Batemans Bay to Sydney... and my birthday!!

Hello lovely people!! Apologies for not posting sooner, it turns out that not being at school hasn't stopped my procrastination skills from thriving 🙃

Our first stop since my last post was Batemans Bay, a nice coastal town where we planned on staying for about 3 nights... until it extended to 6. Unfortunately, the weather was quite dodgy while we stayed here so we didn't end up travelling around a lot. The highlights from this stop were; the cute hippy town called Mogo nearby (it gave very strong Tarremah vibes), a weekend market at another nearby town... and my birthday!

We actually weren't planning on spending my birthday in Batemans but given the weather up north, we decided to stay where we were until it cleared up a little bit. I had mixed feelings about this birthday, I was super ready to turn 15 and was looking forward to celebrating it on the road but it was also my first birthday away from home and my sister and mum. On the actual day, I ended up heading to a nearby zoo where I got to feed giraffes! My dad had to stay outside with Pedro so I spent a lot of my 15th alone. I absolutely loved the zoo and stayed there for around three hours (despite the persistent rain) before getting picked up and heading back to the caravan for the afternoon. It was a lovely surprise arriving back at our site as my dad had cooked cupcakes for me in the griller while I was out. I then had a short call with my grandparents before video calling my mum and sister so they could join in with the singing of Happy Birthday. It was definitely an interesting birthday but certainly fun!

We then finally decided we should probably travel further north and headed off to Shoalhaven Heads.

Shoalhaven was my great-grandparent's dwelling place when my dad was a kid so there was quite a bit of reminiscing for him. In terms of what we actually did there, well... not much. Even though we decided the weather was good enough for us to move, it didn't mean the weather was actually good. The entire time we stayed in Shoalhaven it was pouring with rain. Pretty much the only thing we did was head to the beach right next to our campsite and even that ended up with all three of us being drenched. After two days of hunkering down we decided to move again, this time inland. This was our last attempt to avoid the rain.

Our inland move also led to our first "farm stay". This meant we stayed on people's property instead of a campsite. The family whose property we stayed on was lovely and they had a daughter around my age which was nice. This stop was fairly packed with things to do as my dad had many rellies in the area that he hadn't caught up with in years.

We first met with my dad's uncle Rob and his partner Kate. Rob worked as a car mechanic specialising in MGs so we got to have a look around his (many) workshops. Rob then got swamped with other car fanatics over for their Saturday catch-up so we went into the nearby town of Picton for lunch.

After our lunch, we then headed to my dad's cousin's place. Dave and his partner Trish lived in a very newly built suburb with very nice houses so I was initially a bit unsure of what they would be like. After only a short while at their house, Trish's daughter and her fiancee came over. This was when I got very excited as I met my (sadly) closest gay rellies! Trish's daughter and her (rather attractive) fiancée had just returned from a cruise in Hawaii and were very excited to share about their recent travels. After I chatted to them for a while we were roused by the sound of an engine revving out the front. Trish's son had arrived after his trip back from Canberra where he'd picked up a new motorbike. We stood out the front as everyone (my dad) admired his new bike and I chatted to my newly found gay rellies about the recent gay agenda. After the bike was adequately examined and all agendas were sorted, we said our farewells and headed back to our campsite. The other rellie we saw on this stop was my dad's other cousin, Cherie. We weren't expecting to catch up with Cherie and her family on this trip as they had recently experienced a family loss so we were excited when they invited us over for a visit.

Cherie and her husband Gavin had two kids, Charlotte (18) and Ben (early 20s). I particularly enjoyed chatting to Charlotte about all of her animals and her hopes for a future career in veterinary. Charlotte had 3 horses, 2 dogs, 2 cats, 2 bunnies, 1 guinea pig and 1 fish. I loved meeting her three horses and hearing about all the different things she does daily to care for them. It made me fully appreciate the effort horse owners go to to manage their pets (although it didn't discourage me from getting one in the future). We said bye to this impressively big family and headed back to our campsite for our final night there. In the morning after packing up, I said bye to Holly (the girl whose property we were staying on) and we drove to our next site.

Our next stop was Camden so my dad could catch up with some more rellies (the last ones I promise). We went and saw my dad's aunt and uncle, Helen and Ron. Although I hadn't seen Helen and Ron in years, I felt as though I knew them better than the other rellies we'd seen. Pedro unfortunately had to stay outside given their pet cat so I didn't spend a lot of time in the house. Out the back, Pedro and I got to enjoy Ron's extensive collection of birds (mainly finches) and Pedro was also gifted a toy star from Helen. We then had to head off so we didn't get caught in crazy Sydney traffic.