The camping 'dress rehearsal' in Bombala NSW

First Night in the Van

The one thing I really must put in the van first are PILLOWS!

Because rolling up to camp in a small country town where the shops have shut for the day and realizing that you have forgotten them is totally inconvenient.

Our first night in the van according to me was cosy and comfy and I slept well in spite of not having a pillow. My neck alerted me to this fact the next day however as it was very painful. However, Neurphen sorted that out. According to Greg however the first night in the van was like being in a roasting oven. We have different thermostats for sleeping and I am a cold frog and he isn’t. Never mind, at least we weren’t cold.

The amenities block at the Bombala caravan park is spotlessly clean and they have conveniently placed heaters over the showers which was a nice surprise. Its not the biggest block with about 4 loos and 3 showers but that didn’t matter. I only needed to use one of each . The heater was operated by pushing in a big white button which was on a timer. The timer went for 3 minutes. It was enough time to get your gear sorted then it went out. When it went out it was instant cold again so one had to pop out of the shower wearing only a towel and press it in again. Then you had enough time to get your shower going – waaaiiiting for the hottttt waaaater to come through!!! And it went off – out again big button push in, duck back in the shower – now you actually got the job done and click - off again. Freezing and wet and dripping –get out, out push button, back in.

Right under the heater it was heaven. Three minutes and if you have to moisturize your skin as it suffers dryness like I have to every time I get wet, then you just get to the coated stage when you are now properly freezing in spite of the heater and guess what happened. Eventually partially warm and rugged up to the eyeballs I emerged from the shower block, now desperate for a decent really hot coffee!

My goodness it was very cold that morning in Bombala. There had been a frost but no lingering fog and it was a perfect blue sky sunny morning – except for the wind that was lazy. Lazy wind goes straight through you rather than around or so it feels freezing you to the core.

A chilly morning in Bombala - our camp

Greg had a shower and also rugged himself up, then we warmed up the cruiser for a coast into town. Actually we could have walked but my bike and gear was in the car and it was just easier to take everything rather than go back for it and be late, later. We met some half frozen friends and found a coffee shop that had been highly recommended by the caravan park manager. Ask a local I always say. Well the coffee way yuk and for some reason they put a sugar in mine which was double yuk and tasted like instant but the toasted sandwich we got was really great. The company we had invited was also great and the more Canberra people that spied us in the coffee shop, the more folk we gathered eventually crowding out the café which bought more business for them. Won’t be asking the caravan park guy for culinary advice again though!

Eventually it was time to go for our ride so we reluctantly left the sanctuary of the warm coffee shop with the yummy toasted sangers and ventured out into the lovely day with the freezing wind for our bike ride. Greg was in the support vehicle in case someone had a breakdown – like a broken bike not an emotional one because actually he wouldn’t know what to do in either case except put both in the car and offer them a mint.

After the ride which was quite fun we met back up at the pub – to thaw . We hung around there for the rest of the day leaving briefly to go to the RSL because you have to share the love and loot in a small country town, then back to the pub.

There was a run in the afternoon which saw some more Canberrans turn up and then after a circle (which is a hash house harriers tradition) we stayed at the pub for quite a pleasant meal. (sometimes in country pubs you can be pleasantly surprised or definitely not). Someone had an abundance of $2 coins and found a juke box. Although it wasn’t quite loud enough, we all started to dance and then roped in some game locals and had a really good night. The combustion fine was blazing down one end of the pub and a gas heater up the other so soon everyone was boiling hot and stripped down to t shirts, all having a great time.

We still had not solved the problem of the pillows so half way through the dancing effort, a fellow hasher and I nicked off to their motel and temporarily ‘borrowed’ their spare pillows for the night.

The next day my neck was very grateful. Greg had another roasting oven experience, I slept like a log and we woke up to another very nice day that wasn’t as cold as the day before. Bonus. After showering, taking our pillows (sorry sneaking our pillows) back to the motel in which they belonged, we ventured to the bakery where, praise the Lord – after all it was Sunday and church bells were chiming , there was decent coffee!!!

After a big night dancing after a big day of hashing what is needed is a recovery run and someone had set a great run – which nobody felt much like running so everyone walked. It was set around the town. This took in various historic sites and gave my husband who was all hung about with a digital SLR something to take photos of.

Ducks on the Bombala river. If we had more time here we
may have seen a platypus which is what this area is
famous for among other things!

Sick of dawdling, waiting for him to take photos all the time, I joined the rest of the group and had a great chat with some people who I had not met before the weekend. They were great company. We all vowed we would see each other again – as you do and just hope! Actually a few of them had caravans and as we were explaining about our holiday aspirations in the borrowed camper, someone suggested a Caravan Hash. Never been done before and the trail is the road lead by co-ordinates on a GPS. What a GREAT IDEA! Can’t wait for that one!

After another circle, some farewells and a last good look about we set off for home – wishing our holiday would come around faster as the prospect of work did less than nothing for either of us. However it was only 3 weeks to go. So close but yet so far.

The reason for the trip other than to say farewell do a dear friend was to find out how camping was so we decided that the mattress that was in the van was a little squishy and Greg found that he was feeling bone sore in the morning. No drama we would just get another mattress cut. The ones in the van seemed to be the ones that came with it. It was no hardship and we would leave it in the van as a big thank you to our friend that was lending it to us. The other thing was PILLOWS. Obviously!! Since I didn’t cook in the van, cooking is an unknown but it can’t be too hard so we will take our single cylinder gas stove as a backup. Another thing we had to do was flush out the water tanks as where we wanted to go we would have to at some stages carry water in. Other than that we thought we were pretty well organised.

That completed our ‘dress rehearsal’ one camping trip, two nights in the van and we were really happy about it.