Our planned destination for the day was Port Macquarie. A resort town out on the coast and a slight deviation from the main highway north. Not wanting to keep our lives too simple we left the highway one exit too early so once again had to contend with additional kilometers of sealed but rather rough road. The objective had been to catch some of the coastal scenery but in the end we saw very little and ended up getting a significant dose of driving through suburbia before reaching the centre of the town. Given it is quite a large place we needed a map and therefore the information centre but unlike most towns we go through, the signage was pathetic.
Before getting ourselves too lost we stopped and asked someone where it was – “in the glass house down by the waterfront” was the answer along with directions on how to get there. On entering the area we soon discovered it was tourist but certainly not caravan friendly. Ok – we know where it is. Lets get out of here without hitting someone or something if at all possible, which we did, and then of course there was nowhere to park. After driving aimlessly around some of the roads we finally found a spot in a dead end street about a km away from where we needed to go. Then it was a brisk walk to the glass house to get maps etc.
While in the CBD and waterfront area we took time to look around and go for a walk around the port to the town beach. A very nice estuary entrance and beach with an interesting attraction of sorts being that all the boulders that make up the breakwater had been painted. Many were by families who had visited at one time or another and others were by individuals or couple proclaiming their love for one another and even the odd RIP. Carol was particularly taken by the “Good’s” rock – given that is her maiden name…
After lunch we tracked down the petrol station as both tanks were dry where Ross got told off for jamming the lever of the filler pipe open with the filler cap from the Beast instead of standing there and holding it – apparently a big no no… Unlike NZ it is not possible to latch the lever on when filling which when getting 130ltrs can make the process a bit laborious. Then it was back on the road north. With a few jobs to do in preparation to selling the van we decided to book into a caravan park for a couple of nights and chose the beachside area of Sawtell that is about 9km south of Coffs Harbour.
Monday was clean all the difficult bits of the caravan such as the curtains and vents and also touching up some of the paintwork on the drawbar and gas bottles. Just to make it the van a bit more attractive to any prospective buyers. We did however take the time to checkout the beach and coastline at Sawtell which in itself is a pleasant little town. The beach area in front of the caravan park is quite varied in that there is a very calm estuary that opens out onto this very long surf beach. While we were there a significant swell was coming in. A few plaques along the shoreline for people lost surfing or swept off the rocks were a good reminder of how serious the waves could be at times.
