Dec 28, 2010

Flew Home for Xmas

Our laptop was returned to us Christmas Eve, new screen & new keyboard along with a new 240v power pack. Everything else was the same including no loss of any hard drive so all contacts in our address book have been retained. I was a bit concerned that even though i had backed up the contents onto an external hard drive before sending the computer away for repairs, i had not backed up emails & the address book, whew! all well that ends well.

Christmas at our home in Perth was much the same as any other year except we were missing our Daughter Erin and her Boyfriend Scott, also both our Nephews were missed as they were working away. We did have some new attendees - Elle's Parents Chas & Rae & Brother Charles Elle came for the day, Elle is our Son's Girlfriend and it was nice to meet them for the 1st time though we are certain they were bemused with just how loud & chaotic our family get together can be.



Temperature's have been around 40 degrees centigrade every day and Christmas day was no different, fortunately we have a swimming pool and plenty of time was spent in and out of the pool in between eating and keeping our fluid levels up.

Santa had left many presents under the Tree and it is our family tradition that we have a secret Santa, a present is given to the recipient without them knowing who it was from and they in turn choose a present and give to the next and so on, by the end everyone had worked out who had bought what, most of the presents turned out to be for Millana & Ruby our Grand Daughters - they must have been very good girls throughout the year to receive so many.


Today things have returned to normal, the temperature has dropped to a more comfortable mid 30, visiting family have all left and Aaron has returned to work so it's just Caddie & the girls & Vickie & myself - SERENITY !!!!!!!

We have three more nights and then it's up to the Airport to fly 'home' to Queensland, we call it home wherever our Caravan is, it's always lovely seeing our family during these return visits but it also reinforces just how much we enjoy the lifestyle that we have. We have been following the weather conditions back over East and we hope that our travels are not hindered by all the recent rain & floods, when we do get back we will be heading down to Newcastle to meet up with our mates Kimbo & Ned, - 2011 will be another journey similar to our 'Mates & Mud' trip we did back in 2007 except this time we hope it will be more 'Mates & Fishing' as we head to South Australia and eventually get to Ningaloo on the West Coast beginning of May.

In the mean time i will continue to ramble on about what we are doing, try and include as many photo's as i can.

Happy New Year & Safe Travels if your on the road.

Dec 8, 2010

Life without a laptop

Where is NIKNOFF ? i hear you all ask, things have been quiet on the blog, well the answer to that is the laptop decided to stop doing it's thing and although it's under warranty nothing moves fast in the service department of Toshiba or so it appears. In fact i am so annoyed with the way our situation has been handled it has put me off having another Toshiba Computer.

So, what's been happening since my last entry, nothing much really, we have been based at Kenilworth for 3 weeks and then went down to Kalbar and stayed at the showgrounds there for 6 days before returning back to kenilworth and taking up residency for another week. Vickie had some more Doctor appointments about her eye and that has compelled us to stay in the area, her Dr is in Maroochydore and only 45 minutes away from Kenilworth, the Eumundi Markets are on Wednesday & Saturday and only 30minutes away so we have been spending our time either chilling out or driving to & fro for appointments or markets.

The weather has been wet much like the rest of the East Coast at present, though certainly not like the floods the inland area's are getting, hot & humid and rain = Queensland at this time of the year, we don't mind it at all but we are getting an unsual amount of ants around the van which we are eradicating with baits & sprays.

We leave here Friday and go and stay at some mates at Maroochydore the night and then onto to Deception Bay where we will leave the rig at another mates place while we fly home for Xmas. Who know's when i will get the laptop back so there is a chance things will go quiet again until then.

To all our family around Australia, our Mates, fellow Travellers we have met and the Lurkers out there [I know who you are] We would like to wish you all a very Happy, Safe & Enjoyable Christmas.

Caiguna to Boondi Rock and Home

 Arrived back home in Safety Bay WA after battling the worst head winds we have encountered for many years, rain and wind, wind & rain ....