T.C, RULING THE HOUSE

Spoke to the Hodges a couple of days ago to find out that our old cat T.C is now ruling their house, he has the dogs, geese and other animals all worked out and is sleeping on the end of Dave and Cara’s bed, we are very happy that he is happy. Our water pump completed it’s interstate journey this morning and is currently being reinstalled onto the front of the motor. I must admit that I was starting to get a bit worried that we might be stuck here in Dubbo for a while longer but it looks like we will be back on our way tomorrow. The light from the control tower at the airport has been cutting across the clear skies the last couple of nights and the moon has also been lighting up the night. Had a big electrical storm last night which brought a lot of rain but the strength of the sun in the morning soon had everything dry quickly. Visited Jedda Boomerangs the other day and the kids decorated one each with a hot wire instrument, we then learnt how to throw them properly, it was very interesting and quite easy to learn. They are thrown at a flock of birds in the distance and if it comes back it means you have missed! To check which way the wind is blowing you kick up a bit of dust and see which way it blows as a boomerang is thrown into the wind on a 45 degree angle. We have discovered the Melbourne band Cat Empire, and are enjoying listening to their funky tunes, if you haven’t heard them, they are well worth a listen. A great book we have read recently is The Kite Runner, which we would both recommend. The Wellington Caves complex which we went to yesterday is quite incredible, the Cathedral Cave has one of the worlds largest stalagmites, about 15 metres tall and 30 metres around the base. Considering that they grow at a rate of an inch each 100 years what we were looking at was incredibly old. The cave system was well lit and the series of caverns spread to 45 metres under ground. There is also a huge sculpture at the turn off to the caves called The Pod. It is made of steel, rock and some lovely mosaic, designed by an Aboriginal artist and created by a collaboration of local artists and the main steel girders were from a bridge in the area which collapsed in 1989 We are getting a refund for our canoe this morning, minus a bit, their policy is to not give refunds, only exchanges, so we had to lose about 10%, a lesson learnt. *****COUPLE OF DAYS LATER******* Well, it was a bit of a saga with the water pump, the one we received back was not our original one which was meant to be reconditioned, the guy who normally does them was away so they sent one off the shelf. It did not quite fit properly and after about 15 phone calls back and forwards to the suppliers and speaking to various different people in different states we finally came up with a solution. So, 24 hours later Matthew the young mechanic brought it back after grinding a section off which then allowed it to fit, we were ready to rock and roll (and pump water through the motor) once again. He had spent about 12 hours altogether working on it and he charged us four hours which was great. It was about 1.30pm by the time we finally left Dubbo so we did not plan to travel too far. There is a nice camp spot we found about 10 km North of Dubbo, next to a river and we had a beautiful dinner last night of barbecued tuna steaks on a bed of mash potato with fresh stir fried vegies, yum. We tried to catch a few fish but had no luck. Was a very cold night, our thermometer says it was minus 4 this morning, we know it is cold when we can see our breath, but the sun is shining brightly now at 8.20am, have had some nice porridge and are ready for the day ahead. It is really nice to be back in the bush after being stuck in a caravan park for the last 9 days or so, but we did have a good time in Dubbo. Found out some different names for those wicked prickles, some people call them cats heads and others three corner jacks, which gets shortened to three corn jacks, whatever they are called they are very nasty.