Happy 16th Birthday to me!

My birthday started at 7:10am, when I kinda half woke up, looked at my watch, and decided to sleep in for a while longer. Five/ten minutes later the phone rang. Chana got it and gave it to Mummy (who was asleep), then Mummy passed it on to me. It was Auntie Beth, ringing from NZ to wish me a happy birthday. After that most of us went back to sleep for a while. Then I had a coffee and took Sparkie for a walk before we all sat on the family bed for presents.

Because we are in a small country town at the moment, I only got three small presents, but Mummy’s going to get me something else when we get to a bigger town.

 

It was stinking hot day, until about 2pm when a storm appeared on the horizon. There was a warning out for hail, strong wind, and heavy rain. We heard some thunder and the clouds were getting really dark so Jessica and me decided to take the dogs out before the storm hit. About ten minutes into the walk there was really loud crack of thunder, the lightning was getting close, and we could see the clouds moving in fast. So we abandoned the walk and headed home. Just before we reached the bus there was another rumble and the wind picked up. I yelled at Chantel to pack up her toys and Jessica quickly started to help. We were about to bring down the awning when the wind started blowing even stronger. Mummy yelled at me to grab a pole holding the awning up, but the wind was blowing bits of grass and dust into my face so I couldn’t see. Eventually I covered my eyes with my arm and grabbed the edge of the awning. Mummy started dropping the poles and then the wind caught the awning, nearly ripping it out of my hand. I had to forget trying to protect my eyes and use both hands to hold it. Jessica grabbed one side as I dropped my pole. The rain started just then and the wind drove it into our faces. Daddy unhooked the awning from the side of the bus and we were yelling at each other over the wind and flapping of the tarpie. We dragged the tarpie inside, and just as we were nearly in the door there was a crack and a fizzing sound. I saw sparks flying off a power box as thunder rumbled around us. Finally we were all inside, and Jessica’s saying how scary it all was. I’m just glad we got home when we did!

After running the dogs and playing in the cool of the evening, Jessica decorated my cake and we all sat down for dinner.

Somebody had the silly idea to get me relighting candles – I blew them all out, looked away, then looked back and several had relit themselves! I think it was Chana’s idea. But anyway, it was funny.

Burrendong

On Tuesday we went to the Burrendong State Forest near Wellington (NSW), and it was awful. The tourist brochure said there was a water slide out there, etc, etc. They failed to mention the $10 entrance fee, and the fact that the water slide is only open on the weekend. Besides that, the barbeques weren’t working (and hadn’t been since January). The place had a real rundown feel, which is fine, but the fact that we’d paid $10 for next to nothing was annoying. And the lake had blue-green algae in it.

On the bright side, there was a great view and plenty of tracks through the bush to walk the dogs. Sparkie and me went for a half hour walk and didn’t see any people at all, which is always a nice change after spending so long in town!

On the way to camp, we stopped by a strange sculpture. Apparently it’s meant to be a seed pod with stalactites inside it. It represents something, but I can’t remember what it was! And the wall around it was meant to be the hills around the town, or something like that.

Parks

On November 14 we woke up around 7am to watch the solar eclipse. We didn’t get to see the full one like up in Townville or Cairns, but it was cool enough. Didn’t get any photos though, unfortunately.

 

Yesterday we went to the Dubbo Waterpark, which is nowhere near as cool as the one in Townville, but the younger guys loved it.

This yellow ring sprayed water at people who stood inside it – Chantel named it “the Stargate.”

 

After that we went to a dog park with agility equipment. It wasn’t as good as the one in Beenleigh, Brisbane, where we went in July. Well, it got a tiny mention here with no photos. Anyway, this dog park here in Dubbo had so many prickles in the grass that we had to stop every few minutes to pick them out of the dogs’ feet! And it was late in the evening so most of the photos are blurry.