We have finally made it home after a wonderful five months away.

Our last real day of the holiday (Day 141) proved to be one of the highlights of the trip. We took Kev up on the offer of a day out on his Catamaran and left the Cairns Yacht Club at 730am heading out to Fitzroy Island. It took us over 2 hrs to make our way out to the Island, with a mixture of motoring and sailing. We had a hook up late morning at the same time as a young whale decided to come and swim beside us - the kids thought it was brilliant. Max and Mark got onto a Mackerel Shark that Max enjoyed pulling in, but unfortunately it got off about 10m from the boat. Max wasn't disappointed - he got to see it a couple of times when it jumped out of the water. It was nearly 2pm before we put the anchor down off Fitzroy Island and cooked up some snags on the BBQ. Tess and Mark both enjoyed a swim - Mark tied a rope to Tess' life jacket so she could bounce around off the back. We got moving again at about 4pm and and by 5pm the line whizzed out the back.......and Mark was straight onto it. He spent nearly 10mins pulling in a rippa Spanish Mackerel - 1.08m ! And boy was Max happy !! Finally they'd landed the metre plus fish.....it was Max's no. 1 aim for the trip. There was sooo much excitement and chatter following getting the fish on board, and lots of photos were taken. It was nearly 8pm before we got back to Cairns and unloaded our gear. We had dinner at the Yacht Club, but by the time dinner was served it was after 830pm and Tess was falling asleep in her chair (Max was still talking about landing the Spanish Mack) - it was a big big day and nearly 10pm when we got back to camp.

Day 142 was pack up day, and time to start making our way home. We left the Caravan Park after doing a much needed load of washing - Max's clothes were soooo smelly after holding and touching the Spanish Mack! We drove out of Cairns late morning and managed to get just over 500kms done before pulling up at our worst camp stop of the trip - right alongside the hwy at a place called Guthalungra. We enjoyed some Mackerel for tea before retreating to bed and falling asleep to the sound of trucks roaring past.

We were up bright and early on Day 143 - the trucks and a train were a great alarm clock. We were on the road by 8am and did another 560kms before sneaking into Mt Morgan to surprise Ty and Ess at the pub. We enjoyed another catch up with them over tea, before the kids and I retired to bed. Mark, Ty and Ess sat up chatting til 1am in the morning - madness.

Day 144 was a bit slower.......it was after 11am before we left Mt Morgan with another big day driving on the cards. We didn't want to drive the coast road due to the road works that we experienced last time, so headed for Dululu, Bioela and then into Dalby. Although the roads were awful, it was a nice drive and not too much traffic which was nice. The weather was good and we were desperate to enjoy the last rays of sunshine before hitting Victoria. We enjoyed Noodle Box for tea in Dalby and continued to drive on, eventually stopping at a truck stop for the night between Milmerran and Inglewood (still in Qld) at 945pm. We had the top of the camper thrown over and the kids swags inside about 10mins later, and by 10pm Tess was snoring. We had a good sleep, but the long day and 630kms had taken its toll on us and we were all pretty enxhausted going to bed.

Unfortunately we lost the benefit of the night driving by sleeping in till after 8am, so Day 145 was even slower than our start at Mt Morgan. It was a struggle to get the kids moving, and it was 945am before we pulled out of camp. We crossed the border into NSW at a place called Texas, and the temperature started to drop. We stopped at Moree for lunch and found a fantastic playground - though it proved difficult to drag the kids away when it was time to move. We had the first car trouble of the trip on the other side of Moree, with the fuel light coming on. It turns out it was a blocked fuel filter so we got that sorted at Narrabri and $40 and 15 mins later we were on our way. We checked the forecast for the overnight temp at Dubbo and it was going to get down to 6 degrees overnight. We figured we could handle camping in that (as opposed to getting a unit), so decided to pull into the Eumungerie Rec Reserve 40kms shy of Dubbo in time to cook tea. We jumped out of the car in shorts and t-shirts but very quickly piled on the jumpers, trackies and beanies - it was cold!! We ended up grabbing every spare blanket we had, and the kids and I went to bed with socks on while Mark resorted to a beanie. Turns out it got down to 1.8 degrees ...... far too cold for camping!

After a nippy night Mark's alarm went off at 630am on Day 146 in an attempt to get us up and going at a reasonable time. Tess and I started the morning with a lap around the Rec Reserve in an attempt to warm up. We had a quick breakfast and continued south through Parkes and onto Forbes where we enjoyed a great cuppa. It was then onto West Wyalong, Narrandera and Jerilderie before hitting Conargo. Mark was keen to show the kids the Conargo Pub, and the boys enjoyed a game of pool while Tess enjoyed Pink (So What) on the jukebox. We arrived in at Deniliquin at 5pm having done over 600kms, and were very happy to step inside a cabin and turn a heater on.

Day 147 was to be the last day of the trip - we decided to take the kids to Echuca and check out the site of our wedding at Braund Bend. We then headed in to show them The Pevensey (the paddle steamer we got married on), and they both thought that was pretty great. Of course they wanted a ride, but we've decided we'll go back and do that another day. We left Echuca and headed for Bendigo, and were struck by the horrid wintery weather about 15mins out of Echuca. By the time we got to Bendigo the sun was out again but it was still pretty cool. We called in to see Carmen at the cemetry and thanked her for taking care of us whilst on the trip. The drive from Bendigo to Yendon felt like the longest of the trip.......Tess was getting rather bored.....'how long to go', 'when will we see Candy'. We arrived home at 5pm and were greeted by 7 degrees outside! Thankfully Mum and Dad had the fire roaring so it was a balmy 26 degrees inside. Tess was out of the car and headed straight to Candy - and although the dog seemed happy to see us, I'm sure she was wondering why we had deserted her for 5 months! Mum and Dad had balloons and a 'welcome home' banner up for us, and of course dinner and bottle of red to share. The kids spent the next few hours dragging their toys out of the playroom and jumping on their beds. Tess then enjoyed a nice long bath - something she had really missed (and often needed!) on her travels.

It's hard to believe that we've been gone nearly 5 months - 21 fabulous weeks in the sunshine. We've covered a massive 26,718 kms (with a fuel cost of just over $6,500) and have had such a wonderful time doing it. It has been brilliant to have been able to enjoy the time with each other, and to see some truly magnificent parts of the country. Of course we are now already thinking about how and when we will be able to manage to do it all again.

Many people are have asked what our highlights were, and it's hard to pick out just three but I've had a go......

1. Our time at Cobourg (Arnhem Land) - thanks to Chan we experienced a brilliant part of the world that was never even on the agenda when we set out (in fact I didn't even know where it was when she first mentioned it).

2. Out on the Catamaran with Kev - another highlight that wasn't part of the planned trip - and such a great way to finish off the holiday. Catching "The Spanish Mack" absolutely made Max's trip!

3. The Gibb River Rd - it was mid-late May when we did The Gibb and it seems like such a long time ago. The gorge walks and swimming holes were spectacular and it's not hard to fall in love with that part of the world. We look forward to doing it again with Corey, Kristy and the boys in a few years.

But for now it's back to reality.......cleaning out the car (you can't imagine what it's like after 5 months on the road), doing many loads of washing, getting Max organised for school on Monday and Tess to Kinder Tuesday (the kids are very excited to be seeing their friends again).

The last job on the blog now is to organise the Travel Journal - "Off Exploring" print a bound copy with each of the blog entries and all of our posted photos. It will be a great keepsake of our fabulous trip and one that we hope the kids will enjoy re-reading in years to come.

Signing off ......The Filmers