Back to the Real World - Shore Leave

20th December 2020 – 8th January 2021

John and I had always intended to be back in Brisbane for Christmas although we hadn’t expected to arrive by car. Due to an engine failure John and I had left Summer Breeze at Burnett Heads and hired a car. We arrived at my brother Paul’s house with a car load of

“gear to sort.” This is the story of our lives now – getting rid of the non-essential. We just don’t have the room for it although I still have a dress up box that John wants to dispose of – he’s frightened I’m going to force him into another cute outfit.

Paul and Ness were spending a family Christmas at 1770 so we were kind enough to house-mind, dog mind and have mum over for a few days over Christmas. It was a very busy few days taking mum to her doctor, buying food, preparing Christmas meals and doing the Christmas lights tour. Did I mention that John hates city traffic and I could hear a bit of under the breath swearing? John and I had a lovely Christmas brunch with my sister Clare, her husband Don, mum, as well as the two dogs. No photos though. We were exhausted.

New Year's Eve was also very quiet - we're beyond struggling to get to the bar or waiting at the taxi rank. This year we dressed up in bright clothes and forced ourselves to wait up until midnight.

We spent another two weeks at Paul’s place – they must wish we would find a place of our own. It’s a little frustrating to have no plans. We were basically waiting for the engine to arrive at Burnett Heads. We spent our time going for drives, having picnics (Dutton Park), eating out, visiting wineries (Sirromet), visiting markets (Harris farm), going to the movies (The Deep), and organising our gear, a euphemism for throwing it in the storage shed. We had a sleep over at Clare’s place. Max, the very big staffy-dog is very affectionate and likes to sit on Clare’s lap.

When the Queensland government announced, they were going to

have a 3-day lockdown (or as we prefer to say a Locky-D) to get control of the beta variant, John and I decided to make run for it. We stayed to catch up with my brother Dave from Nambour then left. Maybe running off was not in the spirit of a lockdown but we were going back to our boat and would isolate there. Many others obviously had the same idea as the five-hour trip took seven hours due to congestion and heavy rain.

Next: Lazy Days at Burnett Heads