Sun, sea, sand, snags and sore spots

I have an admission to make.

I mentioned in an earlier post that BabyCakes had bought a new (second hand) car just before Christmas. What I didn't mention was that it was a 4WD - in fact, if we lived in North America, what BabyCakes bought would be called a "truck". It's big and it's shiney. After some careful consideration, I decided that his all round decency and desire to take his new vehicle actually off road might be enough to outweigh the 4WD factor, and I wouldn't have to break up with him after all. (I've never dated someone with a 4WD, and in the city I resent being surrounded by them. The argument of "I love driving a 4WD, I can see over everything else and get much better sight lines" is an extremely selfish one, and makes my life in a sedan a hellish proposition at times.)
I am very happy to say though, that within a month of having the new Triton in his possession, it has been off road, and BabyCakes and I have had our first real taste of 4WDriving!

BabyCakes bought the "truck" to hold his work samples safely in the back, and not all over the back seat, to not have the joy of an un-lowered, un-skirted car that one does not have to wince at when anyone walks near. It is also his first 4 cylinder car he's ever owned... all be it turbo diesel....


As you can see by the size of his grin, BabyCakes kinda enjoyed it....... a lot! It was good fun, and we had a lovely day with friends.

A group of friends (4 couples, which shall be known as Rastas and Primrose Goddess, Mr and Mrs C and the new Mr and Mrs K) have been talking about going camping together for a few weeks now, there was talk of getting away before everyone went back to work etc. but that didn't happen.
It was decided amongst the group to go up to Bribie Island to have a look around at their camping sites, and generally have a nice day out.

On Saturday we met promptly at whatever time people could get there as close to 8am as possible at the jumbo service centre at Caboolture/Burpengary before we started our convoy to Bribie and all the little stops that needed to be made on the way (checking geocaches, permits, batteries, food, water, air etc.).

We made it to the car park before the access road to the beach at about 9:30 am from memory, and that was where BabyCakes and my adventure and learning curve really started.

The drive down the beach stopping a couple of times on the way to get to know the area and for Rastas to get some GPS way points, was pretty uneventful. We took it slowly, asked our questions and got our answers, were taught some beach driving etiquette and stopped for some morning tea (very important that!).

We then drove to the limit of our access (to the light tower) and once again Rastas took way points and we had fun looking at all the shells and pebbles on the beach.

I have to say at this point that the pebbles and shells were a high point in my day. The simple beauty of them, even the fact that one can still find amazing shells on the beach and the amazing colours we saw were a delightful antidote to a week where one night we turned on the news to have a story on murder, bashings, and a rape all within the first five minutes.

Nature has a special way of grounding me and giving me hope that sometimes I desperately need. It is almost always from simple beauty of light, colour and texture that I find that peace and awe for the world we live in.

Even the fact that there were

creatures in the shells, living in beautiful shiney homes. The pebble that Primrose Goddess found, with natural holes through it was amazing, and we were told it is also supposedly good luck to find such a thing... It certainly was a lucky find to see it.

We then headed off to find a spot to set up for lunch. Rastas had sourced us a magnificent and amazingly easy to erect sun shelter, and BabyCakes unpacked his much loved Weber Q and we had a very civilised BBQ once the wind was blocked from the from the Weber and it was able to be lit.

While the food was cooking Mr K set up his kite, which quickly grabbed Mr C's attention and they had a blast until it unfortunately got caught in a dead tree on the edge of the dune. I think the 20 minutes it took to free it from the tree, and untangle the strings kinda put a dampener on that fun. Rastas set up his high powered binoculars on a tripod so we could have a look at a passing container ship (I saw the caravan on deck first!), and once it had gone from sight, we could get a pretty decent view all the way up the beach to Caloundra, which was pretty cool.

After lunch Mr C could not resist the lure of Rastas' kite which was bigger and fancier than Mr K's kite (so Rastas tells us). There seemed to be a bit more control in this kite and Mr C spent quite some time keeping it in the air on a very very blustery day.

We all got a bit distracted by the kite and/or sitting around digesting our lunch and chatting that by the time we were all packed up and on the way back to bitumen we realised we'd left it a bit late to leave.

The tide was coming in, the beach was getting smaller and the sand we were driving on was quite soft. We followed tracks that someone had left before us, which was both a blessing and a curse. The track was not particularly straight and the ruts were getting huge. BabyCakes found it quite fatiguing on his arms to control the vehicle. When we had loaded up and headed out, we had planned only to stop at the service station to re-inflate tyres as necessary, but I can tell you we were all delighted to see the car park, which seemed to take forever to get to, and upon discovery of an ice-cream van there, we stopped for a celebratory ice cream cone. BabyCakes needed to unwind the tension a bit - not that the tension stopped him grinning from ear to ear.

On the way out we passed someone getting towed out and Rastas stopped to give water to a vehicle that had overheated, certainly not a day to be out and about by oneself.

The drive back to the city gave BabyCakes and me lots of time to chatter about the fun we'd had.

The new "truck" had got dirty, it had been off road and we'd been 4WDriving in probably the safest company we could have.

We had even been invited back to Mr & Mrs K's place to go for a swim in their pool!

The cars were all washed on the way home and we had an encore BBQ at Mr & Mrs K's for dinner. The pool was delightful for the pre-dinner swim, it cooled us down and cleared the grit of sand and sea spray from us. Mr K even helped BabyCakes out by using the high pressure cleaner on the Weber Q, making it almost sparkle (it would have been very sparkly with more de-greaser).

It was not really until we got home, and stretched out in front of the TV and promptly fell asleep during the pay-per-view movie we had ordered that we realised how tired we were. It wasn't until I woke up on Sunday (in bed) that I worked out just how all pervasive the muscular aches were. I'm not sure if they came from the tension of the drive off the beach, the general jostling of the 4WDriving experience, or from some kind of hypersensitivity to all of the above due to pre-menstrual hormones, but my goodness did my body ache - EVERYWHERE!

I'm glad we went on Saturday to give us Sunday to recover, and rediscover the sand that managed to find it's way into everything...


ohhhhhhhhhh..... is there anyone more bitchy than a group of boys discussing their 4WDs?