Barron River National Park

On Sunday we went for a walk in the Barron River National Park and then for a swim in a water hole. Unfortunately the battery died on the camera so only a few photos. Caleb and Bethany went storming on ahead so not many of them either.! Quite hard going for Ruben who was a bit small to manage some of the route and a bit heavy to carry.

Ruben

Ruben is not a huge fan of soft toys.  He prefers to snuggle up with a couple of vehicles!!

Rodeo

A couple of weekends ago we went to the Mareeba rodeo. 

This was Ruben's favourite bit, the trucks watering the sand at the lunchtime break. He was puzzled when everybody else left for lunch. "Mummy where's everybody going, they're going to miss the trucks?"

Holidays

This last two weeks have been the winter holiday. That means day time temperatures are around 26 degrees C and night time is about 21 degrees C. It means we are feeling cold and have started wearing jackets in the evening and not swimming as much!!! We have  had a few picnics, met up with friends, had BBQs, done a bit of swimming and had a few day trips. Last week we visited a historic village. Today we are roller skating and tomorrow we are off to the rodeo in Mareeba.
School starts again on Tuesday around the time children in the UK are breaking up for the summer holidays. Of course our summer holiday is at Christmas!! It is very upside down here!!

Ruben's birthday

Ruben's birthday is actually on Monday, but we celebrated it today. He has been planning it for months, a trip on the Kuranda Scenic railway. The trip is an hour an a half from Cairns to Kuranda in the rainforest, winding it's way up the Barron gorge through tunnels, over bridges and past waterfalls.

It was finished in 1891 and has 15 hand-made tunnels and 37 bridges to climb from sea level to 328 metres. Daniel went up with the boys and I drove up to meet them and then after a picnic we swapped for the journey home. Ruben got to go both ways as he was free! Unfortunately he fell asleep half way into the second journey and only woke up when we were back at the station. Still he loved it and had a great day.

Cutting the cake.

Just a photo of Ruben with the Bishop cutting the cake to celebrate 55 years of the Good Shepherd Church!

Bramston Beach MAF Camping weekend

This weekend was the first combined MAF Cairns and Mareeba camping weekend at Bramston Beach - about an hour south of Cairns. We arrived Friday - Daniel went first with Ruben to put up the tents and I picked up the older ones from school and drove down separately. We were planning to take two cars anyway as we couldn't get all the camping gear and us in one car! It had been raining most of last week and the camp was almost called off  but at the last minute it was decided to go ahead. I drove down there in pouring rain, but amazingly when we got there the rain had stopped and it held off 'til most of us got our tents up. After a BBQ dinner we went to sleep to the sound of curlews crying and waves crashing on the beach. Just in case you're jealous, the sound of Curlews is like a high pitched baby wail and the waves crashing on the beach was very loud and it was hard to shake off the feeling that a tsumani was headed your way. Added to that, one of the tents leaked and we had to abandon it and move into a different one. To round it off  I was sharing an air bed with Ruben which does not aid the sleeping process! Feeling better now? :)

We woke the next day to the raucous laughter of kookaburras in the trees above us, who both mornings decided to wake the campsite up at 6am. Ruben beat then to it and woke me up at 5:30am! Saturday dawned with mostly fine weather and we walked, swam, dug holes in the sand, played games, drank coffee at the café and watched our children jump the waves whilst praying they didn't get eaten by crocodiles. All part of the Australian experience! (The lady at the front desk said not to let the children swim too far out as there were crocodiles in the sea) After another joint evening meal we had a  bonfire on the beach toasted marshmallows and the kids had fun waving sparklers around. Again just to paint the picture more accurately, it's not that relaxing having a sparkler spun round really near your head by a 2 year old!!

We started Sunday with communion on the beach at sunrise before packing up and returning home.

Sorry, not that many photos as we spent most of the weekend chasing Ruben round the camp-site!!! If you can spot him, that's Ruben in the middle of the top picture and Joshua and Caleb swimming with other kids in the bottom one.