Day 19: The Park

It rained all night.  And not just rain, like sheets of water falling from the sky in wave upon wave of wet.  It was so incredible!  I would be woken up by the crashing sound it made as it smacked into us, then I’d want to stay awake to listen to it only to be lulled to sleep by it once again.  I was in Heaven.  I only woke up twice and both times it was a bit chilly in the car so I turned on the heater for a minute.  When I got too warm, I turned it off.  Worried that the kids might be cold, I took off my hoodie.  It was still too warm.  When I asked the kids this morning they all agreed that they didn’t get cold except those that didn’t wear socks to bed and the one who kept throwing her fleece sleeping bag off of her and onto her brother.  All in all, it was a successful night.

We looked around for a Denny’s type place to eat and were once again struck by the insane food prices!  To get our kids just an egg mcmuffin type sandwich somewhere it was going to cost over $100.  In the end, we found a little bakery with some meat pies and doughnuts that wouldn’t break the bank.  In the end we paid $50 for every pareja (how do you say that in English?  Every two kids? Every buddy group?  Every couple? Pareja is just so much simpler!) to have a meat pie, a doughnut and cup of hot cocoa.  Pricey, yes, but after saving money by not staying in the caravan park, we figured what the heck we’ll splurge! Hahaha  (And actually, here, that’s not pricey.  If we lived here, our kids would have never seen the inside of a restaurant!)

We were supposed to drive the short 150 k to the 12 apostles then move along to the city of Mt. Gambier—which I realized is actually in the State of South Australia—more on that in a minute.  That’s just like 75 miles so it shouldn’t have taken over 2-3 hours, right?  WRONG!  It was through the rain forest and apparently the storm we’d enjoyed the night before had reaped havoc with the forest.  There was debris all over the road—literally covering it.  Some places entire trees had been knocked down and we had to slow down to 5-10 mph to swerve around them.  At one point traffic was backed up forever because, we found out once we were moving again, a good Samaritan was using his chain saw and truck to clear a path across the road.  It was incredible!

Our 3 hour tops drive took us over SIX hours!  It was insanely fun so we didn’t mind, but by the time we pulled into Warrnambool--the place we’d scheduled to stop for lunch—but it was already 4:30 in the afternoon and time to stop for the night!

I called a couple caravan parks in the town and they had plenty of vacancy—it is winter after all—and we decided we’d stop and eat some supper then drive 50 k to the caravan park.  The office closes at 6 and we had learned our lesson.  She said so long as we were there by 7-8 we would be fine but after that we’d be on our own.

We found this incredible park with electric BBQ grills, perfect for a nice hot supper.  At first glance we noticed the ponds with the bridges and the normal run of the mill play land so we thought it would be a nice little layover.  

As we started exploring we found it had a really neat spider web made out of ropes just a little ways past the play land.  Then as you walked farther in there was a tower of gigantic tires.  

Then we saw the maze!  It was incredible!!  Walls just tall enough for the kids to not be able to cheat and just long enough to be able to get lost inside but not too long for you to panic.  We played in there forever until we looked farther into the park (when the real life train went past freaking Lui out—he was so excited!) and then we saw it! 

 The tower.  Once side had a zip line for children under 12, the other had one for children over 12.  I’ll bet we spent two hours just playing on the zip line (Flying Fox here in Oz).  It was very dark by the time we pulled the kids away and even then the only way we did was because π had thought up a fun game to play in the maze.

As we all gathered in the center of the maze to hear the instructions for the game, it started to sprinkle.  Now, at home, we would normally keep playing until it started coming down for real.  It took me some fast talking to get the kids to the cars as quickly as I did but just as the last one got in, the sheets started falling again.  We drove over to a pavilion near the bathrooms and had the kids change into pajamas.  We’d decided when 8:30 came and went and we were still playing that sleeping in the car again was worth it to stay and enjoy the park. 

Ready for the night, and pi and I ready to drive (we had tons of energy after playing with the kids so much) we started out.  Well, we tried to but the car that Cody was driving wouldn’t start. 

Have you ever been in a foreign country and had your car not start hours after everywhere in town was closed?  Yeah, it’s not a good feeling.  Especially as the panic starts to set in and you realize you’ve been so irresponsible to stay playing till way after dark with 8 children in tow and nowhere to stay for the night except for in the car that is now broken down and to top it all off it’s pouring rain!

Lucky for me the part of your brain that worries about stuff like that was damaged at birth so after the initial thought popped into my mind, it immediately popped right back out again.  It briefly crossed my mind that I should be concerned, but after fiddling with the car for a minute I knew it was either the battery, the cables, the starter or the alternator.  Easy fixes all, if you have tools—which I clearly didn’t.  Even the most basic of tools—a pair of jumper cables—could give me a better idea of what we were dealing with.  Pi got on the phone with local automotive places—or tried to.  I started by calling Cathy, then BJ when she didn’t answer, then Reece when he didn’t answer then I finally got in touch with Jordane.  (Note to self, make sure all cousins have your phone number while in country!)

After an hour and a half of trying to figure things out, AAA (well, Australia’s version of AAA) showed up, jumped the battery and set everything right with the world.  It’s amazing how simple the fixes to life’s catastrophes usually are.

All of that energy we’d had that was going to keep us driving into the night had been leeched right out of us.  We found a nice out of the way turn off after driving just an hour or two and settled in for the night. 

Without the storm raging, its really quite warm here in the cars.  I’m just in a hoodie and sweats, the kids are bundled in flannel pj’s, hoodies, coats then their flannel sleeping bags on top.  I don’t think I’ll even pull my sleeping bag out!  As I write this I keep pulling the kids’ bags off the floor and putting them back over the top of them. 

Just now J asked in a sleep laden voice, “What are you trying to do? Smother us to death? It’s too hot for that!”   haha Looks like I’m not the only one who’s warm enough. 

I swear the more this trip goes on the more I feel like I’m on a college road trip instead of taking my kids on a family vacation.