The alarm woke me at 7am which is pretty early for me these days. The air around me was cold and I felt like burying myself in the doonah but I couldn’t. Today was the day! Ruthie and I had decided to head north again for the rest of winter, 8 weeks in total. The 2010 Camry hybrid was going to get a final run. Camping was the go and the back of the car was packed to the hilt. In fact it was so tightly packed that I expected when we got to a camping spot, I could open the back door and the tent and swag would just spring out and erect themselves. Clothes, toiletries and fridge are in the boot. Mind you, the boot isn’t very big as it contains the battery. Although we tried to fit as many of our worldly goods into that sedan as possible, I was thinking this will probably be the closest I get to experiencing homelessness. We still have our health and the truth is we don’t know what the future holds so these two sixty something year olds are heading off on our camping adventure. Covid has put a halt to all other travel so it will be great to see our own back yard.

Our original plan was that we would head for outback New South Wales, then outback Queensland and onto Darwin. From there we would head straight down the centre of the Northern Territory, then South Australia and home. At the last minute, we had to change our plans. Covid lockdowns hit all those states except South Australia. We decided to do the trip in reverse and hopefully when we get to some of the other states, the lockdowns have ended. It was ironic to think that Victoria was one of the only states not in lockdown for a change and here we were trying to escape. I’m sure some of our friends thought that we were crazy to take off in these circumstances but warmer weather was calling. We were looking at it differently. Maybe we do have to learn to live with Covid around us in our lives. We were feeling a bit more confident as we have had our first Covid vaccination and due to have our second on the road. As long as we were sensible, obeyed the restrictions and stayed away from hotspots, we were thinking we would be fine.

Swan Hill was our first destination. Ruthie was born here and spent the first seven years of her life here. She delighted in reminiscing about her birth house, local swimming pool, local park, her primary school and the Guardian newspaper office where her dad had worked. As a young girl she had stood on the banks of the Murray River with her mother as the Gem paddle steamer made its final journey and permanently relocated to the Pioneer Village. Sadly, she lost her mother at a young age. We visited all of these places and I could relate to the elation she felt as I had done the same thing when we had visited my birth place in Holland.

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The next day it was on to South Australia via Mildura. The Camry clicked over 200,000 k’s on the way. Ruthie wanted to take me to the longest bar in the world in Mildura. Pity it was shortened to about a third of its size in 1995. Oh well, the thought was there and I still managed a beer.

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