Leaving Tasmania

Hi All!

We have had an absolutely lovely Tasmanian time! However Ingrid is starting to feel a bit tired so we have decided it is time to start the homeward bound journey! We will be leaving on the boat from Devonport, next Wednesday, planning to make a few stops in Victoria before the end of this adventure!

At the moment we are in Waterloo and have enjoyed our time with Paul and Sam Verne and kids! Tomorrow we head for Queenstown.

Will update on our adventures with Andrew and Sue and time here in my next blog. We are all healthy and well and the pregnancy is going really well! Had a appointment this am, and the doctor was very happy with everything!

Love you. Miss you and look forward to seeing you all again soon!

Dave, Ingrid and Sara

Coles Bay

Wine Glass Bay

Hobart and beyond

Hello All,

We are all well and still having fun! We are really excited to be spending time with our friends Sue and Andrew and their gorgeous little boy Nathaniel! But before we get to that we might finish telling you about what we got up to in Hobart.

We stayed with the Thompson family for the first few days and then moved in with Chrystal for the last few days! Both were wonderful times!

All rugged up!

At the Thompson's Sara enjoyed the attention of their kids and the different toys to play with and at Chrystal's she seems to appreciate having her own space! We enjoyed the fellowship and just catching up with them over the week we spent there.
In summary of our activities, we had a look around at Mt Wellington, and did another lovely walk near their house, and basically enjoyed relaxing and celebrating Easter with them. We also spent a lovely morning exploring the Salamanca markets, did some Op shopping, enjoyed the yummy Cadbury factory tour and expanded our historical knowledge with a tour of the Penitentiary Chapel (a convict prison) a look around in one of the prison yards of the old female factory. We also had a lovely day trip to Huonville, where we saw a miniature village, some funky carved trees and an apple museum.

Sara enjoyed her first Easter eggs

Upon leaving Hobart we met up with Andrew, Sue & Nathaniel Ellis (Who have flown in from Adelaide to holiday with us for 9 days) in Sorell (just East of Hobart) and then travelled together up the east coast to Coles Bay, on the outskirts of the Freycinet National Park. This is where we are currently residing.

Since we have been here we have hiked to the famous Wineglass Bay (located in the Freycinet National Park) and been up to Douglas Aspley National Park and Bicheno, which were both beautiful places. For those interested in things mechanical, we have had some (flat) battery issues with the car. However, after discovering the fact that the interior light had been on we believe that we have resolved that issue. Tomorrow we will be heading over to Swansea for Church and to do some exploring.

Love David, Ingrid, Sara & Bubs

Happy Easter!

Hello Once again!

I hope you all had a wonderful Easter, as we remembered the sacrifice of our blameless Lord so that we could be saved! We enjoyed reflecting and celebrating this with the Thompsons!

So now I will try to provide a few more details about what we have been doing!

DEVONPORT (March 17-20): We spent most of our time in Devonport relaxing/recovering, doing housekeeping type things, like buying Sara some new shoes (she had grown out of the ones we took with us) and some other things like that, and researching our what to do at the information place. On the Sunday we attended a nice Church of Christ, and we also took in a lovely drive of the general area!

MOLE CREEK (March 20-23): WE used this lovely spot as a base to do a few day tours of things in the area. At Cradle Mountain we did the Dove Lake walk which was so diverse and beautiful and of course took in the lovely views of the mount.
We also checked out the Marakoopa caves, which were fantastic! But this excursion also turned out to be a major highlight as we were able to witness a platypus playing in the creek nearby in the middle of the day! It was so special to see this in the wild!
We also did a walk at Alum Cliffs (very pretty), visited a Honey farm, Cheese Factory and Raspberry farm (All VERY yummy!). Sara loved the cheese so much that she has even learned to say the word!
We also noted that in this area they appear to have major problems with European wasps - they are EVERYWHERE, particularly seeming to be attracted to the bugs on the grill at the front of the car when we park, but have not really bothered us!

