Writing these newsletters has always been a great way to recap and relive the past week or so’s adventures. Reflecting on the last 10 odd days, I initially had an impression in my mind of chill beach times and casual driving days.
Pfft righto bro.
We had downs, we had ups, we had terrible weather and we had amazing glass off pristine days.
We took delivery of our FOURTH RTT - numero 3 sprang a leak in the deluge we endured - can confirm a soaked mattress is not fun.
I (GL) had a bucket list dream come true. Hint, it involves ocean dwelling mammals.
KL is finally getting over her fear of surfing. Just shows what a nagging pain I can be 😁
I (GL) gone and messed up big time - I lost our main action cam 😬
(It’s amazing how often we have gone from high to low (or vice versa) within 24 hrs)
AND
We stumbled upon one of the top spots of the entire trip - BIG CALL.
Let’s also not forget our cheeky school night stop over in Sydney. You might not take us for the city kind of people. You would be correct, but we just had to drive over that Sydney Harbour Bridge, ya know 😉.
CURRENT STATE OF PLAY
I’m struggling to recall this last week ish’s adventures. We’ve done and moved so much, but then, at the same time, we really haven’t. Compared to some of the distances we covered in the North, we haven’t driven that far. On the other side of the coin, we have popped in and out of so many towns, coves, beaches and bays it’s all swirling.
Best thing to do in these situations is whip out Yahoo Maps and timeline it!
As of last week’s edition, we have boosted through:
Eden → Merimbula → Batemans Bay → Jervis Bay (my word, what a spot) → Kiama → Wollongong → Sydney (Maroubra, Coogee, Kirribilli, Manly) → Newcastle → Booti Booti (one of the all-time names) → Forster → Crowdy Head → Port Macquarie → Hat Head (all time spot) → Nambucca Heads → Coffs Harbour → Woolgoolga
Above mentioned spots are notable mentions where we have stopped to overnight, surf, or just enjoy some local and cultural cuisines (aka McDonalds).
This week’s honourable mentions go out to;
→ Emma (KL friend from way back) for hosting us for morning tea in her adorable house in Berkley/Wollongong.
→ Maddy (KL friend from way back), Ben (Maddy’s partner in crime) and Georgia (the fun housemate) for throwing us a pizza party, mid-week, on the fancy side of the Sydney Harbour Bridge. Always enjoyable towling rookies at Monopoly Deal 💪. Hot tip - don’t give newbies the cards with the rules on them 😘
As far as trip dynamics go, it’s an odd space we’re in currently.
We drove by our first distance to Brisbane sign - “Brisbane 563km” away. This brought with it all the mixed emotions of a journey coming to an end, and the excitement of reunion. The weather has been diagnosed with bipolar - it doesn’t know what it wants to do - rain, shine, storm, blow a gale or a combo of all. Budget camps are becoming such a threatened species, we have heard David Attenborough has been enlisted in a new documentary about it. Normal camps are chockers due to NSW School Holidays goers still at large and, lastly, our bank account is looking more and more like Christian Bale from the Machinist. Naturally our thoughts are turning towards the immediate future of jobs and income. KL has lined up some part time work encouraging people not to drown in swimming pools, and I’ve knocked back a few job opportunities in search of something…. more on this at another time.
So yes. An interesting time we find ourselves in.
Story time.
Since KL’s mysterious foot injury. We have opted for chilled out beach vibes to assist with her R&R. We have found those in abundance. The coastline between Melbourne and Sydney has been incredible - Eden and Merimbula being two of our favourite spots. Post Sydney, the coastline between Port Macquarie and Coffs Harbour, equally as good.
Both KL and I are in the infancy of our surfing journeys. You may recall we picked her up a swanky new board in Exmouth and since then it’s had a pitiful amount of use. Queue the last couple of weeks and I have lost track at how many times i have been up and down onto the roof racks retrieving and tying down our boards. I don’t know what it is, but there is just something about pulling the boards down, waxing on and waxing off before going bobbing in some surf. This became our morning routine for the 3 days we spent in Jervis Bay and then the 4 days we spent at Hat head. Honourable mentions also go out to Eden and Wilson’s Prom for the fantastic surfing we had there too.
We have really been able to just spend some amazing quality time in the water. We’ve worked through KL’s surfing PTSD she picked up on the Sunny Coast (my bad) and she’s really getting into the groove on her board.
