Wednesday, April 19, 2006

Easter Holiday in Moama

We picked Micayla up from school early on Thursday afternoon with the intention of leaving by 2.00pm. We finally made tracks at 3.30pm. The Monash was 50 minutes to Kings Way so we went a different way, overall the traffic wasn't too bad. We stopped for about 1/2 hour for dinner and got there around 8.00pm. A 4 1/2 hour trip, a bit longer than usual but it could've been worse. It didn't take us long and we were set up when Marty, Julie, Sarah and Brandon arrived around 11.30pm. And that was it, all our clan had arrived. For various reasons most of our usuals couldn't make this Easter, so it made for a very quiet relaxing trip.

Our annexe is very old and leaks so we have a tarp over the roof of it. We'd left it up from the last time we were there and when we arrived we found it torn and shredded. It looked like the annexe was wearing a hula skirt. It was too late to do anything by 8pm so we decided we'd buy a new tarp in the morning, after all we weren't expecting rain until late Friday. At 5.30am it started raining so here we were out in the rain at 5.30 putting up a tarp we got out of Scott and Tania's van. Happy we were covered again we went back to bed. When we got up in the morning we found that Scott and Tania's tarp leaks too and we were all wet under foot in the annexe. Bought a new tarp and got it up before a thunderstorm hit us. It rained all Friday evening and we spent the night entertaining Marty and Julie inside our van. The boys were planning their high country trip on the lap top while Julie and I chatted eating and drinking.

Saturday we went and visited my sister and brother in law Rochelle and Mark and their kids Kieran and Taylah. It was Taylah's birthday a couple of weeks earlier so we gave her her present and the kids had a ball playing on the bikes and scooter on the road outside their van. We came home and lounged around with a glass of wine/beer around the fire. We then set up the spit and cooked a delicous leg of lamb smothered in rosemary and thyme and had roasted potato and pumpkin in the camp oven/pan in the fire. Brandons comment was "we are cooking our food in the ground". How cute! We had no more rain for the rest of the weekend and sat around a beautiful warm fire.
Sunday morning the kids got up to their Easter Eggs and then wanted to go swimming. How could they? It was freezing. Because of the cold we had not even bothered to put the boat in the water. The girls nagged and nagged, so we thought if we take them swimming they'll feel how cold it is and get out and not nag anymore. They were very brave, toe testing first but ended up waist deep in the water. While the girls
were swimming Bailey was throwing rocks and sticks into the water. After a while they got cold and hopped out for the rest of the day; well at least until they started nagging to put the boat in the water because they wanted a biscuit. We decided to put the boat in at Echuca wharf and decided to take a little cruise to see the Port of Echuca by boat. We then decided to find a spot to ski from and Adrian kept driving and driving and we were freezing in the wind. We'd gone so far that when we found a spot we discovered we were actually only about 2 k's from our camp spot. Remember we launched in Echuca and we camp in Moama. I didn't bother to ski, cause the water was just way too cold. I was standing in the water for about 10 minutes and usually, after a while, your feet get used to the cold water but mine just kept getting icyer. The girls had one biscuit then we were taken back to camp while the boys went and brought the boat back in. While everyone was gone, we were sitting in the van and it was quiet all around, then Micayla spotted a Kangaroo bouncing through our campsite. The kids were all very excited and it jumped over the fence like it was bouncing over a stick and hopped away. We had another quite night by the fire before packing up the next morning to go home. Home to the big clean up before Micayla went back to school the next day. Although we were keen to get to school, because late Thursday afternoon we had a phone call from her teacher to say we had won 3rd prize in the school Easter raffle. There was 18 prizes all up. Now we have Easter Eggs to last us until next Easter. It was a washing basket full of bunnies, eggs etc but there were also books, toys, teddies and stationery, just to break up the chocolate.

1 comment:

Laura said...

Hi Andrea

Loved your story of Easter at Moama. The photos are fantastic, I felt like I was there. Sounds like you had a relatively relaxing time up there except for the rain and chill factor. Wish we could have been there, maybe Christmas?
From Laura, Dave and Kaytie