With another big drive planned, we headed off early from Bulahdelah. We’d hoped to stay near Sydney and spend a few days visiting my brother’s family as well as a few of the Harbour town’s main tourist attractions. Unfortunately we couldn’t get any camping accommodation within about 100km of the city. After spending so long on the road, it was disappointing that we weren't able to share some of our adventure stories with Peter, Rachel and Will. We were all looking forward to catching up so on a whim, I decided we’d head straight through Sydney and surprise them with a whirlwind visit.
The kids were thrilled to drive through the heart of the city, across the Sydney Harbour bridge and past some of the city’s other iconic landmarks. Sydney’s streets are famously very narrow but we figured if semi trailers could navigate their incy wincy lanes, so could we!
We pulled up in Peter’s inner urban Leichhardt street, engaged the hazards and gave the horn a toot to announce our arrival! Not that we really needed to - our dusty, oversized rig did not easily ‘blend’ into their rather conservative local environment! We had time to catch up the latest news, meet their beautiful new pooch, Lewis, and marvel at how much all the kids had grown. Will had clearly spent the year sprouting and was now eyeballing me! He was preparing for a school ‘survival’ camp (with some hesitancy I must say) so we distracted him with tales of our new favourite internet viewing…cats v cucumbers. After pondering the prospect of whether their cat, Annie, would make a good ‘victim’, Will casually asked, “do we have any cucumbers?” Although none were immediately available, Peter committed to sourcing some when they went shopping later in the day. (A text from Peter that night confirmed Annie’s crazy response to the strategically placed cucumbers created plenty of fun and more laughs than they’d had in a long time.) We managed a few ‘selfies’ and family photos before taking to the road to again.
By late afternoon we had set up camp in a tiny but picturesque town 10km west of Kiama called Jamberoo. This little village of about 1000 people is nested at the top of a valley, edged by the towering cliffs of the Illawarra escarpment to the west and Saddleback Mountain to the south. Its undulating landscape was once covered by forests of cedar but these were entirely harvested in the early 1800's before the region developed around a more sustainable industry of dairy farming. At its peak, Jamberoo supported a number of butter factories but these have since disappeared and the town is probably most noted now for its large water fun-park.
The Council had kindly allowed visitors to use a small area beside the local sports ovals and tennis courts for free. There were toilets close by as well as a skate park and basketball courts. The camp area was adjacent to Hyams Creek, where small families of ducks paddled about happily in the fading afternoon light. The kids found some locals playing at the skate park and joined them for some footy, basketball and watched as they expertly maneuvered remote control cars over the skate jumps. Afterwards they spent some time exploring the creek before coming back to camp for dinner. There were only a couple of other campers, grey nomads, who looked content to enjoy their happy-hour drinks and share stories of their adventurous roadtrips. All seemed peaceful and idyllic in the world of Jamberoo!
That was until about 11pm when a large group of young men came to join us. They’d been watching a televised ruby game at the local sports club, which was located across the oval from us. We could hear their enthusiasm and excitement growing as the game drew closer to the final siren. They were far enough away that it was only a distant distraction so we weren’t concerned about it impacting on us. Unfortunately, we were very wrong. When the game finished, about 15 of them decided to set up camp across from our van. They immediately retrieved a few eskies full of alcohol from their cars, turned on a boom box and lit a fire. With bellies full of grog already, their language and volume filters were completely disabled. After an hour, it was clear they were only getting started. The music got progressively louder as did their yelling and swearing. We contemplated calling the Police but didn’t know how long it would take for them to arrive and whether they’d even ask them to leave. Instead, we decided to pack up and move on ourselves. It was midnight and we had no idea where we could go but it seemed the best way to try and salvage some of the sleep we desperately needed! The kids had miraculously (but unsurprisingly) slept through it all so we had to wake them while we packed up. As we were feverishly stuffing our gear into the van and winding down the roof, one of the blokes sauntered over and offered a half-arsed apology. His only explanation for their inappropriate and disrespectful behavior was that they’d lost their rugby grand final that day. I’m not sure if he was expecting sympathy or understanding from us but what he got instead was a big “Fuck You”. We spent what was left of the night at a truck stop beside the busy Princes Hwy in Kiama. It was hardly the idyllic setting we’d hoped to enjoy at Hyams Creek and the constant traffic noise was awful, but it sure beat putting up with the Jamberoo bogans.
It’s ironic that we’d travelled almost the full circuit of our incredible country and the only two places we had to deal with bad behavior was on the east coast – Gold Coast and Jamberoo. We’ll happily stick with the west anytime!!
Our ‘traffic’ alarm clock woke us early. With little to pack up (we hadn’t unpacked anything after arriving at the roadside stop!) we were on the road in record time, heading for Pambula where Michael’s Aunty and Uncle had offered ‘real’ accommodation INSIDE their house…inner spring mattresses and showers were beckoning!
Looking back, it was actually an incredibly disappointing end to our epic Big Lap adventure. The 17th September was to be our last night of the trip together in the camper. The remainder of the journey would be spent with family, sharing their homes and thankful for their hospitality. To have suffered the indecency of being forced to relocate from an idyllic, picturesque spot in a beautiful little town to a truck stop beside a noisy highway with the dulcet sounds of lorries rumbling by all night was not how we'd imagined it. But, In the words of one of Australia's most (in)famous characters;
"SUCH IS LIFE"!!
Photos from left to right
approaching the Sydney Harbour Bridge
entering the Sydney Harbour Bridge
With our Sydney family...from L to R: Will, Rachel. Gemma, Wendi, Jesse, Tashi, Peter
The idyllic setting at Hyams Creek, Jamberoo
enjoying the 'serenity' at Hyams Creek, Jamberoo before the bogans arrived
Our eventual 'camp', beside the Princes Hwy, Kiama...a little less picturesque than Hyams Creek but ironically much quieter at midnight!!