Who am I kidding?

So who am I kidding anyway. I don't have nearly enough time to tell you every day of our holidays, and it's kind of old news now anyway, so I'll just let you in on a few highlights.

We camped one night north of a little town called Briagalong. In the morning Melody looked behind me while we ate breakfast and pointed out a rather large dog. I had heard some barking in the early morning and guessed that maybe it was a farm dog. It was about 150 metres away. There were no large sticks in sight but I did break a branch off a bush as some form of protection. Abigail needed to go to the toilet and so the whole family walked to the toilet block. As we got closer the dog backed off. I stood near the entrance way with my branch and eyed him from a distance. He stood for the longest time staring at me too. A few days later we had camped by Mallacoota and were visiting a little church in the morning. The pastor told me (he had been a farmer) that not that would not have been a farm dog, as farm dogs always stay with their masters. Eastern Victoria is a lot more sparsely populated and I was surprised to learn that indeed there are dingoes in the eastern forests. We had encountered a dingo. Even during our encounter it disappeared into a creek gully and reappeared 30 metres away from us. It had been stalking us. Hardly a "highlight" but certainly a good camp fire story.

We stayed a few nights in a town called Merimbula in southern NSW. Merimbula is a popular spot with Victorians, but was still fairly quiet in early November, just the way we like it. While staying there, we were able fulfill one of Abigail's big holiday wishes, which was to see animals. We visited a little sanctuary called "Potaroo Palace" where we were able to get quite close to a number of native animals. Abigail simply loved this, and proved to be the biggest animal lover there. We could hardly tear her away from the wombat even 10 minutes after the presentation was over.


We were able to get up close and personal with the kangaroos. Abigail and Melody both loved being allowed to feed them with special pellets.


When patting the echidna, make sure not to go against the spikes!


The art at an Australian native animal inspired gallery was high quality.


Another highlight for us was the Buchan caves in eastern Victoria, by Orbost. The caves have an impressive display of stalactites and stalagmites. (One goes up and one goes down, don't ask me which.) We particularly enjoyed this spot as it had a very pretty camping ground which we made use of and will have to return to.


The valley where the town of Buchan is situated.


Abigail enjoyed her run around the Buchan caves camp grounds.


We also spent a couple of days in the seaside town of Lakes Entrance. Lakes Entrance is very close to a stretch of beach that is completely straight for ninety miles and is aptly named "Ninety Mile Beach". Abigail thought it was a pretty big sandbox!