16 July

On the road again today, heading East for a change, we are soon on the East Coast. It was great to see the ocean again.

Our first stop was Bunnings, Brad search for his cap with built in torch continued. Chatting to a lady in the store, she told us of their recent flood experience. The flood waters reached 185cm in the store, everything that was not sitting on top of the shelving had to be disposed of. This was an enormous Bunnings store, a loss of around $8 million. The Bunnings store had been open only 10 weeks, approx. 18 weeks after the floods. The lady said, there are still whole suburb areas where the residents are still unable to live in their houses.

Our next stop was off to the beach, taking a walk along the strand (Esplanade). The sun was shining, a light breeze coming off the water. Palms, water, sand and green grass, we were in heaven after all the dirt (which is nothing compared with what is coming for us as we head to the Cape. We've started to see some very red dirty set ups driving south). We found the man made swimming hole, the boys went for a swim, the water was very pleasant, I wished I had my bathers on.

Continuing north tonight we are camped at the Hulls Heads Recreation area, a small beach front camp that is run by the coast guard.

We've decided we will try and tackle The Cape without the caravan. In preparation, the boys have started building tonight a pvc pipe water tank, that will sit inside the roof racks, there's a screw cap to fill, and a tap will be added. We'll paint it black to attract the heat. We've not used this sort of set up before, however, we've seen plenty of people use such a set up.