Moving north towards the North East Tasmania

We finally left Launceston. It is only a short 30km trip to Lilydale where there is a very small free camp adjacent to a nice little waterfall. It was so short we decided to drive the car separately rather than hitch it up.

Lilydale Creek

We will need to be relatively close to Launceston, since we need to fly out of Launceston next week for a short trip back to Sydney for our daughter, Camille’s engagement party. We hadn’t intended to spend so long in Launceston if we weren’t working there, but there was so much to see and do that it was easy to use Launceston as a base from which to travel and Ian, the owner at Old Macs Farm was always around somewhere and one felt very secure in leaving the motorhome for long hours at a time.

Cheap Fuel

We were also surprised to see the cheapest fuel prices since we have arrived right here in town. $140.9 for ULP and $142.5 for diesel. It goes without saying that we filled up whilst here.

Meeting our neighbours... again

We rocked up at Lilydale after a late departure from Old Mac’s Farm (main reason is explained below) and lo & behold, Graham and his wife who were our neighbours at Old Mac’s were there ahead of us. I hadn’t met either of them until Lilydale but we sure made up for it here. She likes to knit booties, scarves etc and sells them on the road as they travel. She is like me in that she doesn’t get car sick (other than reading) and so she can knit whilst her hubby drives. We were the only campers there for a while.

Lilydale Waterfalls

After a chat getting to know them a bit, we went for the short walk to the waterfalls. They are not big, maybe 6m high nor are they deep but very pretty and natural. Though there is no sign either way, you could cool off in the shallow pools along the way and by bypassing the trail at the end you could even hop under the falls themselves which is always a lovely experience. .

Lilydale waterfalls

Camp ground full

By 6pm the camp ground was pretty full. 3 cars of back packers, a family of 5 in a caravan and an older couple, Joy and Bob, whom we invited to join us for happy hour. They were traveling in a small motorhome called Gypsy Spirit. We also met others such as Gypsy Barb who has well and truly nailed the solo travelling to an art. Her motorhome is a testimony to her bubbly, independent and individual personality. My gosh, she went to back to uni when she turned 60 to d her Masters just because she could! She is off to do some volunteer work amongst aboriginals next year! Way to go Barb!

Getting help with WikiCamps

Going back a tad, we were fortunate with helpful new friends at Old Macs Farm: First off we met Nigel and Kim Rutland with their 3 kids. (Rutlands on the Road)  Nigel volunteered his wife, Kim to show me how to download WikiCamps onto our Aldi bought tablet and though we had some hassles with the tablet dropping out, she succeeded. When we played with it that night though we just couldn’t get the WikiCamps to work unless we were onlilyine and even then we were frustrated with not being able to access some features. Then this morning, just as were sort of packing up, Rob met our new neighbour, Noel and he offered to teach Rob how to use WikiCamps some more. We finally understood that the fault lies with us (of course) and through one tiny little ‘key’ we were able to unlock the features and understand where we went wrong and now we should be able to use WikiCamps with no more hassles, well that’s the theory. Noel even had Rob use WikiCamps whilst he watched over his shoulder and made sure Rob knew what to do himself. This is just one more reason why we love this lifestyle. So many people are so friendly and willing to be helpful and share their experiences and expertise. So what was started some 3 weeks back in Tocumwal by Wayne (Morwenna) and then Kim getting it finally downloaded and then Noel teaching us, all added to an enriching time of learning.