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Oz2020
  • Robin De Falbaire
  • Lara Brooks
  • Robin De Falbaire
  • Lara Brooks

Oz2020

A 365-day adventure by Robin & Lara Read more
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  • Trip start
    September 9, 2020
    Oz2020

    Leaving Sydney

    September 9, 2020 in Australia ⋅ 🌧 16 °C

    After a couple of back and forth between Sydney and the bush, we are now setting sail at last!

    First up NSW

  • Oz2020

    Bendeela Camping and Picnic Area

    September 10, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ☁️ 16 °C

    Wombats , kayaking, swimming and fishing spot. Couldn’t camp there due to COVID and bushfire damages. Nice spot to spend the day. And the wombats come out at about 3:30 and wonder around

  • Oz2020

    Kangaroo Valley

    September 12, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ☀️ 16 °C

    Great last weekend with the crew around Kangaroo Valley. Kayaking & fishing, wombat spotting. Although started to see the devastation of the 2020 bushfires.

    Went to see the land our friends Dave and Freya just bought! Grats to the new land lords!Read more

  • Oz2020

    Batesman Bay

    September 14, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ☀️ 16 °C

    Went fishing at honey suckle bay, nothing to report. Local told us better for skid.

    Slept at Murramarang National Park, North Head Campsite.

  • Oz2020

    Cullendulla Beach track

    September 15, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ☀️ 20 °C

    Spotted this walk on an article of what to do around Batemans Bay. It was a nice peaceful walk across the beach and into the mangroves. You could see hundreds of crabs scurrying back into the mud when they here you walking. If you stay still for a while - you see them cautiously coming back out onto the surface.Read more

  • Oz2020

    Brou lake surroundings

    September 15, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ⛅ 15 °C

    During the day:
    Nice board walk through the mangroves at, Cullendulla Creek walking track.
    Walk around broulee island.

    At night:
    Stayed at brou lake, Eurobodalla National Park. Met Guillaume who generously shared his catch of the day! (Huge Aussie salmon)Read more

  • Oz2020

    Broulee Island Walk

    September 15, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ☀️ 20 °C

    Broulee island was known by the locals to be a good surfing spot. So we headed there to get Robins fins wet, I stayed on the sure and saw that there was a 2 hour walk around Broulee island, which I surprised Robin that we would so once he finished surfing! The walk around the island was beautiful. Rocky landscape, rock pools and whales in the distance.Read more

  • Oz2020

    Brou Lake/ Brou Beach

    September 15, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ⛅ 18 °C

    We camped for the night at Brou Lake campground, Eurobodalla National Park. This was a lovely spot with both the ocean and lake that connected at high tide. Lots of mosquitos though, which we were not prepared for. If you go down to the beach at just when the tide starts coming in, you see he water pour over the sand dunes and funnel down into the lake! Robin fishes and I sat there for an hour watching the water come in. It was so peaceful and chaotic at the same time. Loved itRead more

  • Oz2020

    Gillards campground Mimosa Rocks Nationa

    September 16, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ☁️ 19 °C

    Travelled to Gillards Camp Ground, Mimosa rocks national park - recommended to us by Guillaume who we met the night before and shared his salmon that he caught there. So we followed suit to try out our beach rod again. Got there late, set up camp and went straight to the beach. An hour later - caught nothing, was really cold - so went back to camp. Met an awesome couple Gwenyth and Mark who shared their adventures. Went fishing again in the morning - caught nothing. We had coffee with our new friends, and they recommended a few places to head next !Read more

  • Oz2020

    Narooma

    September 16, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ⛅ 17 °C

    Drove through Narooma to visit Australia rock, bought a 12foot beach rod and saw seals bathing in the sun! Met a nice guy at the tackle shop who showed us how to do a beach rig and let us know some good places to fish :)Read more

  • Oz2020

    Narooma, NSW, Australia

    September 16, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ⛅ 22 °C

    Narooma, a beautiful little town on the south coast. Although smallish it still has so much to offer. A beautiful coast line of beaches, Australia rock, lovely locals - we met ours favourite locals at Compleat Angler - lovely English man helped us choose a beach rod, learn some fishing tips and told us about the local seals - and the bottle shop guy - who told us about some nice brewery’s in the area. Love meeting people who go the extra mile to make you feel welcome and ensure you know all the right places to go!!