Sara and her stitches

WESTBURRY (March 23-27): David and her would go to pet and feed them grass. From here we took a gorgeous Here we stayed at 'Andy's Bakehouse Cafe' a neat place which only cost $2 a night, although the facilities were very basic. The cafe was open 24hrs and served the BEST ice cream ever! Sara loved the horses (or Naaaayyyyyss!') that lived in the paddock behind where we were set up, and every morning David and here would walk around to pet and feed them grass.
One day trip from here, was a scenic drive up the Tamar River's Western side and had a delicious and very generous meal at Beauty Point. (NB. this is near Beaconsfield).
We also went to Burnie and met up with David's Nana (who was stopping there for the day on the cruise ship she was travelling on) which was a really great day! It was so lovely to catch up with her and we had a lovely lunch together! On the way home we stopped to see the beautiful murals that adorn the town of Shefield.
We also had a very sad day when visiting Liffey Falls, as Sara slipped and cut her lip badly requiring 2 stitches! She was very brave and you will be happy to hear that it has healed up beautifully!

LAUNCESTON (March 27-31): Here we had a lovely time in City Park (they have a monkey enclousure in the park - so cool!) and shopping in town, and Dave took in the Boag's brewery. We spent a nice day exploring the Tamar Valley further, including a Strawberry Farm, Batman's Bridge, Platypus House and Seahorse World. All of these were great! and some time just relaxing at camp was great too, after we worked out that it was NOT Good Friday yet. The Hot Cross Buns were yummy anyway!

A lovely veiw from George Town (in the Tamar Valley)

ST. HELENS (March 31-April 5): We stayed in a recreation park called Moulten Bay. We attended the combined service for Palm Sunday of all the local churches on the foreshore. This was very nice. In St. Helen's we particularly enjoyed campfires (thanks Mum and Dad for the jaffal irons!) and a meal shared with our neighbours on one evening. We mainly relaxed and took it easy here although we did go up to the Bay of Fires on one day and also went fossiking a Moorina (we may even have found some very tiny sapphires!), took in a couple of Rain forest walks and another Cheese Factory. On our way to Hobart we had the most amazing pancakes at Elephant Pass!

Bay of Fires

Sara helping Dad out with the dishes

So that brings us to where we are, but I have spent enough time for now and will tell you about that later!

Dave, Ingrid and Sara XOXO

Tasmania

Hi everyone,

Sorry about the long silence! We have been in Tasmania for about 3 weeks now, but have had issues with, a) finding time to blog, b) finding affordable internet, and c) finding internet that will allow us to blog. But here we are and I can finally update you all!

I feel a little daunted by all that I would like to share with you, so I will attempt to do it over a few blogs. Today is just the overview!

At the moment we are in Hobart enjoying to lovely hospitality of the Thompson family! It has been great to catch up with Chrystal in particular!

In brief (get a map if you have one) we arrived in Devonport on the boat and have toured our way via Mole Creek and Westbury to Launceston. Then over to the east to St Helens and eventually down to Hobart yesterday.

We think that Tasmania is amazing and very beautiful (but too cold at night) and have had many great experiences and adventures that I will tell you about later. We have seen lots of gorgeous things and views, abundant wildlife and meet interesting people!

We are looking forward to catching up with Sue, Andrew and Nathaniel Ellis soon, as they are coming over to spend a few weeks with us here! Yay!

Sorry for this brief , concise update but it is all I can manage right now!

Ingrid (Dave and Sara send thier love too!)

The Great Ocean Road is GREAT!!!

Hi everyone!

We are now back in reception and back in contact - for the moment! We are in Melbourne spending a few days with Hans, Natasha and Eric Trinkle, which has been so lovely!

Tomorrow we head to TASMANIA!!!! We have to be at the boat at 7.30 am so I'll keep this brief and get back to making sure we are ready to depart early! We will arrive in Devonport at about 7pm that night, so we will let you all know how our boating day goes!

A hilarious but very regular sign we saw

We had a absolutely fabulous time along the great ocean road, taking our time to take in the amazing and wonderful things that God has made! At times it was slow going as Sara fell asleep in the car ad we had to sight views one at a time, but when she was awake, she seemed just as amazed as us at what she saw! We never realised there was sooooo much to see and also to learn about the various ship wrecks that occurred there.

From Warrnambool, we stayed a night in Peterborough, then the next night at Princetown (where we experienced the worst cooked fish ever!) and then camped the long weekend at Johanna Beach in the Otway National Park!

We met some great people at Johanna Beach and had a lot of fun with them! We also saw some of the inland beauty at Triplet Falls (a must see if you are ever there!) As Sara loves to say "Ooooo WOOOOWWW!!!"

Then on to Melbourne, with a night spent in a gorgeous Caravan Park at Cumberland River and lots more pretty coastal views and Dave even went in for a Surf at Bells beach! (Sara tried to collect all the rocks on Bells beach while he was in!)