Both Jervis Bay and Hat Head were miracle finds. We had heard of Jervis Bay before, but only of the coastal village vibes in the bay itself. We opted out of the crowded side and went into Booderee NP. While getting a coffee at the local general store, old mate born again told us that Cave Beach and Bherwerre Beach were the places to be and praise be to the almighty, he was not wrong.
It is the first time, besides surfing at Little Cove up near Noosa, that KL has ever hassled me to go out for a surf the next day. She had waves fever!
What we’ve noticed about the beaches on this Southern / Sapphire / Central Coast, compared to the Sunshine Coast, is we have to mission more. We surmise that the beaches and views are much of a muchness between here and the Sunshine Coast, however, whenever you talk to Southerners of the Sunshine Coast, it elicits an interesting reaction. The eyes glaze over whilst the face takes on a wistful longing - “Ahhhhh the Sunshine Coast” they say, “We have plans to move there.” Better get in quick then bruvv, otherwise the rest of Australia will beat you to it.
So many people, all over Aus, have mentioned that they would love to move to the Sunshine Coast. Having lived there for a few years, it is fantastic, but KL and I still wonder at why it’s so iconic. The beaches, water, and towns we’ve chanced upon this side of the country have been just as cool, vibey and buzzy as those on the SC. There are waves up there and there are waves down here. Sure, the weather may be a wee bit cooler in patches and wetsuits may have to be worn at times, but we’re still pondering the mystery. Maybe once we’ve moved and lived in Merimbula for a few years we can advise further.
Anyway, circling back. What we’ve found is to get to good beaches this way, you have to mission. It’s not as easy as pull up, get out of your car and within 10 paces your in the ocean (maybe that’s the SC’s secret 🤔). At times we’ve had to walk a few kilometres to get to the beach, including lugging of surfboards. Caves and Berhwerre beaches being an example - Caves beach was 700 ish metres, with Bherwerre a juicy 1.7km ish, from the carpark. Thank the lordy that people are lazy, because Bherwerre was some sort of paradise and we had it mostly all to ourselves.
On the topic of paradise - Hat Head has been voted by The Kadon Experience as being top 3 places experienced on the Expedition Australia Take 1 series.
We are not really supposed to be sharing such secrets, we had a few of the locals advise us to keep our lips sealed. The less people that know of it, the better and we couldn’t agree more. However, we feel we owe it to our vast audience…..
What makes it so special. It’s hard to describe, but I shall do my best. It’s a wee town nestled at the end of a headland and in the bounds of a National Park. Because of this, development opportunity is low, so it feels like what coastal towns may have been like pre-development booms. One caravan park, one pub, one grocery store and one take away store. A few holiday rentals and a few permanent residents. Everyone knows everyone and even though it’s kind of clicky, you feel welcomed. The caravan park was absolutely packed. But we never felt crowded out oddly enough.
To us, the town beach was reminiscent of Noosa’s main beach. Stunning. Water so clear that you could see the flatheads and mullet swim under and past you. I stepped on at least 30 of the bloody things, so marine life for days. That’s the Northern end of the Head. The Southern, wilder end of the head has only one NP campsite. There is a track onto the beach that you can drive as far as the eye can see. It reminded us of Indian Head on Fraser Island, except less hectic and sharky.
Usually, I wouldn’t have the balls to go surf the wild side. Rips and currents and wild seas are not fun. Rolling onto the beach, and what do we see, 5 or so surfers catching the most glorious of waves rolling off the headland. The heart got pumping and what ya know, I’m paddling out before KL had time to put Frodo into park. We timed the pants of this it was glorious. But. Not 10 minutes into my attempted wave catching, I see a dark shape lurking in the water. A big splash later and, great, now I have the Jaws theme song running through my mind. Before I can react, the shape to comes towards me at pace. Just as I’m about to squid ink the water to cover my exit, the thing gets into a wave and leaps out of the water a few metres in front of me. Dolphins! Suddenly I am surrounded by a dozen or so of them all zooming in and out of the waves. A mother and her calf zoom under my board and catch the next wave before continuing down the coast. I couldn’t believe it, fear, adrenaline, and amazement all course through me as I get cheap shotted by the next set.
A dream come true - surfing with dolphins. Well, they did most of the surfing.
Unfortunately, KL got caught napping on the job and there is no footage of this momentous occasion. Just my word for it.
As with all things, we cannot always be riding the highs of life. We must get dumped at some point.
