Eventually Mars drove the van down to the paddock and amidst the mayhem managed to slip his foot on the accelerator rather than the brake. Consequently, the jockey wheel was bent and had to be supported with some bricks but we managed to head out about 10:00am. It was a very quiet car ride...
We were heading North and were almost at the QLD border when I realised the time had changed on my phone! NSW has daylight savings but QLD doesn't - so we weren't as late as we thought! Yay! Our first stop was at the Resort to see if our room was ready. It wasn't but I picked up all the goodies for the kids and booked their Kids Club night.
While we waited we drove round to the end of the 'Spit' to have some lunch. The kids were climbing over the rocks and watching the boats go in and out. Soon they started finding some fishing hooks, sinkers and other gear. We imagined someone had spilt their tackle box over on the rocks and all the gear had gone down between the rocks. Brenton was small enough to climb in and hand all the treasures up to Chad. They were so happy with their find!
After lunch we headed out to Paradise Country for the afternoon. We saw plenty of kangaroos, koalas and got up close with a snake. For us the highlights were the demonstrations at various time during the afternoon. We were one of the few Australians there so we were picked to help out during the demonstrations / shows. Amazingly, Karli was super keen!
The first show was how to make damper and billy tea. Apparently, you put the tea leaves in the billy and then swing it around a few times. Karli managed to do that but when she put it down she accidently kicked it over! All good though, it was only for show! There were cups of tea and damper ready to eat on the side.
The next show was to demonstrate how a horse is far more useful than a quad-bike. The riders of the horse and the quad had a competition to collect 4 flags from around the arena. Karli was chosen to hold one of the flags to be collected. Naturally, the horse won!
The next show was whip-cracking. That was really cool - lots of talent! Again, we were one of the few Australians so we made sure we were vocal about it! Consequently, Mars was chosen to help out with their demo. He had to hold a twig in his mouth which was then snapped by the whip. To keep his nose safe they put a blindfold on him! Mars was ok with holding the twig in his hands but definitely got nervous when he had to hold it in his mouth! But he survived unscathed to tell the tale!
Following the whip cracking was a sheep dog show - rounding up the sheep (like the sheep trials we had seen in Victoria) and guides them through an obstacle course and then into the pen.
A highlight for Chad was a demo on boomerang throwing. They threw the boomerang and managed to get it to circle the tree and catch it again!
From there we headed back to the hotel. At the hotel we found our room and changed to bathers to enjoy the pool area. It was fantastic with different options for all ages. We stayed there for about an hour then headed back to the room so the kids could get ready to go to the Kids Club.
I took the kids down to the Kids Club room where I stayed for a while to make sure Chad, Karli and Brenton were comfortable, then left them to do their activities. They were going to go for dinner and then do some Olympics.
Excited at the thought of dinner without all the kids (just Rowan and Axel) Mars and I headed to the restaurant. We had to wait a little while for a table, during this time Axel woke from his nap, Rowan stacked it on the stairs and the mood had taken a dive (keeping in mind that dinner was at 8pm OUR time but only 7pm local time). The dinner was nice, a buffet. Mars and I played swaps while I ate he handled the kids and then he ate while I handled the kids. Not the relaxing time we had envisioned. We were glad to leave and try get the two boys to bed!!!
We picked up 3 tired but happy kids from the Kids Club at 9:30pm. Despite their early apprehension they had really enjoyed their time.
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