Sunshine Sunday

Last Thursday morning, we packed up some things, loaded up the car and took a 5 hour drive to the Gold Coast. I was surprised by how uncomfortable I felt there. It's like a mini Las Vegas with traffic, lots of strip malls, big shopping areas, huge theme parks, tons of people, billboards and did I mention the traffic? The area we currently live is so much quieter and I have gotten used to that. I find it more soothing. I was a bit overwhelmed there. In the afternoon, we looked at a pop-up camper that we had seen advertised for sale and was our main reason for taking the trek. It seemed to have everything we were looking for so we did a deal. In my haste to get a camper so we could move on with all the things we need to do before Cary leaves for the US, I ignored my instincts that were telling me to slow down. I hate it when I do that. I feel like I let myself down by not Trusting my true self and letting my physical self run the show. I'm still working on the Trust lesson. I'm not positive we got the right camper or the best deal, but it's done and we need to make the best of it.

The next day we towed the camper 2 hours north to the Sunshine Coast where we had a lot of trouble finding a vacancy. We hadn't counted on all of the snowbirds to fill the van parks for the winter. We did eventually find a spot right next to a beach. It was too cold to swim, but nice to play on the white sand and watch the beautiful waves. The camper was easy to tow and easy to set up. I feel a little bothered because the very-nice-older-man that we bought the thing from assured us that "everything works" and the fridge did not work, and the table did not go down nicely to make another bed. We should have checked those things. But it was solid during the windy night we had and we did all sleep comfortably. It has a lot of good points and we will be able to fix a few things on it to make it even better.

We spent two days on the Sunshine Coast, looking for the place we want to park the camper when we go back up there and just having another look around. We all liked a RV park (called caravan parks in Oz) with a patrolled beach on one side, Underwater World on the other, and walking distance to fabulous cafes, restaurants and shops as well as a decent amount of shade.

While we were driving up and back, Sami, AJ & I watched some DVD's while Nicholas played, drew, ate and slept (though not much of that). In one of the Harry Potter movies we watched, Dumbledore says to Harry something about choosing between what's right or what's easy. I thought about that in regard to what is coming up for us. It would be so easy to just stay where we are, doing what we are doing. But it just feels right to break out of that and do what we're about to do. But it is challenging some of my comfortable, easy, notions. Like security and trust that I've mentioned before. I've had to change some of my internal dialogue in order to get my head around some things. We've decided not to go crazy and sell practically everything, but to store it and just see how this adventure goes. We can always sell it later, or use it whenever we are ready to move back into a house. This way it feels more like we're going on vacation rather than moving in to a camper. Even though I imagined myself more like a free-spirited-gypsy doing that, Cary's not thrilled with the deal as we could have bought the same thing back in the US for 1/6th of the price. But that's the way things are here. He's looking forward to the adventure, he's just had enough of the high cost of things here.

After 3 weeks of school holidays, the kids go back to school tomorrow. Sami said she does not want to go and that she wants to homeschool again. Though she is looking forward to starting violin which they will do tomorrow. Once she's at school, she seems to enjoy it so I think she won't mind the next month or so there before we get on the road. I think we'll spend a few weeks visiting family and friends before heading back up to the Sunshine Coast and getting to know the natural learners group there. I hope they are as great as the LifeLearners group we left back in Vegas.