    We didn’t stay in Narooma; but recommend a day their definitely :)    Read more

  • Oz2020

    Green Cape

    September 17, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ☁️ 13 °C

    Drove south to the pinnacles in ben Boyd national park and met acacia and sweetypetey who own a ski venture business in Thredbo. Ran into them again in Eden, they suggested not to miss green cape... and jezz they weren't wrong! We caught 2 fish (1 yellow fin witting and 1 blue swimmer) and 1 huge octopus! On top of it Bittangabee campground was beautiful, Lara went skinny diping in the sea. We had some delicious oysters bought in Eden.Read more

  • Oz2020

    The Pinnacles, NSW, Australia

    September 17, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ☁️ 19 °C

    The Pinnacles is a easy short loop walk. The walk takes you through the world heritage listed rainforest of Ben Boyd National Park. Was a very short loop unless you can figure out how to get down to the beach :) Ben Boyd was also destroyed by the fires :(Read more

  • Oz2020

    Bombala - “The meeting of the waters”

    September 18, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ⛅ 18 °C

    We started travelling towards the snowy mountains and decided to go through Bombala. Drove through South East Forest National park. The ride was long with miles of burnt trees from the bushfires. Big log trucks sharing the road. Got to Bombala. Got yelled at by the lady at the servo as apparently water is triple the price, so filling your water at a petrol station in remote areas is probably a no no. But we learnt our lesson. We stayed at a quiet little caravan park in Bombala near the river. Although not much to do the river has platypuses (impossible to see clearly but can see their movements), horses riding by and a really nice hot shower :)

    For dinner we had the Yellow Fin whiting Robin caught at Green Cape. Had it grilled with lemon and pepper with potatoes and salad. Was YUMMMMY    Read more

  • Oz2020

    Anglers Reach and Caravan Park

    September 19, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ⛅ 15 °C

    We headed to Anglers Reach - a small little town on Lake Eucumbene. We headed here to try our luck at Trout fishing. The drive there was absolutely beautiful. We took the snowy mountain highway. We past through Dalgety and Berridale. The drive through Australian country side, mostly cattle farm, with not a soul to be seen - one car would drive past every half hour, but other wise quite and miles and miles of farm land stretching out as far as we could see.

    We stayed at Anglers Reach Caravan Park, a lovely older lady was running the place. She had been very quiet since the bush fires and COVID. And she told us we were a couple of weeks too early for the trout!

    We arrived late, so we set up camp and googled how to cook octopus! ( also a catch from Green Cape) . Although we were told by multiple people to bash it on a rock to tenderise - we decided the easier option was to boil it for an hour. We then made a octopus vindaye! Lara liked it, Robin did not (too chewy) :)

    The next morning we went fishing again. We lost 2 brand new lures and caught nothing.

    Anglers Reach was a beautiful little town. If you love fishing - we highly recommend    Read more

  • Oz2020

    The Pines Campground, Blowerinng

    September 20, 2020 in Australia ⋅ 🌧 15 °C

    It has been raining a lot and cold at night, so we tried to escape the weather by heading out of the Snowy Mountains. We were told by Acacia and Sweety Petey (that we met in Eden) that the weather was going to be quite bad and to avoid the Snowy Mountains. So we decided to head to Tumut as we had unfinished business with fresh water fishing, so decided to visit the Blowering Damn. We drove through on the Snowy Mountains Highway through the mountains and high altitude. There was speckles of snow, and everything was burnt. It was eye opening. The devastation of the bush fires is all across the south Coast. You can’t really escape it.

    As we were driving towards Tumut at the base of the snowy mountains, we saw some beautiful looking campsites along the Blowering Damn. So we decided to go into Tumut, pick up supplies and then head back out to the campsite called The Pines, in Kosciuszko National Park.

    The campsite was alongside the Blowering Damn. So we didn’t miss the opportunity to fish :)

    We fished till sunset and caught a small Redfin. Apparently they are a pest and should now be thrown back in the water. We didn’t know this at the time. So We threw the little one back in.

    We saw emus running about with their hatchlings. Had a nice fire and went to bed for an early start.

    We had a quick fish in the morning and then headed to the Blowering Damn look out, and walked across the Damn. Then headed to our next destination in the Bago State Forest, to the other side of then fam and we thought it had potential to get us a fish!!    Read more

  • Oz2020

    Bago State Forest

    September 21, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ☀️ 14 °C

    Bago State Forest is on the less accessible side of the Blowering Dam (We only realised after that it was 4WD only) and the weather was not on our side. After checking out the first few campgrounds, we decided they were spot too windy and decided to look further into the forest. On the way (against Lara's warnings and against the advice of a local from Tumut fishing and camping shop: "stay away from the “nice green patches” known as ‘wet spots’ by the lake as you will get bogged up to your axel") Robin decided to drive straight on to a ‘nice green patch’ of grass and instantly the car instantly sunk inches into the ground...

