Blog 12: New South Wales - Pambula Beach to Sydney

As you will read below, this has been a pretty hectic week/weekend, thus the late post. Pretend it is Sunday ;).

What is important in life? How much do the objects, things, products and consumables we acquire liberate or imprison us? Most people have dabbled in the concept of minimalism, or decluttering your life/environment/home/life.

We are lucky enough to live in a society where we can, in fact, work hard and save for three and half years, pay for a wedding, Land Rover set up and year long unemployed-vagabond-adventurers honeymoon road trip. We wouldn't be living this experience without the care and support of our community of friends and family who have facilitated this opportunity. We thank all of you.

This week is a bit of a different one. Last night we slept in our own actual bed, played and cuddled our cats and got to think a lot about what we have and haven't missed being on the road for the last twelve weeks. We are back in Perth for this weekend to celebrate the nuptials of our good friends Dave and Marie. Back to Sydney tonight.

This mattress is much more comfortable than our roof tent (Although roof tent mattress IS super comfortable after a 4 hour red eye flight and a 3 hour drive to the blue mountains). Having a kitchen with ample food preparation area is very nice. It was great to see our family and (some of our) friends. And our cats. And to have a night out on the town. Oh, and a normal, flushing indoor toilet being a few steps from bed and not down a ladder into the rain. That is pretty nice.

Things we haven't really missed: TV, work (duh), vacuuming, house cleaning, having more stuff (furniture, nicknacks, books, crockery, appliances, clothes, filing cabinet full of old documents...), mail, lawn mowing... there is probably more.

Anyways, back on with the Travel Blog show:

We said goodbye to the friendly Kangaroos and sunshiny beach at Pambula Beach and turned northwards. A quick stop in Pambula proper to pick up some locally roasted coffee beans, and it was northwards towards family and flights.

The old wharf at Tathra was home to a very cool art/food/coffee space and a nice clifftop walk around to see waves breaking on unfamiliar cliffs. The excellent bakery we heard about in Bermagui was closed, so it was a rainy lunch hiding in Gary until we turned north again.

A long afternoon of driving took us to Huskisson on the shores of the calm and beautiful Jervis Bay. Gary ticked over 250 000 km on the highway just south of our destination, which is about 20 years old in Land Rover Years. The place we stayed happened to be run by a fellow Land Rover enthusiast, so a good yarn and a rainy muddy sodden-grass set up later, and we were sleeping in our warm and dry roof tent.

With the rain in full force, we spent the next day mostly indoors exploring Huskisson until we ended up at the Pub for the afternoon, playing Bananagrams and Lost Cities and enjoying the local brew.

Adam finally finishes a Banana-lone game. Ruth Kindles.

Thankfully on Tuesday the weather cleared enough for a morning walk along the bay looking for geocaches (then the app went a bit weird and wouldn't load descriptions of any) and enjoying the sunshine. That afternoon we swam at the beach, lounged in the sunshine and generally dried out. Magic.

Wednesday morning let us enjoy a glorious sunrise with some yoga and a wander along the beach. An easy drive into Woolongong took us to a nice place for coffee, a bookstore for reading materials and a visit to the toy soldier shop for Adam's hobby cravings.

From Woolongong we drove to Berry, a gorgeous little town we were last in nearly four years ago for Adam's cousin Alexanders wedding. They have a great tea shop. Rooibos Chai is very nice.

Wednesday evening we arrived at cousin Alexander and his wife Sara's place in Sydney and got to meet their 6 month old son for the first time. Super cute little man. We hung out and learned that there is a plethora of vegan food options on Uber Eats where they live. Sweet.

After a morning wander around Rosebery, on the advice of cousin Sara we went and checked out a cool little place for brunch. Then we moseyed on down to the Domain / Botanic Gardens for some picnic rug (and digestion) time with a view of the harbour, bridge and opera house before moseying on over to Vegan Dim Sum Lunch. We safely navigated the mess of Inner Sydney streets to the airport, parked Gary securely then jumped on a flight to Perth.

When your blue latte matches your dress...

The rest we have sort of covered above. Stay tuned for next week!

Also coming up: Adam does a 10 000 km service on Gary in his Uncles driveway. What will he fix? What needs changing? Will Gary finally get a proper wash?

All our love,

Adam and Ruth

foragingforvegantreats

Statistics Update:

Days on the Road = 83

Distance Driven = 10 672 km (Quintuple digits!)

Mean Distance per Day = 129 km

Mean Fuel Economy = 14.05 L / 100 km

Best Fuel Economy = 12.17 L / 100 km (Port Lincoln to Port Augusta)

Nights Free Camping = 27

Nights in Roof Tent = 75/82

Coffees Purchased = 30