In Melbourne we have done a little bit of shopping today, but mostly just enjoyed watching Sara and young Eric play together! They are hilarious how they sit and chatter (scheming as to who will be hard to put down tonight we suspect, as they have taken turns!) and laugh at the jokes between just them two!

Lots of love to you all and keep writing emails!

the WILSONS!! XOXO

PS Photos have been added to posts below

Warrnambool

Hi All!

We arrived in Warrnambool last Saturday afternoon, after having a lovely time in Portland!

Before leaving Portland we took a lovely trip to Cape Bridgewater (about 20min away) where we took in the gorgeous coastal scenery, checked out the 'blowhole' and 'petrified forest' (formations in the limestone) and took a 2 hour walk to see a seal colony! It was a great walk (though steep at times) and there were seals at the end of it which was great! (We were on the cliff top looking down at them from a platform) At one point one of us exclaimed 'WOW' at the view! Sara though that word was great and spent the rest of the way saying 'WOOOOW!, Wooooow!' much to our amusement! We don't think she know what it means but she continues to use this word a lot! V. cute!

The "petrified forrest" and the Seals at Bridgewater

This was much more satisfying than our trip to the gannet colony earlier in the day! There were meant to be thousands of birds there and at first we couldn't see any. On further exploration all we could see was lots of dead bird remains (killed by cats and the like we think), and only about 8 live gannets. Ingrid was particularly devastated.

So on Saturday after packing up we bade Portland farewell and headed for Warrnambool, stopping for a VERY yummy fish and chip lunch in Port Fairy (at the place on the wharf - very famous apparently)!

In Warrnambool, after attending the Baptist Church here yesterday, we spent the rest of the day looking at the various coastal lookouts and other pretty spots, and stopped by a glassblower, which was fascinating!
Today we went to the 'flagstaff hill museum' (if you go here set aside lots of time to see it properly, we will be heading back to finish it off later). It is set up in a recreated a village, which we wondered around, meeting period dressed people and learning more about the history of this place and the many shipwrecks that happened on this coast.

Ingrid also had a Dr appointment today, to check up on the pregnancy, all appears to be plodding along well! Ingrid is feeling a lot of movement, although Dave hasn't managed to feel anything yet. Sara enjoys cuddling up to Mum's ever growing bump!

Tomorrow we leave Warrnambool to head along the Great Ocean Road!

"Sara enjoying a snack she found herself"

We continue to enjoy our little camper trailer home and this lifestyle immensely!

Until then,
Dave, Ingrid and Sara

PS Sorry no photo's still, we can't upload them at public libraries unfortunately!

Loving Life in Portland!

Hey All,

We are still enjoying life in Portland! In short we have made a few friends, had a bit of a look at the sights, but we still want to head out to Bridge water (which apparently is very nice) on Friday, gone to the museum, attempted to find the elusive gannet colony and just chilled a bit too!

We attended Portland Baptist again on Sunday and were invited out to lunch afterwards along with some other families, which was a lovely time!

"Home Sweet Home!"

Dave has been doing an amazing job at the vineyard, mainly working as 'bucket boy'. He praises God for the unusual strength and stamina he has experienced in this role, and feels very blessed!

Ingrid and Sara have spent time exploring the town on foot most of the time, although this week we have had the car as Dave has organised a lift out there. We attended playgroup again today, which was great, and even brought along a friend we met at the fruit and veg shop!

Sara's favourite activities of late include chasing birds, trying to stand on her head (very funny) and a lot of climbing. She has helped us to met most of our neighbours in the caravan park, as she waves at anyone walking past and will have a chat (as long as they don't get too close) if they will stop for her!

We plan to leave this Saturday, dropping in to Port Fairy and then heading most probably towards Warnnambool.

Until our next post!

Lots of love and hugs!!!!

The Wilsons

PS thankyou for your posts and emails! It is always great to hear from home!

Hi all just a quick one, cos I am paying for internet this time and Sara is NOT making this easy! We are in Portland and having a great time, We have managed to pick up a bit of work, today I cleaned a kitchen and tomorrow Dave is off to pick grapes!

Gotta go!

Ingrid

Mt Gambier

Just a quick one to say we are still having a great time! Chris has been very nice and let us stay and extra few days while we sort out our next steps, ie. where to go with the best job prospects!