    After a solid hour of digging, flattening the tyres, placing recovery tracks and getting muddy. With Lara behind the wheel and Robin pushing the car, we managed to get it out of car cemetery. Victory.

    After a little celebration, We we’re back on the road and followed foreshore drive, that winded around the lake. A large storm had hit us, with hail and heavy rain.. we drove for another half an hour on a quite difficult road and finally found a perfectly sheltered and secluded campsite right by the lake, just as the sun came out too :)

    We tried fishing in late afternoon and all day the next day from sunrise without any luck even though fish was jumping all around us (probably teasing us)...

    The Blowering dam seemed like the perfect place to catch fish but was being difficult to us...    Read more

  • Oz2020

    Burrinjuck Lake

    September 23, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ☀️ 13 °C

    On our way to escape the bad weather and still pursuing our fishing quest, we drove north and arrived to Reflection Caravan Park on the shore of Burrinjuck Lake (the road to the free camp site at the state forest was closed).

    We finally managed to buy some worms (been hunting for about a week, apparently the worms ‘weren’t growing’ in QLD) from the local shop in the caravan park and immediately dropped hook line and sinker in the water in front of our campsite.

    Unfortunately, it seems we did not drive far enough as the bad weather was following us. Rain showers kept on coming one after the other, beautiful rainbows would appear as the rain would stop. We kept fishing through the showers and scored a Carpe at dusk! Finally!!    Read more

  • Oz2020

    Mudgee

    September 25, 2020 in Australia ⋅ 🌧 12 °C

    The massive storm front was still upon us when we reached Mudgee, a region known for its good wine... so we stopped at Blacklea winery and were ‘welcomed’ by an old grumpy owner who was tired of answering questions and was hovering over the bar making us very uncomfortable, so we left his establishment in a rush! Unfortunately we were not in better luck with the next two wineries we had planned to go as they were booked out.

    We headed to Mudgee town as a massive storm was looming upon us, so we went on a pub crawl at: Mudgee brewery (grear red ale, which we got a travel size Growler, known as squiller), Woolpack hotel (nice live music), paragon hotel (cheap pizzas, average), We ended up sleeping in the parking lot in the middle of the town)...

    Next morning, although 4°, the sun was out and we got better luck with the places we visited:
    1. Gulgong old mining town (average - too many cars to get a good pic of the old buildings)
    2. Bakery - Mudgee Bakery - average and commercialised. Looks like they extended the cafe and lost its charm)
    3. Cheesery - Mudgee Cheesery yum yum
    4. Honeyree - Honey Haven Mudgee - no need to stop there just drive past, but they did a nice coffee
    5. Winery - Thistle Hill - Bought 12 bottles of 2016 shiraz at Thistle Hill Winery (We still haven't figured out where to put all this wine in the van...)
    6. Walk to The Drip Gorge (also know as the great dripping wall) in the Goulburn River National Park

    All in all we weren’t prepared for a weekend in Mudgee - everything booked out - so lesson learned to be more prepared !!    Read more

  • Oz2020

    Dubbo

    September 27, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ☀️ 16 °C

    We spent 2 nights around Dubbo as we had some errands to run: car maintenance and administrative crap.

    Night 1: Ponto Falls Campground, got there late after our Mudgee extravaganza. Simple campsite (lots of birds and friendly ducks) - closed since covid but we went in anyway.

    Day/ Night 2: Headed to Dubbo, we stayed at a rest area to work on the car. Unfortunately, Robin spilt engine oil on the bed... so we had to pay for the crapiest caravan park just to clean the sheets at the laundry machine... We ended up at a burger joint for dinner.

    Spent the following day working on the car doing the regular service and ran some errands for Robins VISA - good thing about Dubbo, everything is 2 minutes away!! (Robin met a lovely chap who went over and above his ‘very busy schedule’ to certify his papa era. We stopped for the night at Terramungamine Camp Ground. We met Nicole and Ruby (her 15 year old dog). Nicole is a nomad who currently works with the local Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community, she told us about some nice spots around, such as a rock where aborigenese would sharpen their tools thousands of years ago. She also told us that someone got shot in the leg at the campsite we were staying at 2 weeks before. Apparently some locals like to rob the rich tourists ...

