Bribie Island Shake down trip March 6 to 8

Shaking out the trailer kinks

We were getting down to the nitty gritty of planning for our August trip to the Kimberleys when it occurred to each of us, simultaneously, that this was going to be a VERY expensive trip. Vehicle hire from Darwin for five weeks was going to cost a bomb and the cost of mere campground cabins or safari tents (let alone resorts or wilderness lodges) was outrageous. Hmmmm ... what to do?

Well, we thought, we do now own a four wheel drive vehicle, a Subaru Imprezza .... and our camper trailer needs a purpose in life, so it occurred to us that maybe we might be better off to actually drive ourselves to Broome and back, and take our accommodation with us. Genius! (John adds: Duh!  It was you who wanted a 4WD for camping!).  Oooh ... scary!  That's only about 10,000 kilometres or so (give or take a thousand).  Easy peasy.  Isn't it?  (John adds: Check with us in six months, but hey, I popped up to Darwin in January with Jess's car.  It was so much fun, let's do it again! ).

With this idea in mind, we took advantage of a fine few days off together  - most unusual to be off for so long at the same time - and packed up the trailer for a trip to Bribie Island and a long weekend of camping.  Not even glamping .... the Bongaree Caravan park doesn't offer en-suite sites. We had to rough it with the plebs.


Our site had sea views....well just!

John outside Bongaree Caravan Park at Bribie Island

Of course we were thinking it would be best to iron out any problems within coo-ee of home and decide what gear we currently have that is excess to requirements and what might be essential to have (but we don't yet possess) for this sort of big trip.

A phone call to Bongaree Caravan park secured us a powered campsite. Then we dragged out the trailer and dusted it down (Barb actually wiped the tonneau cover clean - good heavens) , re-packed the gear and loaded some fresh food and clothes. We were away by midday.

Our shiny Subaru with the camper trailer

John getting himself technologically connected

Comfy trailer set-up with new floor mats

The Subaru pulled the laden trailer with no problems at all. Even up and down steep hills it was a breeze. When we arrived at Bribie ("Bribby", as the GPS will insist on calling it) we easily found the campsite right on the waterfront, but managed to get lost finding our designated spot. The sites are TINY!  Thank goodness there were no campers on either side of us when we first arrived, so we could manoeuvre into place and set up camp in peace.  (John adds: John has yet to cope with the basics of reversing a trailer, let alone master the skill.)

It quickly came back to us how to assemble the tent and annexe and within the hour we were sitting down with a cold beer or three to watch the people behind us get their tent up. So far so good.

We're using the floor matting we bought at the Kawana Home Show last year, and our lovely comfy folding chairs for the first time while camping. Aaah! The decadence!  Never mind that on day two we realised that the trailer came supplied with, um, floor matting.  Not nearly as good as the new stuff, but of course!

a stroll on the beach at sunset

It was a peaceful and idyllic setting

Aaah! This is the life!

Once we had everything arranged to our liking we went for a walk to explore the island waterfront.  It was glorious. Very peaceful too until the noisy birds arrived. Rainbow lorikeets and corellas screeched happily overhead in the trees and the sun set soothingly over the placid waters of the passage.

Noisy lorikeets

We found a lovely Italian pizza and pasta restaurant nearby and were wowed by the food, it was so much better than meals we had in Italy on our trip in 2010.  When we mentioned this to the waitress she was quite tickled, and was further tickled when we said we were down from Maleny for the weekend (for non-SE Queenslanders, Maleny is the go-to weekend destination).  We left before the tickling grew out of control.

We returned to our campsite to find nothing had gone walkabout in our absence. A relief.  It's very hard to lock canvas walls held together with velcro. The air was still pretty hot and sticky after a very warm day, so we were glad of the (merely) USB powered fans that John rigged to keep us cool at night. Also we were grateful for the mesh windows and doors to keep both the mossies and cane toads out. Wonder if they'll be as effective against snakes and crocs in the outback?

Camp set up...washing done

John relaxes with a wine

Barb relaxes in new camp kitchen

We slept surprisingly well in our trailer bed but we were woken very early by the dawn chorus of lorikeets and crows.  The dawn chorus was preceded, of course, by the pre-dawn eruption of the kookaburras.  Is it their function to act as an alarm call for the other birds?

We'd left home regarding this as a shakedown trip to iron out remaining wrinkles in our set up.  Accordingly on our first morning we popped 20 or 30 km back up the road to the Anaconda store in Morayfield.  Stopping off only for breakfast at Coffee Club (yum and ee) we dived in and emerged with a cornucopia of goodies.  John had been wittering on about the need for a more substantial fridge and Barb had noted a sale ending the next day.  The result was almost embarrassing for the largess with which we emerged.  The fridge John had his eye on really was reduced, and of course we got other items.  The result was that for the "normal" price of the fridge we got that, a camp kitchen (really, really good!), a beer fridge, an inverter (both unasked for but it was thrown in for free) and a myriad of other bits and pieces.  And it all works!  Who said there's no such thing as a free lunch?

After all the hard work...John deserves a beer

A husband's work is never done

Work all done now!

Of all these goodies by far the most important, at least in Barb's eyes, was the jaffle iron.  To John's ill educated mind this looks like two lumps of cast iron hinged together, but Barb was adamant on Sunday morning that they produced the perfect breakfast.  Ah well! 

relaxing fishing

 a very beautiful spot

Breakfast was done and that was our cue to pack away, and it seemed every other visitor took the same cue.  We left by about 9:30 and the whole site was noticeably emptier than the night before.  Campers so close to Brisbane clearly have to work on Monday morning.  Oh.  So do we!