Trip up New England Hwy - beautiful weather!

Wed 29/9/10

Left hotel @ Fern Bay (Nth Newcastle) at 10am after a long chat with owner – a man of many talents incl union busting and confrontations, prop mgmt at the corporate level.... It was a family run hotel and was into natural remedies (no chemicals!).

Today we looked around a very cold/windy Newcastle esp the Nobbies and have gone up the Hunter Valley to Tamworth (country music festival fame).

We stopped at Muswellbrook for an ice-cream and walk/rest stop and they had free Wi-Fi, though it was so painfully slow I bailed on it in the end, but we got prices for Tamworth and eventually went to the motel in Q.

We only had two reports on Wally/Heather, so no more news than you.
Heather was chuffed that M&D turned up at Cairns - sounded like M&D did us proud (again).
Today was supposed to be the day Heather was hoping to get signoff by the surgeon for surgery in Melbourne and hence the RACV would pay for her 4WD/Caravan to be freighted to Melbourne from out in the wops.

We are still seriously sleep deprived and have fought over the silliest things...
tiredness - bad
severe tiredness - severely bad
tiredness + hunger = worse!!! Satan’s Son + Daughter :(

I looked in the mirror today and noticed my face was peeling/cracked - wow!
Luckily we are both doing ok - plenty of vitamins and echinacea etc (we both rattle)

We had a nap the last 2 avos on arrival, but still arent having very good sleeps - hopefully tonight.


Thurs 30/9/10 – Armidale Motel - $90 motel on Nth side of town (hilltop) – microwave + 27” LCD TV.

9am departure from Tamworth. Went next door and took a photo of the Big Guitar then into town to get a Telstra Data pack where we ended up buying a HTC Desire phone with 1GB data/mo. We converted over K’s ph $10/mo, so the upsell ended up costing us $8/mo for 380 mins of extra credit and being on the Telstra Next G network.

We had lunch at TIC and drove up to the Oxely lookout over town and south. Nice day, but cooler like y’day...

Onto Armidale via Urulla and the Dangar Falls walks/lookouts where we spent 2 hrs before sunset.

Got into Armidale late and went to a hotel just north of town and ended up speak to owners for 90 mins. They were very well travelled....

Fri 1/10/10 – Warwick (Charrabah Resort – 34km SE of Warwick) $60/night – basic but large. 20 degrees

Up b4 7am and left by 8am – went into town and walked along the Gray St walking St and a loop or two around the old town.

Cool, but nice old buildings and balconies, predominately in wood.

Drove to Glen Innes, while talking to Heather. Wally’s gall bladder removal op was postponed from y’day until today.

Wandered around Glen Innes for 20 mins (bloody cold in wind) and then onto nearby Standing Stones (like mini Stonehenge).

Drove onto Tenterfield which we drove thru and straight onto Bald Rock Nat Park stopping at Captain Thunderbolt hideout (in granite outcrops above river with commands views of surrounding country. This was also the spot where Australia was planning to pull back to if the Japs invaded from the north. The site had a tank barrier (series of solid posts every 4m apart.

The Bald Rock walk to the summit took us 1.5 hrs return. We went up easy walk 2.2km and I came back down the steep section 1.2km (gr8 views below!). The granite monolith was very large but you crept up on it gradually so it didn’t have anywhere near as much impact as Ulura which it had been compared to... .unfair comparison!

Hotel Resort was lovely and large, but a little shabby and had a resident mouse who left presents on the pillows.

We did quite a bit of office work till 11pm to try and lighten the car load!