Tuesday, July 22, 2008

On The Road Again

Hi All
We left Roxby Downs about 11 am on Monday morning. We knew we had a long trip ahead of us and it was going to be very difficult with a 3 week old baby and 12 month old. For those of you who have seen my car, we didn't have the DVD back then, and oh my god those of you who travel big K's and have kids GET ONE! We spend $250.00 on the one we have at Christamas 07' and it was the best $250 we have spent on anything. Tony drove and we made it as far as Pimba before we had to stop. We both needed coffee, and Brandy needed a change. The poor kid had mess from the back of her neck, to her toes so I basically has to bath her and finding a change of clothes was also a huge effort as they were all in the back of the car with everything on top of them. We headed off again and drove all day, the kids went very well considering the amount of time they were in the car, I would sit between them occasionally and keep them occupied and we also had the music going and they liked that.

Mickalee napping in her car seat.


Brandy snoozing in her car seat

(please take note that the date on my camera has always been wrong!! I lost the instruction book and don't know how to change it : )

I can't remember exactly where it was but either just outside Tennant Creek or just outside Alice but we came across a broken down car. They were travelling from town back out to the camp and there were 4 adult and a few kids, waiting there and they waved us down. We couldn't fit anyone in the car but we offered to pass on a MSG if they needed us to. They said no someone was coming along soon they just needed some water. Luckily when I left Roxby I had filled up 2 2 litre bottles with boiled water for Brandy's bottles, As we were also buying water along the way we had plenty and gave them some.

We made it Marla Road house for tea and slept in the car at a rest stop Alice Springs side of Kulgara. We made it to Alice Springs about 10am Tuesday morning, booked into "Stuart Range caravan park" I did some washing and some shopping, as we knew it was the last major town we were going through other than Tennant Creek and we didn't want to turn around and drive to Mt Isa to get stores as soon as we got home. Tony tried to get to bed reasonably early but unfortunately Brandy had other idea's. She was on the bottle, and was sleeping better but she had been in the car for so long and had slept most of the time she was over sleeping! I eventually settled her and got some sleep myself. We left Alice Springs at 4 am and planned to go straight home. I think it is about 1300K's. Give or take a few. The road from Alice to Gregory is pretty boring, there is basically nothing to look at and the more often you do it the more boring it was.

We stopped in nearly every town to either get a drink, feed or change the girls, get fuel or just stretch our legs, so this did make the trip drag on, however we needed regular breaks as we were doing such a long haul. There is no way in the world I could be a truck driver. At Three Ways Road house I went to the loo and was amazed to find a vending machine with travel nappies in it. I had never seen anything like it before. I had seen ones for tampons, and condoms but never nappies, so I bought one for Mickalee. We reached Camooweal before dark, and as soon as we crossed the QLD border we knew we didn't have long to go now. The car and the trailer had not failed us and considering the amount of K's we had done we were surprised. We turned onto the Camooweal road and were on the last stretch home when we did a back tyre on the car. This would have been no worries normally but because the kids were over being in the car they were crying, Tony was having trouble getting the jack out of the tool box and everyone was tired. We eventually got the tyre changed but not before a lot of swearing and yelling!!

We arrived back in Gregory Downs about 11 pm Wednesday night and drove straight past the Hay Farm to see our friends at the pub! After 6 weeks away for Tony and 8 weeks away for Mickalee and I we had to go and see everyone and catch up on the local town gossip as well as show off our new beautiful baby.

After saying our hello's and receiving a few welcome back's we headed back to the farm, unloaded the girls and fell into bed for a well deserved sleep. Brandy must have known we were tired because we gave her a last feed about midnight and she slept till 8am. WOW!! I really appreciated nearly 8 hours straight sleep. I had hit the baby jackpot and got two good sleepers.

Bye for now and Happy Blogging.
Bec

1 comment:

Missy said...

Gee that sounds like a long drive! And here I was saying 50km out of town was too far haha
Sometimes babies just pick up when we need a break! It's nice to have good sleepers (I know).
As for the nappy machines we had one here in Hobart. In the baby change room though. Haven't seen them anywhere else though :) They are a great idea.