Bungunyah, we're good!

Nick applied for September (school holiday) leave much earlier in the year but his application was rejected, so we had decided to do day-trips from home. When his roster was received though, it showed him as being on leave for the first week of the holidays even though there had been no other approval advice.

The roster for the second school holiday week arrived a bit later and we cheered to see Nick's line again marked as annual leave. Given several medical appointments, we semi-planned for departure at the end of the first week but were still unsure of our destination.

As departure day loomed closer we hadn't achieved much packing, cos we still hadn't chosen where to go. 

On Wednesday afternoon, with map on the table, Nick and I discussed a few ideas. Neither of us were overly keen - until Nick suggested Yowah!  It was a lot further away than our original vague "plan" but we were much more excited about going!

Packing commenced in earnest but even with our best efforts, we didn't hit the road till around 2:00pm the next day - pretty much 24 hours after deciding to go. Bandit packed himself into the car at 10:00am, so was very pleased when we finally left the driveway!

We ate a very late lunch en route and rolled in Bungunyah Rest Area at around 9:00pm. Nick set up a table for our new-to-us three-burner dual fuel stove (purchased earlier in the week), so I could chef an easy dinner.

There had been bacon and cream in the fridge at home, so I bought mushrooms at Toowoomba and then pasta at Goondiwindi (cos I'd forgotten it at the previous stop).  I'd chopped the bacon and an onion before leaving, which streamlined cooking on site.  I'd also sliced strawberries to macerate with sugar as we traveled.    Our late dinner was much appreciated as were our decadent strawberries and ice-cream.  It's a hard life, eh?!

There was no real menu plan this trip.  We packed one Engel as a freezer, stocked with meat from home.  It was stashed in the back of Elmer.  Cold items were packed into two eskies, which travelled in the camper trailer storage box. 

Erin was excited to use her new swag (and a silk sleeping bag liner) for the first time - real camping rather than bedroom floor trial!  She slept very well as did Nick and I with our revised bedding of 4WD mats and latex foam overlay.   The innerspring mattress from the van fit into the trailer but wasn't as comfortable as we hoped.  The lower profile of mats/overlay meant we could stack Erin and Vaughan's mats on our bed during transit for easier set-up on arrival.

We were up early, breakfasted and back on the road by 8:30am.  A great first night/morning effort!  Hooray for us!