for two days, as my roster is once again pretty packed.

Today, we are going on a 3 hour river cruise.  Yes, me, on a boat.  D’s idea, obviously, as there is a US aircraft carrier in Brisbane this weekend and the cruise is specially laid on to see it.  Should be fun, if I don’t fall in the water and get eaten by bull sharks.  Then, tonight we are going to a leaving party for one of my ATR friends who is moving to New Zealand.

And that is all the blogging you get... I leave you with a final cute photo of my child

(Temporary Backup) Back at work

It happened!  After 9 long weeks, my return to work happened glitch free.  I narrowly scraped inside the time window for revalidation, at 67 days only needing to complete 2 training flights.  If I had hit 70, the requirement would have been 10 training flights plus a check.  It was made a little harder due to having only had 3 days’ work since my month in Africa, but it wasn’t long before the rustiness fell away.  (Nice excuse though)

After my reval, I was supposed to just have a few quiet days on reserve and days off before work started in earnest, but when offered a 4 day trip with bucketloads of overtime, it was impossible to refuse.

This trip had me covering Sydney flights, overnighting at the Gold Coast, right beside the beach.  It was odd being so close to home (90 min drive) and a pity that D couldn’t join me due to work, but the location was amazing!

Four days began to feel like a really long time before I finally got to go home - for one short day!!!  It was then off again, overnighting in Cairns this time, where it rained and rained and rained.

I got home late last night at 2300 and quickly packed to travel to Hobart this morning, this time for “fun”.  Getting up with my alarm at 0415, I felt like a zombie well after arriving at the airport.  Scraping onto the flight with the very last standby seat, I am now using the QF free wifi to blog on my way to Sydney - where I will hopefully scrape onto the mostly-full flight to Hobart.  

This is a big weekend: today is when I meet D’s daughter, C (9), and tonight we are going to dinner with his ex and her new partner.  I have to say I am a lot more nervous to meet the ex than to meet C!  However, it is very important that I do so, as we are really hoping that C will be allowed to travel up to Brisbane in the upcoming school holidays.

There was a really beautiful rainbow over the house when I left for work a couple of days ago, so here you are!  An early morning K&D residence shot, with a rainbow.  Or two. 

In other news, it’s just a couple of weeks now until I can go climbing again! My wrist is still somewhat sore when I use it, and aches quite a bit at night time, but with lots of heat pack and massage treatment, it is continuing to heal well and strengthen.  I doubt it will ever be 100% but I will keep working on it!

Anyway the cabin crew are bringing around breakfast now, so i

April

April has come and almost gone, and despite being off work, I’ve still managed to fit a lot into the month!  The hardest thing has been the loss of independence due to not being able to drive.  It is amazing how quickly one learns to do things with one arm - and even then, after the first two weeks in the cast, I was able to use my left hand for light things like holding a fork, etc.

Since then, a lot of my days have been spent at work with Dave, working on things like fixing the P51d (Mustang) which was both fun and frustrating at the same time.  It has given me a much greater appreciation for the work that engineers do!  

We have been on a few short hikes up Coochin and Ngungun, although I won’t be able to climb my favourites for another few weeks until the tendon is stronger.  We have watched sunsets, been to the beach, and spent a glorious weekend away in Noosa together - our first mini holiday!

I also went down to Melbourne for a couple of days to visit a friend, and this coming weekend we are going to Hobart to visit Dave’s daughter.  This will be my first time meeting C, so I am a little nervous!  

The last couple of days have been a bit hectic - we almost got the Mustang finished, and then on the first engine run, a drive shaft snapped which may mean the removal of the entire engine, which is a massive job... ugh.  After all the hard work of the last couple of weeks it was a bit depressing!  Then, Lily suddenly developed an abcess and was in to the vet’s for emergency surgery, and the very same day I seem to have developed tonsillitis.  I can only say that I am very thankful that this has happened before my return to work.

It looks like I may be back at work in two weeks... I am now seeing a private occupational therapist as I wasn’t making much progress with the public system.  My new OT thinks that two weeks might be a bit fast, but I am determined to work hard towards it. 

This week, due to the Mustang being officially broken, Lily needing 24h supervision, and being a bit under the weather myself, I am keeping myself busy around the house.  My wrist exercises alone take up 4h30 of each day (6x45mins).

Also, we are another step closer to booking our trip to the UK and Ireland in September, as we have found flights - I just need Lily’s vet bill to clear off my credit card before I can book them 😂