Actually feel like falling asleep at 9:23 instead of blogging, but will force myself to stay awake. Kids were asleep by 8:45, the earliest so far. We set the alarm for 7:00 this morning, and will do so again for tomorrow ... we need to become early risers for this holiday so we can make better progress. It takes 2 to 2.5 hours to wake up, eat and pack all the gear to get on the road. Another great day today. Started with a ride on the miniature train at Big Rig ...

Great day today, just moseying around Roma. The kids found a friendly dog a couple of doors up from our caravan park, which they patted and played with through the fence. They called him “Wags”, and Max wondered if we could buy him. (He loved Aunty Michelle’s many dogs, too, especially Jack.) We walked beside the creek through the magnificent old river gums, tried out the new fitness equipment along the way ... it would have been a superb area before the r...

Today we drove from Cooyar to Roma, and tomorrow being Sabbath we will spend the day here rather than on the road. Roma seems quite a big and busy town, but hopefully we can find a nice walk somewhere. The country around Dalby was flat, but most of the rest of the way had some gentle hills and plenty of trees, which was a nice change. Not many birds around, though. The locomotive is in the Historic Village at Miles, where we stopped for lunch.

Today we enjoyed some sunshine and rest on Uncle David’s farm. And yes, it is a gorgeous and very quiet spot. 1200 acres, I’m told. The first highlight of the day was an exploration of the cattle yard, with its many pens and gates, the ramp and the piece de resistance, the cattle crush. We must have spent the best part of an hour working the levers and pretending to be, in turns, the sick cow, the vet and the farmer. Next we went for a ute ride through the ...

Mostly driving today. Bit annoying that it took from 10:30am to 6:00pm to do only 400km, and therefore we were pitching camp in the dark. The compensation is that we are in a lovely spot, a private farm in Queensland’s Darling Downs. I say lovely even though I haven’t seen the place yet, but it is mixed bushland and farmland set in rolling hills. There are no sounds apart from frogs and heavy breathing, quite a contrast from Moree where there were trucks, tra...