Rouse Hill, Xmas 2012

December 18^th, Up early to finish packing up to leave. Terri and Patrick came around to see us off, on our way to The OK Corral Caravan Park at Rouse Hill in Sydney. This was our first stay at this Park and so an unknown, as our usual Park was Sydney Gateway at Parklea which has been converted to a Lifestyle Village for the over 50’s. We turned off at Medowie and went to our Storage Shed at Salamander Bay, to pick up 2 boxes that belonged to Steven, then continued on to Sydney. This detour added a lot of time to our journey, so with breaks it took us 7 hours to get from Wallamba River to Rouse Hill, in Sydney.  After booking in and setting up Greg, Dianne, Jessica and Annaliese came over bringing a much appreciated Pizza Meal for all of us. We were very happy with our site, nice and shady, nicely grassed, a large concrete slab and clean amenities. One difference to other Caravan Parks, checking in was done at a “cone of silence” booth at the entrance, where I was given directions to our site and help to guide me in, but the Office was at the other end of the Park and a long uphill walk. I was given a friendly welcome, paid the fees and then driven back to our site in a “golf cart”, how flash is that.

December 19^th, Did the last of our Xmas Shopping this morning (Secret Santa Presents only). We went over to Greg and Dianne’s and as they are still working, Val made a delicious Chicken Stroganoff for Dinner.

December 20^th, We packed up our equipment and headed off to Steven and Ed’s new apartment at Elizabeth Bay, to help them with a few odd jobs. They had just picked up the keys, so the place was empty. My main job was to re-paint the freshly painted front door, from a dull red to a gloss red. Sound too easy, doesn’t it. Val main task was to take up the curtains, as they were all different lengths and dragging on the floor, another easy job. We started with a tour of the apartment, which was a very impressive 3 br, fully refurbished, new kitchen and bathrooms and freshly painted and carpeted right through. I masked, lightly sanded the front door and gave it a first coat of new paint. As it started to dry it was obvious that it would need a 2^nd coat, in 2 hrs. Val set up her sewing machine on our table and proceeded with the task of pinning up and hemming the bottoms of the 20 curtains in the apartment. Her instructions were to make the curtains just resting on the floor and her efforts were frustrating her as she was never satisfied with the finished results. I discovered that the curtain brackets were slotted, so adjustable, which calmed her nerves when I was able to adjust the height to her satisfaction. We took care of some minor tasks, like removing unwanted shelving and adjusting cupboard doors to close with even gaps. The boys were planning to remove the 2^nd bathroom shower screens to install the new clothes dryer, which we thought was not a great idea and created other problems. Val came up with the great idea of removing the existing cupboard under the breakfast bar in the kitchen and fitting the dryer under there. Steven was excited at the prospect and had to contact the dryer manufacturers to find out if that closed in area would be OK. A task for tomorrow. It was a long day as we left home at 10.30am and arrived back home at midnight, but we were happy with the help we were able to give the boys.

 

 

December 21^st, It was both Greg and Dianne’s last day at work, so we had the girls for the day. They had a great time feeding the goats and ducks, playing on the swings and merry go round and swimming in the pool.

December 23^rd, Greg picked me up at 9.15am and we went to Steven and Ed’s apartment at Elizabeth Bay to modify the breakfast bar to take the Clothes Dryer and I had to put a 3^rd and final coat of red gloss paint on the front door. Greg also hung some very heavy mirrors in the lounge room and I fixed a leak at the main bathroom shower head. Ed had packed up 7 boxes of things he didn’t want and gave them to me for our garage sale in February, next year. We got back home around 6.30pm, satisfied with our days efforts to help Steven and Ed settle in.

Mind you, it might take me a week to recover as I haven’t done that much work in the last 10 years.

December 24^th, Val started preparing her salad and trifle for tomorrows Christmas Day Lunch at Greg and Dianne’s. I dropped off everything to be put in Greg’s fridge and was finding that I was getting a cold today, so Dianne gave me some cough and cold mixture they had in the cupboard. I was feeling so bad after dinner that I went to bed early, very unusual for me.

December 25^th, We went to Greg and Dianne’s around 11am and gave Jessica and Annaliese their Christmas presents, which they loved. Greg had laid out a great table setting and I had left my camera back at the Van, bugger! Greg Dianne and Val were busy preparing the food for lunch while I sat around feeling miserable with my cold (only to be expected). Steven and Ed followed by Sue and Mark (Dianne’s parents) arrived and our party was complete. We did our Secret Santa presents for the Adults, we all got what we wanted, and we were now ready to eat the delicious food, prepared for lunch.

December 27^th, I stayed in bed all day yesterday and until lunchtime today. Val had picked up some more cold tablets and cough mixture, in an attempt to make me feel better. My cold was starting to improve, so we went around to Greg and Dianne’s place to share a Chinese takeaway with them for dinner, which was very enjoyable. Dianne had  eaten something, while they were out  spending their Christmas Vouchers, that didn’t agree with her and  she was vomiting, so we didn’t see her till later in the night when she came through looking very pale.

December 28^th, I cleaned out the back of the car this morning, as Steven had phoned to let us know that we were to pick up more boxes of stuff that Ed was giving us for our Garage Sale. We left early to meet with Nikos at 2pm, at his work building in Sydney CBD. Steven joined us and we went for a coffee and chat about the state of our finances.  It was good to catch up with Nikos again and we had a very useful discussion from which we decided to look into Relocatable Homes on the Central Coast after another year on the road and then selling both the Caravan and Ford Territory and buying a smaller car. Steven and Nikos went back to their respective jobs and we wandered around Town until Steven finished work. We loaded up the boxes from Steven and Ed’s Apartment and they took us to dinner at Mickey’s Place in Oxford Street, Paddington. The food was delicious and the atmosphere nice and quiet, compared to their first choice of the local Pub on the corner. It was far too late to do any packing up tonight and Greg offered his help to get us off to Blacksmiths in the morning.