We are just back from our hols - a road trip up north - a journey of more than 2000kms all told. I know some of you will be struggling to convert that to miles so I’ve done some calculations on your behalf. It comes out at 238,857 miles which is basically the distance from the earth to the moon. Actually that doesn’t sound quite right, just bear with me a sec whilst I double check my sums. You may want to hold your nose because I’ve run out of fingers to count on so the shoes and socks are going to have to come off for this one. Okay, that looks a bit more realistic it’s approximately 1250 miles which is the equivalent of Land’s End to John O’ Groats and back again and then back up to Penzance again just for good measure. Its also the same as driving from Maltby to Rotherham and back 99 times and then back to Brinsworth again for good measure. Hope that helps everyone to visualise it.
As we were only away for 6 days in total you may be forgiven for thinking that we must have spent the entire time sat in the car. You can also be forgiven you for wondering why we would want to travel so far. And you can also be forgiven for thinking that it would be madness to have your main family holiday in the middle of winter. However, you can’t be forgiven for wearing polka dots with stripes.. what were you thinking?
So, where did we go on this here road trip and was it worth it all that driving?’ Well, we went oop north. We started in a place called Kalbarri, whose Town motto is ‘You’ll love it’ (which I took to be more of an order), and boasts of some amazing scenery. I’m always cautious when I’m told that famous landmarks have to be seen to be believed even especially if it means adding unnecessary mileage onto the trip. I can pinpoint, exactly, when this ‘tourist’ scepticism began (Warning, I’m about to go off on a different tack here… no wonder we ended up doing more than 2000 kms with my inability to stay on course). Did I ever tell you the, cautionary, tale of our canal boat trip to Llangollen and the legendary Horseshoe falls? No, well… back in the days B.C. (before children), Wendy and I (it was before marriage as well), along with Bob n’ Caz, Pete n’ Hayley, Chas n’ Dave, Pepsi n’ Shirley, and Roy Rogers n’ Trigger (despite there being a strictly no pets policy on the vessel) took a boating holiday around the canal systems of Cheshire and that there North Wales. If I recall rightly we picked up the ubiquitous Una Stubbs somewhere around Nantwich. Anyway, as you can imagine, we spent the first half of the week toiling through locks, tunnels, other boats (they really should have had the good sense to get out of the way) and canal-side pubs. It was at this point that we chanced upon the picturesque town of Llangollen (I say chanced upon, but as it’s name would suggest the ‘Llangollen canal’ does in fact only go to Llangollen). Several hundred other folk, with 70ft long boats, had all chanced upon it as well which meant we were forced to park-up (I’ve a vague notion that the proper term may by ‘moor’) about a mile, or-so, outside town (having failed to find the local NCP for narrow boats). So we trekked into Llangollen, passing several signs on the way informing us that we were just a short walk from the mighty Horseshoe Falls. The group wasn’t of one mind as to whether we should make this additional journey to view this wonder of nature, but eventually we decided (having counselled a passer-by for his opinion) that we should make the de-tour. As this was B.C., the task of moaning continuously and asking whether it was much further was divided equally between us. Eventually, shortly before nightfall, we arrived at the ‘Horsehoe Falls’! Disappointing doesn’t really describe it. It was indeed in the shape of a horseshoe but it was more of a ‘stumble’ than a ‘fall’. It was generally felt that a more accurate name for the site would be ‘Horseshoe please mind your step’. The only way it could be described as breathtaking would be to take into account the 2 mile walk that we had just undertaken to get there.
There was none of that this time… the scenery is indeed amazing. The gorges along the Murchison river are 150ft deep (high?) in places and we enjoyed a fantastic walk over/through/around them. It was so interesting, in fact, that the kids forgot about their duties of moaning continuously and asking whether it was much further… despite the fact that we may have got slightly lost at one point and Harriet sustained a mild ankle strain along the way. She may, however, have mentioned the pain and agony, she was enduring, a couple of times en route.
So we did indeed love Kalbarri despite the fact that Monday was a bit of a wash out. Some heavy afternoon showers meant that we were forced to have indoor playtime. We ended up playing charades - based on the contents of our ipod. I can’t see the concept making it on to TV (unless we can somehow build in a house makeover/cooking/talent contest element into it) but it passed an hour or so. George’s mime for ‘Echo and the Bunnymen’ was inspired but his effort to do (the rather straightforward) ‘10 Global Deejays Ft Technotronic’ was poor to say the least. I called a premature end to the proceedings when faced with trying to convey the song ‘Monster Pussy’ by the Vaselines using only the medium of mime.
I know you’ve probably only just finished laughing at the last lot of photos we sent out (I refer mainly to the 70s disco)* but by the time you read this blog we will have also sent out the holiday snaps. You may well notice that the photos all have a similar theme. The vast majority of them are either of: incredible scenery, Harriet (who is by far the most photogenic of us all), or dolphins… in fact some of the pics are a combination of all three. The only slight disappointment on the trip was the fact that we went all the way to Shark Bay and we didn’t see a single shark…hundreds of bloody Dolphins and a Dugong (sea cow to you. Apparently sailors used to mistake them for mermaids… can’t see it myself, even accounting for the wearing of full-strength beer goggles.) but not a shark… not so much as a dorsal fin, or even scary music. There are sharks in Shark Bay… it’s not just a clever bit of marketing. In fact, there are several species (more than 30) in the bay including Tiger Sharks (which as you have probably guessed from the name don’t make great pets). But as the most common species in the area is the Nervous Shark (Carcharhinus cautus) it may explain why they didn’t make an appearance. It’s not that we didn’t try to attract them - we went on a trip on a Catamaran where they encourage the kids to sit in the boom net at the back of the boat… if that’s not shark bait I don’t know what is!
Actually, now I come to think of it, we did come into contact with sharks… namely the petrol stations that charge 40 cents a litre more than normal simply because they can. There isn’t a lot of room for manoeuvre when there’s the best part of 100 km between petrol stations.
Anyway, next winter we are planning on driving even further up the coast… to Coral Bay. Not sure what’s there, I really hope they’ve got a small water feature in the shape of a horseshoe.
* I should point out that it is totally accidental that there are two painted ladies on one of the Australia Day photos of Harriet. I hadn’t actually intended to get Hattie in there at all.
