I know it has been an awful long time since we last wrote on our blog and we do apologise for that.
What have we been doing????
We you know that we travelled to Wagga Wagga for Christmas - where we also celbrated the 80th Birthday of my Mum on the 30th December. Mum's birthday is the 31st December, but we celebrated a day early to allow those who had commitments on the 31st to attend..
She really didn't know what was going on but all the gathered family had a good time catching up and celebrating the event.
We then back to Jimboomba for a couple of days prior to the arrival of grandbaby number four - his parents are calling him 'Lucky Last' :)
The night he was born.
He was 4100gm born and at 6 weeks of age weighs a whopping 6000gms. He loves his mothers milk :)
His older brothers and sister have fallen in love and he is developing his own little personality already.
The Van
Before we went away at Christmas we were curious as to how much our van weighed (as we had an inkling that it was heavier than it should be) - so we took it in FULLY loaded to the weigh-bridge and got the shock of our lives :) :D
The scales said that we had 900kg over the TARE weight [according to the COMPLIANCE PLATE the fully loaded weight should be 2116kg and we had 2700kg fully loaded weight (or ATM)]. What the!!!! There was no way that we had that much in the van.
We went off for our trip to Wagga and when we returned we had the van booked in for some alterations - so we decided it was the best time to take EVERYTHING out of it and get a TARE weight (empty weight) and ensure that it weighed the amount that was on the Compliance Plate.
WELL - NO it didn't weigh that much - it was 304kg HEAVIER than what it was supposed to.
We have weighed ALL the equipment that we have put on or in the van and YES - we do have too much in it BUT even with the solar panels, three batteries, rod holder, jerry cans, water, gas, food, clothing and crockery etc - it DOES NOT ADD UP TO 900kg.
Take off the 304 kg difference in what it does weigh and what it should weigh and we are getting closer to what all our equipment, food, clothes etc weigh. so we have an idea of where we have to cull our belongings. Now if we had a dual axle caravan - we wouldn't have to cull anything BUT as we only have a single axle-van - we have to leave some stuff at home :(.
We contacted the Builder in Melbourne and it has taken 4 weeks to get the thing sorted - hopefully!
the builder contacted the chassis builder and the suspension builder and they have recalculated what the weights should be and what the van can safely carry over all the terrain that we want to traverse.
We have recieved a new compliance plate with the new weights on it and we now have to take the van and the paperwork along with the new plate to the Roads Traffic Authority - where they have to inspect the caravan and allow us to put the new plate on the van and adjust the weights that are recorded on the registration labels.
We took the paperwork in today BUT because we are into our 15th day of rain, and there is no covered area for the inspectors at Cleveland - we have to wait for the rain to stop or take it 3/4 hour away to Kingston/Woodridge to get it inspected there.
Darryl has decided that we will wait for the rain to stop - could be a while before that happens......
Last Friday we had two lovely people join us for the weekend......
Nick Scaife (LifEuphoria - founder and Bicyclist) and his lovely fiancee - Claudia Breitbach.
Once Nick finished cycling around the coast of Australia (27000 km over 7 1/2 months) with Jimmy McGee, he was joined by his lovely girlfriend - who became his Fiancee two days later.
We had a fantastic time - and two VERY late nights. Just after midnight on Friday and then 2am Sunday :)
They left us yesterday afternoon to make their way to the Gold Coast to visit an Uncle and Aunt of Claudia's and then today they were hoping to travel to Lennox Heads to visit friends. they may have to detour via Casino to get to Sydney though as some of the coast roads are flooded and are said to stay that way for at least a week.
Ronnie and Graeme went for a trip down south in January - had to detour because of the fires around Coonabarabran and then on the return trip they had to be careful because of the damage caused by flooding.....
Australia Day we went to cousin Julie's place and had a fantastic time with about 20 other people. Rain pee'd down all day BUT the company made the difference. :D
During Cyclone Oswald - we loast a palm tree that was covered in Elkhorns, BUT we managed to saw it into quarters and have saved all the elkhorns for the future. We re-attached one to another palm tree, gave one to our son-in-laws parents, Cousin Julie took one and we just have to work out how to hang the remaining one onto some wood and hang it under the Patio.
Once we have got everything worked out with the van we will really start planning our travels for 2013. We will be heading up through Fernvale, to Nanango, onto Bullyard near Bundaberg and then we will see where we go - depending on the Weather.
We have friends at Kilcoy too and Maryborough (Qld) - you will never know where we will show up :)
Keep safe all.
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