CAMPSITE # 17 - Pebbly Perfection

The  lovely sunny morning beachside bike ride to Pebbly Beach that we had imagined was quickly shut down when the ladies at the information centre practically laughed at us.. apparently it  would have been 22kms – mainly along the side of the 100km/hr hilly highway – no thanks!

So we took the easier & smarter option and drove to Pebbly Beach... also known as absolute paradise. The road to the beach is a glorious drive through a tropical forest. The forest practically runs right up to the edge of the sand. 

If you have ever seen photography taken of Kangaroos on the beach, it most likely would have been taken here. The very out of date “Australia” Lonely Planet book that we have actually has a picture of a kangaroo on the beach on the front cover, we looked it up and it was taken in the same National Park.  Tom managed to get some absolute crackers...

We enquired about a beach cabin for the night – just to humour ourselves really as we knew it would definitely be out of our budget... it was and it was booked out. *sigh*

We took a stroll down to the beachside and absolutely fell in love with the place. We were so disappointed that just because we didn’t have the Troopie we couldn’t stay at the beachside campsite. And then it hit Tom, the smartest man in the history of the world, “why don’t we duck back to Batemans Bay and buy a tent?” We calculated that the money we would have saved over the next 1-2 weeks by not having to pay for a crappy caravan in a backpackers and only paying camping accommodation, we would have a free tent and $$$ left over

Buying a tent was our saving grace, the two of us immediately caught a second wind and kicked our camping butts into action. We raced to Batemans, and bought a tent, food & supplies. And thank god for Tom being the smartest man in the history of the world as Pebbly Beach campsite #17 has now been officially awarded the Best Campsite yet. It was absolutely divine. As we drove back to the campsite, we made a pact to each other – that we wouldn’t get frustrated by all of the camping items we didn’t have and how disorganised we were compared to the luxury we’ve set ourselves up with.

Just to point out the obvious here is a listed of what we DIDN’T have –

·         Light

·         Flame

          Table

          Chairs

·         Mattress (lying on gravel with rocks in back is not so cool)

·         Dishwashing stuff

·         The axe (negative man points for Tommy)

·         Tom’s knife (which he barely ever uses but was lost without for some reason)

·         The hammock

·         Shelter outside of the tent

·         Bragging rights over other campers

·         Enough alcohol - is there ever such a thing?

Luckily, we made friends with two of the other campsites next to us who were very kind in letting us use some of their stuff.

Did you know?

·         A group of kangaroos are called a mob

·         A group of owls are called a college

·         A group of crows are called a murder

But I ask you, what would you call a group of Tom’s? A scallywag? A drunkard? An overdose?

Why do I ask? Well, would you believe we had ourselves quite the mob of Tom’s at this campsite.

Of course there was Tom & Amy. In the campsite next to us were Tom & Heidi. And the next site down was Tom & Laura. No joke!! But we certainly thought it was one. Of course with all three couples having so much in common, we just had to have some drunken boozy nights to celebrate – and that we did. It was really lovely to have met the Tom’s, Heidi & Laura, we all got along really well and had some great laughs around the campfire- which given the last week’s turn of events we definitely needed. The best part was it was always Tom’s turn to get the next drink ;)

Being the sleepaholic that I am, I went to bed at a reasonable hour, leaving the Tom’s to be boys and cause mischief. I was then awoken at what must have been about 3am in the morning. From my boyfriend, who somehow manage to smell like a Pub room floor, slurring his words 10cm from my face and anxiously trying to convince me to come down to the beach with him. I rolled over and went back to sleep, as most normal people would. And didn’t I hear about it the next morning. Apparently, there were phospho luminar essence from plankton in the sea. The Toms were telling us that they looked like tiny electric blue flashes in the water like glitter, absolutely incredible! Too drunk to figure out to operate a camera, the Tom’s still have no evidence to prove it. Upon returning the next night, they were no were to be seen.

We were lucky enough to be invited to my Great Uncle Johns place to have a BBQ Sunday lunch with him and Alice. It was a great meal and was so nice to catch up with them both. John has written an Autobiography which he kindly signed & gave us a copy to read - always open for more reading material and it will be great for us to read up & understand the history. Alice is an avid gardener, Tom was in his element when we were given the grand tour - hopefully it's inspired him for when we (finally) have a place to call home at the end of all of this :)

We spent our days, lying on the beach under the 31deg sunshine and swimming in the freezing cold ocean. It was everything that we needed – to snap us out of our thick heads from the night before and also to remember why we’re here. Even though the whole saga with the Troopie has just become an absolute pain in the butt, I think Pebbly Beach made us both realise that it’s what we make of it. It’s just a piece of machinery and regardless of the outcome – we’re still free to travel this beautiful country. We don’t have to answer to anybody and return to work tomorrow. We don’t have to be anywhere by anytime. We can lie on a beach with kangaroos and swim in the ocean and well... do whatever we want. We just have to have faith (I mean, Hope) that Charlie will pull through and if he doesn’t, so be it. We’ll sort something out.