Freedom Camp3 Comments

Freedom with options aplenty #4

Itching for Hitching

The fourth in a series of however many, romancing the freedom camping lifestyle. If you are curious about freedom camping read on. From Cooktown it was down to the well-known Rocky Creek campground on the Atherton Tableland. The campground is one enormous living memorial to the field hospital that was here during World War Two that tended to the wounded of the battles in Papua New Guinea and the Pacific. Filled with history we headed off to Queensland’s highest town Ravenshoe on the top of the Great Dividing Range where we camped at the old railway station in the rain, … Continue reading Freedom with options aplenty #4

Freedom Camp, Places, Vic3 Comments

Finding Skipworth

Itching for Hitching

Nov 2013, Jamieson, Vic We follow the now wild Goulburn River towards the town of Kevington.  Skipworth Reserve is a jaw dropper, one of the best. It’s a large park with shady ash trees and plenty of mown lawn. There are new drop toilets and concrete fireplaces with BBQ plates attached. There is a phone number nailed to a tree for the local wood man who delivers dry firewood, what a good service. The Goulburn River skirts the park and the sound of the rapids and the huge cicadas is both deafening and wondrous. There are about eight other vans … Continue reading Finding Skipworth

Freedom Camp7 Comments

Freedom with options aplenty #3

Itching for Hitching

The third in a series of however many, romancing the freedom camping lifestyle. If you are curious about freedom camping read on. We had fallen in love with Yamba on a previous trip to Queensland but nearby Woody Head National Park turned out to be heaven, heaven with brush turkeys that is. On a roll we spent a night at Mullumbimby Leagues Club (ticking footy clubs now) and decided that perhaps we wouldn’t buy dinner in the clubhouse. On the positive side, a few weeks later we decided to try our first Pub Stay and were hooked. Tracey welcomed us … Continue reading Freedom with options aplenty #3

Freedom Camp6 Comments

Freedom with options aplenty #2

Itching for Hitching

“Oh, so this comes in a series does it?” “Maybe.” Discovering the joys of freedom camping and following on from ‘Freedom with options aplenty’. After a tentative start, one could say that we took to freedom camping with gay abandon. There’s a lot more to caravanning than Caravan Parks. At the Bass Valley Campground near Poowong we were surrounded by tall timber and just landed young backpackers in rental cars and brand-new tents with barely a sentence of English between them. A few days later we escaped Traralgon and bushfire smoke* at Paradise Beach, camped in the dunes on the … Continue reading Freedom with options aplenty #2

Caravan Parks, Vic2 Comments

A Summer Strummer

Itching for Hitching

Feb 2020, Rosebud, Vic I met a chap at ukulele group the other day. He’d only recently bought a little uke and was really enjoying the local ukulele groups at Dromana and Rosebud. He said that he now had to find a club near his home and when I asked, he said that he spends his summers camping on the Rye foreshore. Which is part of the area that I wrote about a while back in ‘The Rosebud Foreshore’. Now this guy had to be around 70 and he said that his family had been camping on the exact same … Continue reading A Summer Strummer

Why Caravanning4 Comments

The Social Set

Itching for Hitching

Life on the road is as social as you want it to be. We find that during our winter trips we often catch up with friends who’ve moved north for good. We also run into mates who are on a different timetable and maybe heading south as we’re going north or vice versa. That planned catch up over a bowl of noodles in Glen Waverley becomes Korean in Canberra instead. Then there are the folks that we’ve met during our travels and who are as peripatetic as we are, if we’re lucky we can meet up in a little town … Continue reading The Social Set