A merry xmas to one and all!

Out and about doing shopping - slabs of beer, haircuts, food for the xmas party which was planned for the evening. The party itslels was lots of fun as A-Ms family was joined by other local families for a regular meet-up.

We headed back towards Lorne after yet more jumping in rivers (as good a way as any to start the day). After lunch we had a quick play in the water at Lorne (complete with Dave surfing his head into the sand - no lasting damage done) and headed back towards Geelong. More bag repacking later and we bade temporary farewell to Claire and headed back to Melbourne. Met up with Kate in Carlton and admired her new car, complete as it was with an esky full of xmas fish f...

The morning saw a splitting of ways. Rob set off with Col to hike out and move the car on to the next pick up point, whilst we hiked on with Claire. This was tough stuff. Hills. Lots of hills. Heavy backpacks. Beating sun. Spirits were raised with lunch and swimming in cool rivers and the decision to head back to the relative tranquility of Aire River rather than attempt another hike in. Hurrah! We found a bottle shop that was open (never has cold beer tasted so ...

A day of two halves. For the morning, we had some wonderful walking on beautiful beaches and frolicked in some very impressive surf when we wanted to cool down (the sun was out with a vengeance today). Mid-afternoon, we did a car shuffle and set oursleves up with full camping gear for the 'hike in' walk to Ryan's Den (you have to take everything with you that you will need - there is no car access). This was less wonderful, as we walked and walked.....