The rest of our holiday OR a lesson in why spontaneity is highly over rated.

Here, at last, is the final instalment of our Stories from HolidayCamp which will hopefully get The Other Half off my back for a while. [SIDE SURVEY: Does anyone here have A Other Half that complains when you don't post regularly? Or am I the only lucky one in this respect?]


HEADS UP! If you mean to read the whole thing and not just scroll through, you might like to take a toilet break, and grab a coffee and some bikkies before you start. This is a long post. 

Many of you asked where we went on our doggy holiday. Now that we've left the building, The Paranoid Typist [that would be me] is able to divulge that we were at Culburra on the New South Wales south coast. This tiny town is just 2 and a 1/2 hours away from Sydney [near the word SHOALHAVEN on the map below].

If you'd like to read more about the towns in the south coast, CLICK HERE for the clickable map.

*

I have to admit, we were pretty slack about going anywhere other than the beach, which was a 30 second walk down a private path accessed from the back garden gate. 

In our defence, nobody goes to Culburra because it's a pretty and interesting town.


But on Friday night, after Uncle D turned up, we finally felt guilty enough to take Georgia for a drive on Saturday. We had no plan whatsoever and no real idea of the area. It turned out to be...


The road trip to nowhere. 
With one more body in the car, Georgia ended up at the back.

"Don't you think Uncle D should have gone to the back and not me? Some humans can be so rude."
This was not to her liking. 


But she soon sorted out the seating arrangement.

We decided to go to Greenwell Point. Uncle D had some fond memories of the place from his childhood days.

Greenwell Point is marked A on the map below. 

If you'd like to see a clearer map of the route we travelled on Saturday, click this: View Larger Map

We saw quite a few people fishing off the pier, which was very exciting because we both love fishing and haven't done much since we lived in Brisbane, more than 20 years ago. But we never got to do any that day. [Surprise.]

Right about then, The Other Half casually mentioned that he'd forgotten to put a collar on Georgia. [Maybe some of you were sharp enough to pick that up in the picture above. I was sitting with her and didn't.]

"Do we have to go back? I promise I won't run away!"


So we all piled back into the car  and drove back to the house. [Because I insisted.]


"I wouldn't mind some fish and chips." Uncle D said when he saw this seafood shack on the way out of town.

Even from the car, it smelt terrific. Too bad someone forgot Georgia's collar or we would have stopped.

*

After we got the collar, we set off again. We thought we'd check out Jervis Bay. 

"Uncle D didn't know how to read the map!"

 

"My Typist says it was a good thing it wasn't HER that said "Turn right!" when he meant "Turn left!" or she would have been in deep poop."

It was an easy pleasant drive, punctuated every 5 minutes or so by Uncle D talking about how there would certainly be good fish and chips at Jervis Bay.

After about an hour and quite suddenly, the road ended here.

This is a bad picture because I was trying to be surreptitious. The little buildings were booths where we had to pay to get in. 


Utter confusion broke out in the car. 


The Other Half couldn't understand why there was a toll booth in the middle of nowhere. I couldn't understand why we had to pay money to get into a town. Uncle D couldn't understand why he couldn't see any fish and chips shops anywhere.

Then, the lady commandant in the booth saw Georgia in the back seat and said, "Dogs. aren't. allowed."

And that was that.


"The Typist took this picture so she could tell everyone I'd been to Jervis Bay, which turned out to be an entire national park and not a town with a bay."

By then, we were all feeling quite bummed about how our spontaneous road trip was turning out. So we were very relieved when we spotted a sign that said Hyams beach 4km! 


Many years ago, on a much better planned holiday, The Other Half and I had gone to Hyams beach with Jordan and Rufus. They'd had a terrific time running and playing with other dogs on the beach. It was a gorgeous spot!


So imagine our surprise when we were greeted by this unfriendly sign.

Which basically said, dogs on leashes only.

We didn't even bother to get out of the car. "How about Huskisson?" Uncle D suggested as we drove aimlessly around the side streets looking for a non-existent fish and chips shop. I suspect the man was quite faint with hunger by then. 

To cut a long story slightly shorter, that's how we ended up in Husky for a very late lunch of very greasy, very soggy but fresh fish and chips.

"After all that, I had to make sure everyone knew I'd been to Husky."

*

On Monday, if you recall, the sun didn't come up so the beach was out of the question. 

We went for another little drive instead...

...and ended up here.


Jim Wild's fresh oysters.

This is Jim Wild who was a world champion at opening oysters in the 90s.

Here's a short video of the man at work.

We sat out back of the shack, by the river where the oyster leases were, and pigged out.

"I wish I could tell you how delicious the oysters were but I wasn't allowed any. [My humans had 36.]"

"I don't get it. I eat roadkill. How could one tiny succulent mollusc have made me sick?"

*

And then, all too soon, it was time to go home.
Tuesday morning, we set off with a plan! We wanted to make a few stops along the way so Georgia could be a well travelled dog! 


Our first stop was Berry, which is as charming a country town as you can hope to find anywhere. 

"I met some of the locals!"

"They're not real, you know."

"I thought my humans would take me to the treat factory, but they didn't."

"Sadly, I didn't get any champion sausages either." 

"The Typist, however, managed to buy a whole bag of stuff for herself  from this shop."

After Berry, we headed straight home. Apparently, it was my fault. I had somehow managed to spend 2 hours shopping in a town smaller than our suburb, so we ran out of time to stop anywhere else. 

Luckily, The Dog didn't really mind.

"Cushion, do you think that cement truck is a little close?"

It was [sort of] good to be home.

*

"Goodbye sea. Thank you for not drowning me. See you again someday soon."

The End.