Travel ....Repeat...

Well we are home from holidays.... and my poor old blog has been very neglected.

I have so much to share from our travels....

but before I start....I really wanted to share some photos from our recent Zoo visit.

It began when we realised we would be away for Brookeys 3rd birthday...

We wanted to do something special before we left....

and as Brookey loves animals....we thought a trip to the zoo would be a lovely gift.

So....we gathered the family together...and headed to Adelaide for the day.

It was awesome....and I am so thrilled we did it ...

The girlies loved it...  they had a ball... there were happy smiles all day.

So I can honestly say.....the Adelaide Zoo was fabulous....

The animals were all so easy to see and we were able to get up nice and close...

The petting zoo for kids gave us the biggest laugh of the day when this overzealous goat continually harassed the kids trying to get the bags of chaff out of their hands. The most hilarious part was...he would flick all the chaff onto the ground and gobble up the paper bag.

He even bailed Bella up against the fence in his quest to score her bag..poor Bells didn't find it quite as hilarious as we did....I don't think eye-balling a goat wasn't her idea of fun....Brookey was more cautious...she hung back a little from the pack....which turned out to be a wise move.

We saw the Wang Wang and Funi the Pandas....who were just beautiful... as well as the Lions...Tigers...Giraffes and cutest little meerkats...among plenty of others.

 Bella was most intrigued to learn that the lions ate 'horse meat'.... she asked a few times if it was true...and I could see her little mind ticking over.

So that was our day.....

I am sure the memories of the day we all spent together at the zoo will last for many years to come.

I thought Id share a few photos of our recent trip away

It was only a short break....but it was lovely.

Camping was wonderful...

The weather was a bit on the hot side.....but on the upside it meant there was no rain.

We camped in some lovely spots....

We ate some beautiful food...

We poked through endless antique and Op shops...

We enjoyed the most beautiful evenings....just sitting....in the peace and quiet....

We watched season one of "The Gourmet Farmer" on DVD... and then moved on to "Puberty Blues"

On our final night there was a lovely thunderstorm brewing...

Its such a shame the mossies were so bad...I would have loved to have sat in my chair and watched it...

instead....we were zipped up in the tent....in the stifling heat...trying to avoid being eaten alive.

..and that was it....holiday break was over.

We made the most of a free weekend and headed over to Ardrossan to visit Mum and Dad Winen.

We took the girlies with us so that Brent and Alex were free to attend Sarahs hens night and Lukes buck show.

I think its safe to say that the girlies had a lovely time.

We walked to the shops....

Bells spent many a moment waiting for the cuckoo clock to chime....

she asked Grandpa .. "does the cuckoo know my name is Bella?"

We walked along the jetty..... and checked out all the fish the fisherman were catching.

We spent an afternoon on the beach..... it started with sandcastles....

then changed to paddling our feet...

It soon changed to a little more than paddling feet....and a layer of wet clothes came off

Poppy and Grandpa did some fishing....

We explored Grandmas garden....

Bought a donut at the bakery....

Had a feed of fresh caught fish...

Entertained Grandma and Grandpa with lots of funny stories....

It really was a fun weekend.

We have been making the most our weekends lately....heading off camping every chance we get.

This last weekend we re-visited the Yorke Peninsula....we have travelled there many times over the years....but it had been awhile since we were there last.

Friday night we travelled as far as Wallaroo....

Then we were up bright and early for a  look around.....and a delicious coffee from Cafe Mia on the foreshore... what I didn't realise until I got home and was talking to a friend ...was that I knew the owners of the Cafe ...what a shame they weren't there when we called in.

We then drove on to Moonta ..... we browsed the shops...and bought a Cornish pastie for lunch..

The next morning we stopped at a few spots within the park before starting the trip home again....

First stop was the old historic ruins of Inneston.... site of the first Bellco chalk factory.

We stopped in and surprised Mum and Dad Winen on the way home.... another lovely little highlight of our weekend.
It was such a shame it was all over so quickly.
I wonder where we will head off camping to next.

Sometimes the planets align and everything just falls into place.. like this weekend away.

Bring shift workers its very hard to get a weekend off....let alone a weekend off at the same time as our friends who are also shift workers. So when I noticed on the roster that we were all off this weekend.....I sent out a text.....asking if anyone was up to a camping trip...it was met with a resounding YES!

So we packed up our campers....and set off on Friday afternoon for Burra.....

Burra is only a a few hours from here....so a nice and easy drive.... its also a town steeped in history... it was first settled in 1845 after the discovery of Copper in the area.....by 1851 it had grown to be Australia's largest inland town and the site of the Burra Monster mine.

We set up at the Burra creek camp ground about 10km outside of Burra...

it was a lovely quiet spot amongst beautiful trees....with a little creek running by. 

This little store was part of a guided tour.....it was an original store of the times....with a shop front....and then down through a narrow low little doorway into the three room residence at the back.

The following day we finished up the tour...there was too much to see in one day....

We began with this little township called Hampton....which was founded in 1857 and modelled on an English village. It was home to 30 miners cottages and a Chapel. It is mainly ruins now....but it was quite easy to see the rows of streets and homes.

It was also very foggy this morning....so it looked quite eerie in the mist.

Our final stop was the Miners dugouts.

These just amazed me.... apparently there was an acute shortage of housing in the 1840's.

So miners dug these dugouts into the sift clay banks of the Burra creek to use as free housing.

Apparently by 1851 there were approx 1800 people living in 600 dugouts along the creek bed.

Sadly in 1851 flood devastated the homes and drove the miners out.