Cutlers Cruz Aus: May 2012

Well Dubbo... what can I say, heaps to see, friendly people but 11 days is long enough.

After booking to stay for 5 days we ended up there for double that. Due to the van problems again of it not winding down, and contacting the dealer in Melbourne ( who we found to be sooo incompetent he couldn't even send the part by express post like he guaranteed he did, but that is a whole blog in itself). We got the part and now it seems to be fixed, fingers crossed anyway.

Looking on the bright side we did see lots of other parts of Dubbo that we weren't going to look at. I got offered a job in a news agency, found my future business ( you'll see in the photos), found a park named after me and also meet some very nice people.

Our sights included the goal and zoo of course, the muesum was a definite highlight with Aboriginal arts and we got to meet the artist and it was all FREE( best way to travel). The Japanese gardens were also cool with a talking toilet complete with a automatic paper dispenser.

For Mothers Day we travelled down to Wellington for a picnic, was pretty cold and I forgot to pack the bread for our sandwiches of lunch but hot chips did the job.

And we also went to the Observatory and got to see Saturn in the telescope. Did you know that the speed of light is 300000kms per second or that a light year is 9467000000000kms away ????

"Now you do."

We found an Aboriginal site with carvings in the rocks and my favourite find was a winery with the most fantastic Moscato . YUMMY

Alizah in her cloak

Levi in his cloak

a kangaroo skin cloak with the one of many designs burnt in

a huge possum skin blanket

the other side of the blanket. Lots of possums

Zara...looking the part at the goal

Alizah with Kaine sad for her

Levi thought it was fun

Japanese gardens

Love the colours of the trees

Automatic toilet paper dispenser ( hours of fun)

Grinding stone next to the Macquarie River

A cool dirt pile on a river bank

My Park :)

The other "Lady" Cutlers

YUMMMY!!

Wellington- Levi & the over grown wombat

Alizahs photo of Saturn and something else not sure which is which

My new business

AT THE ZOO

Finally back on the road we stayed at a free park just outside of Orange and wake to -1degress. It was defiantly chilly trying to roll up the bed covers with frozen hands. We got an early start and headed into Bathurst for Breaky, Jamie wanted cereal in the park with cold milk but there was no way I was going to do that so the call of a Hungry Jack coffee for me and Hot Chocolates for everyone else was calling. We also did a test lap of Mount Panorama took 10 mins due to the conditions and pulling the van and being stopped for the filming of a new car, but we were happy with that.

We did a bit of driving around Bathurst but having the van on it really limits your parking spaces, but we did find a school that looked like Harry Potters castle ( according to Levi). In Levi's words "I would love to go to that school, I bet the library is right at the top".

So getting out of the cold we made our way to the Blue Mountains to see some very breath taking sites. One road lead us on a dirt road that we almost needed a kidney belt on to travel on but was defiantly worth the drive. We saw a wind eroded cave which was quite spectacular and also an amazing view from the top of a very large rock. Unfortunately the fence that surrounded the edge of the cliff was extremely rusty and just waiting for the kids to lean on it to fall hundreds of metres to their death, so I was feeling a little ill and had to drag them back to the car of the trip to Sydney.

Bit chilly in Bathurst

Penny the racing car

A school Levi would like to attend

Wind eroded cave

And again, this really was huge and all made by the wind

Cool rock

Beautiful views

The dodgee fence place, rather high up

checking the view

My boys in a cave

Penny Prado in the Blue Mountains

The Three Sisters

Well we arrived at our caravan park (Lane Cove Tourist Park) about 5pm. So we only had a little bit of time before the sun went down to set up, but we are getting pretty good and a lot quicker too.

So my tip of anyone wanting to come to Sydney is this caravan park, its about a 10 min walk to the trains and then a 10 min train into the city The kids really enjoyed it and to hear the excitement in there voice when they saw the Harbour Bridge and the Opera House was why we are doing this in the first place, and it's really quite cheap to stay at .Tip number 2 if your staying for a week buy a weekly train, bus, ferry ticket it was $55 per adult but is so much better than paying for one trip on the train $22 or even worse parking a car for 3 hours was $55. Crazy stuff.

The first day was spent at Manly, we ferryed across and just sat on the beach for a couple of hours, while the kids were building sandcastles I went to the biggest shopping centre I have ever seen. We needed a stroller for Kaine because his "walk fast" really isn't, then we would end up carrying him and he is way to heavy to keep doing that. So thinking I would become very lost by myself, I found the first shop and I was out of there. Give me the 'good ol Sunnshine Plaza anyday'.

Next day we hit the famous Bondi, hoping to see some of the TV stars. It didnt happen, I did however ask Levi to pretend he was drowning so I could meet them, but he wasnt keen on that.

Jamie and the kids had a very quick freezing swim was I'll just admired the view.

So we have another 4 days here in Sydney then we are heading down the coast, then to Canberra.

Well bye for now and we hope you are enjoying our travels