Thursday, January 31, 2013

Our Holiday.....Making Our Way Home

Thursday 24th January, 2013

After breakfast and checking out of the motel we had to find our way out of Canberra.  

Lake Burley Griffen......Canberra is built around it

City shopping centre

A couple of wrong turns and still thinking we were heading in the wrong direction we finally found the sign for the next town that we had to head to......Yass.



From Yass we made our way down the Hume Highway to Albury Wodonga.  As we travelled down the highway we came across the town of Gundagai.  We stopped here for coffee.  In the park were these bronzed statues of Dad, Dave, Mum and Mabel.



When I was growing up as a young child radio serials were all we listened to as we didn't have television.  One of these radio serials was called "Dad and Dave".  They lived in Snake Gully and as I recall Dave got up to all sorts of mischief.  His girlfriend was Mabel.

About 8 kilometres out of Gundagai is the "Dog on the Tuckerbox".  We went back to show Katie and ended up having some lunch.  In the late 1830's this area was well known for bushrangers including Ned Kelly and his gang paying the town a visit.



After lunch we made our way down the Highway to Albury Wodonga. 


Travelling the Hume Highway

As we were heading south we came across a small town of Holbrook.  There in the middle of town, in a park was this......... a submarine!!!


Albury is on the New South Wales side of the River Murray, Wodonga is on the Victorian side.  We had a short drive around Albury and I found it to be quite a nice  town.  We plan on going back and staying for a day or two.

Main street of Albury

I just liked the name Yackandandah

As it was still early we decided to go onto Wagga Wagga and spend the night there.  Wagga has the Kapooka Army Base nearby.  We found a motel, booked in and went off to have some dinner.  When we came back Katie and Tony went swimming.  






This morning, Friday, we head into Victoria and Swan Hill.  Our plan is to spend the night there.  

Still got a way to go

After yesterdays temperature of 40C, today was a bit cooler.  Most of the day the temperature hovered around 35-38C.  Thank god for car air conditioning.

Around lunch time we came to Jerilderie, a small town of around 700 people just 45 kms (28 miles) north of the Victorian border.  We stopped at the local bakery for lunch.

In the 1870's Ned Kelly and his gang terrorised this town.


While Tony filled the car with petrol Katie washed the windscreen.



Back on the road we made our way to Victoria.  We passed through Echuca, a river port on the Murray River.  This is another place we would like to come back and visit.



Hey Bob, that's a nice size fish!!

We finally made it to Swan Hill.  


Forgetting that this weekend was a long weekend because of Australia Day, we had some trouble booking into a motel.  We finally found one, Swan Hill Resort.


What a place!  They had everything, indoor/outdoor pools, spa, mini golf, tennis, pool tables, table tennis tables and barbques.  It was a shame we were only staying for the night.
No prizes for guessing what we did after dinner.




Finally it was Saturday and we had made it to the last day of our holiday.  We still had about a 6 hour drive ahead of us.  That's not including any stops.  We had to head to Mildura, Renmark and then onto Adelaide.  When we reached Robinvale we had to cross the river back into New South Wales and travel to Mildura. 


We saw a sign that said Sydney, it was tempting to take that road.  

We stopped in Mildura for lunch.  Then it was onto South Australia. How good was it to see this?



Won't be long before we are home now!

While driving through Paringa we made a stop at the cemetery.  Katie was 21 months old when my Mum died and 5 years old when my Dad passed away.  It was the first time she had been to the cemetery to see where their ashes had been placed.

I showed her my grandparents grave, and some other family members.  She wandered off looking at the other graves, Tony and I stopped to look at some others.  

I wondered where she was.  Thinking that she may have gone back and sat in the car this is what we saw.....


I wondered what she was thinking.

We finally made it home around 5.15pm.  Kahra and Darrin called by shortly after to pick Katie up.

We had had a fantastic time.  Katie was so excited telling Kahra and Darrin about her trip.  In all we traveled a total of 3545 kilometres.

Now to plan our next trip away.
  


















1 comment:

  1. I had no laptop with me at work today, so I could not leave you a comment. While the Mrs was having her breakfast, I was enjoying your blog posts on my tablet. I must say, I'm really enjoying this vacation of yours. I just love all your photos. That last photo was simply wonderful. I too would wonder what goes through a child's mind when they come face to face with the memorials of all those who came and went before them. Thank you for another wonderful visit. You have a great night, hugs, Edna B.

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