Ultrasound was disappointing as the staff were rude and the machine said I was only 17 weeks (not 18) so they wouldn't do it properly (they want me to come back in 2 weeks) and I still have to pay the gap! (Well that is my whinge for today)

We went up to see the blue lake today, (which really is very blue) and surrounding beauty! We also managed to catch up with Danielle Mowbray which was really nice, but for the most part we relaxed at Chris's place!




Also check out the pics that have been added to our last blog (now we can)

Be great to hear from you all! Email is wildmoo@chariot.net.au or leave a comment!

Dave, Ingrid and Sara

Balmy Robe

Hey Everyone!

Sorry we have not blogged for a while! Our computer is broke, so we are not sure how often we will be able to update this, and at this stage we can't put pics up. (Pictures now added 15/2/07)

So anyway, we ended up leaving on Saturday morn, after a few delays! We enjoyed a lovely drive to Robe, stopping for a leisurely lunch in Tailem Bend and a brief stop in Kingston to check out the 'big lobster'! (very daggy) Sara was VERY good!

Sara having fun in the dirt at Tailem bend

We arrived in Robe and have been staying in the Bushland Cabins Caravan park! (One of 4 caravan parks in Robe!) It is a lovely natural and quiet park and Sara has had fun playing with the owners daughter!

The Obelisk at Robe

In Robe we have caught up with some of David's family including his Aunty Doreen, Cousins David and Pam and even his step brothers and sisters, Dad and Ros who were all in Robe on Monday! It was a really lovely time with 7 nude children (Sara and her cousins) running around keeping cool in the water toys they had! Sara had a ball!

Dave went out on his cousin's (David) cray boat this morning, which was a great experience, while Ingrid and Sara explored Robe's main street shops and galleries!

Fun frolicking on long beach

We are loving our little camper trailer home and think THIS IS THE LIFE!!! Dave even manged to keep his cool, when Ingrid in a very pregnant moment locked the trailer keys in the tent!

In other news, we will be heading to Mount Gambier tomorrow, and catching up with Chris Spencer and having the ultrasound!

Until our next post, we hope you all are well!

David, Ingrid and Sara

Nearly Ready

Well, things are really underway now! We have the vehicle that will take us to our destinations!

See our lovely white Subaru Outback (complete with a cool spot to put our sunnies!)
And further more we now have something to pull along behind it in our hot possesion!

I will take a picture of it up tomorrow and put it on here when I can!

An ultra sound is booked in Mt Gambier, the house sitting type people are almost organised and we plan to depart the middle of next week!

Talk to you again soon!
David Ingrid and Sara

Progress!

Very exciting news! Our trailer will be ready in the next few days (will post a picture when we get it!) and we just might have found our car! (and at a reasonable price!)

We have our trip books at the ready and are in the process of planning our route!

It appears things are finally starting to feel like they are coming together!

YAY!

Trip Update

Hello Everyone,

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!!!!!!!

Well there have beena few changes to our plans since our last Blog. We have decided that we will only travel for about 3 months (still starting in Feb) as Ingrid is pregnant!!!!!!! :)

(The baby will be due in July)

We have also decided that instead of heading West, we will travel East, exploring Victoria and Tasmania!

We have also now ordered our camper trailer, which should be ready in a few weeks! YAY! It is a universal canvas one. If you want to check them out go to www.universalcanvas.com.au
Well, that is all I will say for now! Hope you like these pictures of Sara having some bath-time fun and showing off her cute new look!

David, Ingrid and Sara

Monday!

This Blog is mainly for James! So it is monday and not much trip related to report, but I thought I would! Tata!

A weekend camping in our backyard!!

Hey Everyone, the weekend went really well! We all slept in the camper over the weekend, cooked in it, even had Christmas in it! :) We got a good feel for the pros and cons of this kind of accomodation and have a bunch of questions now to research before we make the final call!

Hiring a Camper this weekend!

This weekend we are hiring a camper trailer, which we will set up in our back yard and live out of for the weekend. It will be a good test to see how we go and if the camper will be right for us! It's all a bit exciting, but scary too as I think this will be quiet defining for us as far as the direction we will go in terms of accomodation! We are planning to cook, eat, sleep etc out there and only use the house for toilet and shower.
We will let you know how we go!

Welcome to our Blog!!

Hi everyone!

So this is the blog site where you will be able to keep up-to-date with all the happenings of the Wilson's while they go on walkabout!

Kinda groovy hey!