We stayed the night at a Motel in Traralgon that looked like it could have been hired by the hour, before heading South as soon as possible after all of us had some very long and hot showers. The weather began to draw in again and rain was pelting on the windows so we stopped, just prior to Wilsons Prom, at a lovely little town called Fish Creek. We grabbed a coffee and then went for some lunch before noticing a little store that was, unbelievably, Alison Lester's own shop. This well renowned Australian author wrote the book that we have mentioned before in this diary, "Are we there yet?" and this was actually where she grew up and lived and the store is where she is based. We chatted to the chap who works with Alison and runs the store and told him how we modelled our trip on her book, which we read the boys each night before bed whilst they were young. Alison wasn't there but we bought a lovely limited edition print and she promised to sign it for us as the guy who runs the store called her up and spoke to her about us and how stoked we were. We skipped across the road, had some lunch and a bottle of wine, which soon turned into 3 bottles of wine and ended up cancelling the camping that night and stumbling back across the road to the local pub, begging for a room through slurred speech and red wine stained lips. We all crashed that night in bed watching the cricket and got up early the next morning to get to our next destination which was an off the beaten track place to stay called Shallow Inlet. We were to meet Nat and Tony Timothy that afternoon so we had some time to kill and headed as far south as we could to Tidal Creek and grabbed a free shuttle bus to the base of Mt Oberon. It said a 3.4 km walk to the summit and since our boys smashed it on Mt Kosciusko this would be a walk in the park. (No pun intended...) What we didn't count on was the 45 degree slope the path was on for the full duration of the walk so by the time we got to the top Bailey was in tears and we were reciting inspirational quotes about not giving up to the boys just to keep them going. There were some final stairs to ascend but we managed those and it was well worth it. The view was spectacular. We took some photos then made the decent down past a bunch of young 20 somethings on a weekend away. Harry pulled me aside and whispered in my ear pointing to one of the girls who was wearing about 2 square inches of lycra and nothing else and had a sensational set of legs on her and asked me "Is she sexy Daddy?"……"Ummmm…..yes" I whispered back, but Fi heard and the rest of the trip down was a silent affair.

Arriving back at the campsite we met Nat and Tony and their three kids, Ella, Sam and Will. The cricket set came out, the barbie got put on and the beers were opened. Ahhh…it was such a lovely evening watching the kids smash the ball around and the adults just chilling out and laying back. After snaggers and buns for the children and some chook for us we all donned our jackets and went on a hunt for wombats. Shuffling through the bush the chances were a little less than 2% of finding a wombat as the kids were louder than the AC/DC concert Bailey and I went to and so anything for 3km away would have heard us. We eventually split up and the group with no boys saw the bum of a wombat as it scurried back into the bushes. The group that missed the hairy arse gathered and went hunting for it. A few tense moments when scaling a rusty barbed wire fence and skirting around a 16th birthday party that had doof doof music blaring we finally spotted one! It was on the road ahead of us and his faint outline was just visible from the substandard glare of our $5 torch we got at BCF. Fi whipped out the iphone and took a few snaps for evidence but it may be a case of "the infamous Wilson Prom wombat" at future dinner party conversations as the shot is grainier than the "Nessie" photo of 1934….

The following morning we all headed for a nature walk which lasted about 29 seconds as we saw 6 Emus, 2 kangaroos and loads of wombat faeces as soon as we got out of the car so agreed that that box was ticked so all of us made our way to Squeaky Beach. This was a lovely white sandy beach with crystal clear water. I got my kit off and went for a swim for about 3 minutes before retiring to the beach with painfully shrunken testicles and mild hyperthermia as this is the Southern most point of mainland Australia and backs onto the Southern Ocean. We then had another drama as Harry got himself wedged in-between two boulders as the tide was coming in but a few good shoves and we managed to drag him out with a few tears. The highlight for Tony and I was a group of 21 year old female Swedish back packers who suddenly appeared out of nowhere, stripped off all their clothes and went swimming, nude, in the sub-zero waves. I told Fi we should stay just in case they needed some assistance if they struggled in the water but she quietly reminded me that they are probably used to the cold and should I follow them into the water I would ,most likely not have any testicles to shrink by the time we got back to Perth…..

Saying our fond farewells to the Timothys we headed back to Fish Creek where we managed to meet up with Alison Lester who signed a book for us and was really happy to pose for a photo. How cool was that!!!