This dumping came in the form of a wet tent mattress. The diagnosis of which, is still unknown to us. I.e. we have no idea how water was getting in, but on packing down a dry mattress, then driving through rain and popping up the tent, it was wet - but only in the front-end corners. We spent the best part of the week in limbo, caught between wet days, wet nights and doing our best to air out the dam thing while trying to figure out if it was an us issue or a tent issue. Fortunately, we have a good relationship with James Baroud and were in comms with potential fixes. In the end it came to down to a tent issue. James Baroud kindly offered to replace the leaky one with a brand new, fresh off the boat from the factory, one.
Here comes tent number FOUR.
To some, this might be an unacceptable number of replacements and I can imagine there might be a baying in the background for a refund etc. etc.
As the reader, you may be thinking that 4 is still high and in previous Newsletter additions you have told us that you’ve wasted time, effort, and cash in trying to sort out defects in a supposed premium tent. So, it sounds like there may be a quality issue here?
I would say you are most likely right. Sounds like there is a bit of an issue with the new RTT model’s construction and/or materials used and we have effectively done free testing for JB. I can’t argue with that. There have been times we have been beyond frustrated with the issues. But, with each new tent we’ve received, we have seen the changes JB have done to improve any defects identified. E.g. a clasp broke, it was replaced with a more robust clasp. The front bar was cracking, they added extra clasps to prevent this. Someone complained that inside the tent the metal bar was cold to touch at night and a condensation issue. JB sewed a material skirting around the bar to prevent this. There are more of these examples.
If it were another product or another company, this would most likely be the way we would go.
But there are a few things keeping us on the James Baroud train.
1. There is no other tent on the market, that I’m aware of, within the price range, that has the same specs as this RTT. There are other RTT’s that have aspects of what we need / want, but none of them can combine it all into one. E.g. hard shells that weigh under 70kgs, that can also store bedding inside them, have roof rack capabilities, full pop over clamshell, amazing airflow, and low wind noise.
2. Customer service has reached legendary levels. Most of the time these days, when dealing with customer service reps of companies, you feel as if you are guilty until proven otherwise, or it’s a blame game. This has not once been the case with JB. It’s always been an apology for the issues, how can we help to fix and get you on with having a great experience. Being contactable for advice or organising a tent swap, delivered to us, within days. This time, we were in contact with JB about the issue of the leaky tent on Sunday. By Tuesday JB advised us that they would replace our tent, the leak was a defect, and they would drive down on the Thursday, from their Yamba factory to us in Newcastle, to replace it - a 10 hour return journey. I don’t know of many other companies that would react and/or go out of their way like that.
In the end we are happy with everything, and the shitty parts just get catalogued under “it’s all part of the journey.”
LOOKAHEAD
Not much to report on the future to be honest.
We are going to continue to potter in and out of wee coastal villages until we reach the dregs of the GC methinks.
What I can tell you is we shall be stopping in at Yamba over the Australia Day weekend and Byron Bay after that. Byron Bay will be the second last trip milestone, being the Western most and last compass point we have to reach on the mainland.
For any of those on the Youtube train, there may, depending on how things time out, be a bit of a pause between some of the videos. We have been filming as we go along, but we haven’t stopped off to do too much editing. We have wanted to really enjoy the last few weeks of the trip and we have not wanted to waste too much time set up on the laptop editing away at videos. We shall complete the videos and they shall be posted - the edit likely to be done from air-conditioned comfort in Brisbane as opposed to a random hot and humid park bench.
The last and saddest thing to report is; whilst surfing the glorious Hat Head waves, I lost our action camera, Rocky.
We picked Rocky up in Rockhingam, Perth, after our GoPro died and he’s been amazing for filming. All our videos from Perth onwards have been shot on Rocky and he shall be sorely missed. Rocky was a DJI Action 2 camera and me being me (GL) thought I could take him out surfing. The vision was some sick ezz POV shots slicing across dem waves, or at the very least some funny falling off waves footage. Rocky came with a magnetic lanyard you could clip him onto and wear over your neck. In theory and in my head, this worked perfectly, as he had never come off his magnetic lanyard clip, yet. However, about 20-30mins into the surf session. with everything working as well as it could to that point, I tried catching one quite aggressive wave. This wave resulted in me falling off and tumbling around a wee bit. By the time I got back onto my board and paddled behind the break, Rocky was no longer with me.
So RIP Rocky.
Key Travel Stats:
Distance travelled: 33,902kms
Wild animal of the week: Surfing Dolphins
Current Map posi:
