early, early friday morning payton, nova and i started the 8 hr drive to coffin bay national park where we would meet our friends nikki, glenn, zara and laila harrington and another couple whom we'd only met once - ty and shannon andrews. nova, always the most incredible traveller, did great and the road trip was smooth travelling. the campsite was a 60 minute four-wheel into the park to a place called black springs. on the bay side of the eyre peninsula, the beach there is largely made up of mussel, cockel, clam and scallop shells and some sand. the water is a beautiful turquoise and very peaceful. every evening, we could see dolphins hunting just off shore. ty and shannon camped there also (because four wheeling is a big part of "heading bush" in australia, aussies have perfected the 4WD camper trailer that folds down to a 3 meter by 2 meter box on wheels and blows up to a canvas 5x5 meter house with a kitchen and queen size bed. battened down, the trailer then often has a rack that clamps over the top so you can strap the tinny - a little fishing dinghy - on as well as the tinny's trailer! and it all hinges on some sweet little flexible pin and clamp system - not your usual ol' ball hitch. and they drive these knobby-tired things into anywhere, bucking along behind the land cruiser, happy as you please until its home sweet home in the bush); we had a tent. glenn and nikki stayed in a house in coffin bay township since laila is still so young (6 mos).
glenn and ty both have tinnies and love to fish, so payton - not because he loves to fish, not because these are his old drinking buddies, not because he is one with the ocean, but simply (and unfortunately, in my opinion in this situation) because he is a dude, one of the guys - payton went fishing too. now, you know i have always wanted to hang out with the guys, was even a little slow to realize that what i though was lindsey hanging out with all her guy friends was really lindsey crashing guy's night, but at times like this, i don't mind pulling the hen card and saying oh, well, i'll just hang out on the beach with nova... (not that anyone was really asking if i wanted to come fishing). despite all the hooks in the water, about four fish of legal size were caught all week. one of those was caught by my own darling provider, and just when it looked like we might be having a salmon trout and veggie stir fry, glenn, who was holding the fish and showing us identifying marks of the salmon trout DROPPED the fish and it swam away. it was a dark moment. we had just a veggie stir fry for dinner. the other three fish were caught by glenn, so he and his had a happy fish feed back home in their luxury condo in coffin bay. sigh.
we stayed in coffin bay nat'l park for six days. payton, nova and i went on a hike one day to black rocks lookout, on the southern ocean side of the peninsula. on monday, glenn and nikki and the girls drove in to our campsite and ty and shannon in their cruiser and the gardners in gg all drove out to point sir isaac where the fishing was supposed to be great (it wasn't. but everything else was great). about an hour and a half drive that covers seven miles of beach - a crossing that has to be timed with the tides - and a lot of sand dune driving, got us to the tip of the peninsula. nova and zara had a great time running up and down the beach and although the water (and ambient temp) was not conducive to swimming, per se, it was warm enough to go for a dunk or two and enjoy that beautiful water. it has been suggested before that we need long john wetsuits as the water temp here is quite cool, but having none, payton still gamely went snorkeling across the bay with ty and glenn to look for oysters. as blue as his t-shirt when he got out, payton was cold enough to declare that he needs a wetsuit and that a cold beer actually did not sound very good. yet. nova napped on the drive back to camp - it turns out she can sleep (did most her napping, actually) on bumpy, sandy, slippery, dusty 4WD roads. who knew?!
the next day ty, glenn, the gardners, and jessica drove to a different part of the peninsula to gunyah beach - an ocean beach that is bashed by big, beautiful open-ocean waves resulting in a huge sandy beach. the dudes did some surf casting (this is actually a type of fishing that looks fun). you take a long (~12 ft), thick rod, rush into the ocean as the waves recede, toss your bait out as far as you can over the surf, then high-tail it back to the shallows before the next huge wave comes in. you get pretty wet. then, you just stand there until something bites. if you're really experienced, you get a rod holder, set it in the sand, then go drink your beer until your line starts hopping around. then you have to set the beer down and go reel in your fish. you catch pretty big fish surf casting. glenn was the only one who got something - an 18 inch salmon trout (which is neither a salmon nor a trout) - and he is a solid fellow, but that fish tugged him into the water a couple times; pretty cool to watch.
nova, jessica and i, on the other hand, ran around in the sand played in the waves. nova LOVES the waves and is fearless. and smart enough to realize that if it's too deep for her, no problem, get on mom's hip and ask HER to wade in to her waist. what fun!
sand driving is a bit like driving in the snow, kind of slippery and squirrely - but in order to float in the deep sand, you drop you tire pressure and keep your speed up (long stretches of beach and you'll be clipping along at 60 km - a little less than 40 mph). filling up our tires on the way out of the park we noticed a big sidewall bubble (potential blowout. no good.) so got to use the spare. what a great trip! there is a lot of this country that reminds us of rough-around-the-edges montana and the things we loved about that state. nonetheless, the drive home was split up and we spent the night on a little dirt "beach access" turn out listening to the crash of the waves with the southern ocean wind whipping off the water. nova was having some trouble falling to sleep and i found myself wishing i had used the "ocean" option (instead of "rain") on the white noise machine nova used to use in the states, as if the huge natural white noise machine outside our tent door might induce some pavlovian response and cause her to drop off to sleep immediately. it is a mark of how tired i was myself to think that my daughter might ever drop off to sleep immediately. ah - the eternal optimism of parenthood. this of course got me thinking of all the ways you know you're a first-time parent camping: you bring your book thinking you'll have a chance to read, you bring your running shoes thinking you'll have some time for exercise, you daydream about vacation being more restful than everyday life, you daydream about a solid night's sleep, you think your daughter will just want to play in the sand with her dry clothes on instead of march straight in to the water. you find you're second-guessing yourself about your white noise selection seven months ago... it is a crazy world, people!
as it was, we had a fabulous time - saw dolphins, goannas and sleepies (lizards), tons of emus, kangaroos - including a joey in the pouch (actually made the mistake of leaving the vestibule open while nova slept soundly in the tent and we were hanging out at the camp fire and returned to flush out what sounded like a huge mob of kangaroos (probably only 3 or 4) and find nibbled apples, half eaten bread loaves and a pile of kangaroo droppings underfoot - blast!), cockatoos, rainbow lorikeets, rosettes, cormorants, pacific gulls, little penguins and a scorpion. there are lots of snakes there too, and although other campers saw one, we never did. doesn't mean they didn't see us, though! makes for a tighter leash on the babies... nova was awesome - loves playing outside and exploring. not sure when it will be, but we're already looking forward to the next trip...
