Left at our usual time of 8am and headed northwards. Oh, my goodness to get across the other side of Sydney takes forever, three and half hours later we were finally at Brooklyn where we stopped for lunch and then felt we were finally on holidays. We travelled on and finally ended up at Taree for the night at the Dawson River Caravan Park really quite nice. Very long drive but we needed to get to Casino by Friday. So off we tottered for another 400km drive on Friday up through the coast stopping at Woolgoolga for a delicious lunch. We will definitely keep doing the timing to make that a stopoff point when travelling north. Arrived at Casino where Wally had mixed up our bookings but we did finally get into the one near the airport….hmmmm this could be a problem as we are here for five days and there is drag racing on all day Sunday…..hmmmm. Casino also has the ugliest water tower ever made I think but at night it is a splendour on its own with green and yellow lights illuminating the night sky…..looks like a psychedelic space ship about to land. Where is your sense of beauty or taste people of Casino.

Today being Saturday we went out to the Bonalbo Show which is an icon unto itself. Saw quite a few cows and luckily Brahmans which are my favourite anyway. Very small place and a show that is truly agricultural and not the garbage touristy stuff of the Royal Easter Show. An hour was as long as we could manage after watching dogs and horses and cows do their stuff.

Wally had a Facebook request by a friend, from years ago, only last week that he hasn't seen for 45 years and he was going to be in Bonalbo for the day from Brisbane and so were we. Whoa isn't that amazing so we caught up with Dave Bailey and his sons and brothers who were on a Bucks tour bus and was in the pub for an hour and so Wally got to chat non-stop. You would swear they had seen each other last week. They were at primary and high school together then at Telstra in Sydney and shared a house and many experiences in their younger wild days, it is a wonder they survived to tell the tale but it was great to be able to see him again.

Sunday we visited Daphne and her son Daryl at Casino. This is a cousin that Wally has only just discovered and as she is about to turn 80 thought we better catch up with. Spent five hours there with them chatting about family history. Me, well I have a throat thing and no voice so silence on my part and a very long 5 hours. Left there at 3 and were both starving and the only thing open was a Noodle place, remember Sunday and Casino …..yee hah….revolting.

Monday 1st May - today marks 12 years of wonderful marriage to my other half but his standards are slipping. Last year I was wined and dined in Mudgee at a hatted restaurant, so absolutely gorgeous. This year well nothing in Casino so drove 62kms to Ballina to a café overlooking a beach. Menu ho hum, food ho hummish also. Oh well I will see what Mothers Day brings although the sounds of Nundle dosen't do much for my expectations. We did call in and see Margie and John in Ballina, old school friends of Wally's and they are lovely and spent a number of hours laughing with them so all was not lost.

Tuesday, did one of Wally's driving days down to Rappville and then across thru really bad dirt roads up thru the bush towards Tabulum. We did stop at the bridge over the Clarence River and had a lovely spot for morning tea very quiet cept for cows mooing. We could see where the floods of three weeks ago had been thru and we would definitely have been under quite a few metres of water where we were standing. We decided the next bit of travel would have been too much so headed east along the Bruxner highway to the lookout at Malanganee for a picnic lunch. Now sitting to him emptying our water tanks seems such a waste of water but it is fairly stale but I may have to do a loo visit soon if it continues too much longer.

Off to Lennox Heads tomorrow for 5 nights.