Jan is normally stored at Marie’s place, so we packed up our Subaru and drove there. We had had a busy morning, so were tired on arrival and left it until later to put things in the campervan. In the evening we went out for a meal at a local restaurant, Brook 508 Cafe and Restaurant, in Roleystone. We each had an individual meal, followed by a couple of deserts shared between us.

Jan is a 2025 Jayco RMV 19-2 based on a Renault van which Marie, Stephen and I have bought to share. Hence the change to Jan’s Diary. We have just sold the Sherwood, which we have had for four years.

The next day we headed to Moora for an overnight in the free camping car park in the centre of town. I made the mistake of parking in a car bay, rather than a caravan bay, and we were told to move by the ranger. He has quite a reputation amongst campers there and the main sign has ‘Psychopath Ranger’ added to it. He could easily get rid of it, so must embrace this negative identity. Anyway, we moved the van to a proper parking bay. We had arrived later in the day and basically just relaxed until tea time. We had four cooked meals with us, so it was just a matter of heating it up in the microwave using our little power station inverter.

For this trip we had the power station next to the kitchen bench obstructing part of the entry, but for our next trip I’ve put it in the rear. We can plug in the powerboard and keep it in the kitchen, and power the EcoFlow Delta 3 Plus from one of the Anderson plugs we had installed in the rear. This should be more convenient, though I will have to crawl into the boot area to plug it in and turn it on, I can turn it off remotely using an app.

We had a peaceful overnight and I went to our favourite French cafe to buy a takeaway coffee in the morning. Before leaving town we refilled the water tank and dumped the toilet and grey water.

We arrived at Hi Vallee Farm in good time to have lunch and join the afternoon wildflower walk. It is a circut of about 5kms and a fairly easy walk overall, with lots of wildflowers to admire and experts to inform us. As with the other walks on the weekend, the more intrepid walkers went up a steep slope in the hope of finding rare plants and flowers.

Unfortunately, the leader of the wildflower walks did not fill us in very much about the camping area. We only found out about the drinking water tap from the owners of the farm on the last day. It would have been helpful to have known. There was a difficult and an easy way to getting to the camping area and we discovered this for ourselves. Even if we had been in the Sherwood I would have taken the easier route as the gully entry was quite steep.

The Sherwood might have been a better choice for the road into the farm as well, it was rocky in parts, with washed out sections, and corrugations. However, we took it slowly and the Renault van seemed to handle it without any difficulty.

Another point of contention from my point of view is that almost all of the outings/walks started at the camping area, but the leader had us drive the campervan to the house twice when it wasn’t necessary. It was hard to find parking in such a large van and on Sunday I tried to find a flat spot, but ended up parking on quite a slope as she was getting impatient to leave.

On Saturday morning after a bit of a scramble to get ready to drive the van up to the house (not necessary), then take it back to the camping area, I decided to miss the walk. If I had felt calmer and hadn’t had to get the van ready for travel I think I would have felt differently. It was raining that morning as well, so the track up to the house had deteriorated a bit.

For the afternoon outing we walked up to the house, and we got into 4WD vehicles to visit a regeneration project, and another rather beautiful wooded area. There was a lot of sitting around chatting whilst the nimble ones climbed up the rocky slope. But enjoyable as were were talking with the former owners of the property.

It was very cold overnight and we had to put on extra clothes. However, we were better off than another couple nearby who were in a tent. It was good to feel that we could cope with the cold. I had left my phone in the 4WD near the house overnight and we actually slept in, obviously very warm and snug.

On the Sunday we went for another drive, then walk through an area that was particularly affected by a bushfire, showing the regrowth. It was quite amazing, we had views of the surrounding countryside and a mix of sunshine and cloud, so that it didn’t get hot. Still, it was fairly taxing in the end, too much standing around. It was good to stretch our legs for a walk back to where the cars were parked.

We had lunch in the van on a bad slope. There were lots of flies around, but we left the sliding door open and they actually didn’t bother us, perhaps they don’t like cheese sandwiches. We wanted the fresh air as the sun was fully out by that time.

We headed for a caravan park for our last night on the road. We had spent three nights off grid, and it was good to know it was possible. The main limitation was water, we have such a small tank, and we used up most of our extra water as well. We drove to Regan’s Ford as it has good reviews and was about 2/3 of the way home. It was lovely to have unlimited power and water again. The showers were nice enough even for me to shower at night and in the morning.

On Monday morning I had a coffee on the patio outside the Reception. Someone had mentioned that they make coffee, so this was also an attraction for staying there😀

We bought fuel and visited the Ford before leaving. There is a dump point there as well, and before settling in at the CP Sunday night we drove down to empty the toilet.

We had lunch at a roadhouse on the way back to Roleystone. Marie cooked a meal for us Monday night and we had another peaceful night in her caravan port. In the morning we decided to take the campervan home to unload and clean. So, we got home on Tuesday and finished cleaning on Thursday morning before taking it back to Roleystone in the afternoon. Our neighbour was away, so we could have Jan on the driveway for a couple of days.