    Lara wanted to go to the zoo even thought Robin tried to convice her otherwise. The zoo was a horrible experience as school holidays had just started and Lara even admitted at the end that the zoo was dull! Animals seem bored and unhappy ..

    Was a long day, but at least the car was purring! Her engine was as happy as ever !!    Read more

  • Oz2020

    Warrumbungles National Park

    September 29, 2020 in Australia ⋅ 🌧 12 °C

    We arrived at Blackman campsite late afternoon and set up camp in the Warrumbungle National Park. We had awesome views with amazing magma cliff formations (such as the breadknife).

    After making friendly with our neighbors, they recommended for us to do the Bread Knife track walk (4-5 hrs return, among australia's best 10 walks). With it forecast to rain, we debated weather to take the challenge or leave it.

    We woke up early with a cloudy sky and decided to brave the walk. The walk although VERY STEEP, was very well maintained, with pavements and stairs all the way up... and breathtaking view at the top (even with clouds). Definitely a must do!    Read more

  • Oz2020

    Nundle

    September 30, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ☁️ 15 °C

    Recommended from Robin's friend Rowan, who is from the area, to go to the little town of Nundle. Unfortunately, once again the weather was not on our side, so we decided to spend the afternoon at the pub Rowan suggested: The Peel Inn. Which is a lovely small establishement with a beautiful beer garden with overhanging vines.

    After one or 2 well deserved pints, we asked the barmaid where some free camping spots were, she recommended Sheba Dam campground. She also mentioned they had just filled the damn with new trout, so we knew that was our next stop. We got there at dark, robin cooked a lovely Mac and cheese dish which a fellow traveller had donated, and went straight to be ready to catch a trout in the morning.

    We awoke early with a heavy fog setting across the region. could not see 20 meters in front of us. With consistent showers we could only manage to brave the rain for 2 hours.. again having empty buckets with not even a bite!! As we walked back to our camp heavy headed we got talking to a nice group of fossickers (hobby of finding precious stones by sifting through soil near river banks or a water source. They loved showing off their precious stone stash.

    We said our goodbyes and tried heading toward the hanging rock lookout where they had collected some crystals and saffires but the fog was so heavy that we gave up and headed towards our next destination: the coast!    Read more

  • Oz2020

    Samurai Beach Camp Ground

    October 1, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ☀️ 21 °C

    Due to a series of unfortunate events, we were not able to stay at Red Head beach (pay friendly camping beach, where we were supposed to spend the long week end with our friends).

    We managed to find a nudist beach where we could camp: Samurai beach. With a cozy little camp ground behind the sand dunes.

    We woke up with the sun and started beach fishing straight away. Robin caught a the biggest fish yet: an Australian salmon!

    We met Gary on the way out who said "the only way to cook australian salmon is to boil it for 3minutes and put it in a fish cake"... as the flesh is not that good grilled. We decided we would try that over the week end.    Read more

  • Oz2020

    Long Weekend at Barrington Tops

    October 2, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ☀️ 22 °C

    We spent an eventful long weekend with our friends around Chichester state forest (or how we call it: 🎶 Barrington Tops 🎶

    We finally managed to find a spot for 25 people to camp. All our friends arrived really late on friday as they took 5hrs at least from Sydney, good effort!

    We had a wonderful time with everyone: during the day we would drive down to the river. People were cooking amazing food and sharing with everyone. We made the fish cakes with Robin's australian Salmon which tasted fabulous!

    Played some volleyball, juggling lessons and other games and too much drinking of course...

    Some Mauritian friends did a sega (mauritius music) sing along spectacle, everyone ended dancing around the campfire!    Read more

  • Oz2020

    Booti Booti National Park

    October 5, 2020 in Australia ⋅ ☀️ 24 °C

    From Barrington Tops we had 3/4 days to get to Byron before the weekend. We had plans to see Lara’s sister and Robins cousin.
    We said our goodbyes to our Barrington Tops crew and headed north towards the coast.

    We went to swung by Foster and found a campsite on the beach in Booti Booti National Park. We slipped in late and left early. It was very windy, so we searched for a beach that was sheltered. We sound Elizabeth Beach, where we met a guy who told us about the Booti Hill and Wallis lake walk. So we set off on a 3 hour walk.. which we were not prepared for, it was very steep up and down that wrapped around the mountain and coast lines, from beach to lake. It was very enjoyable and got the heart pumping!!    Read more

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