Neurum Creek Bush Retreat - March 2015

Friday 27th March, 2015

Time to go camping again for the weekend thank goodness.  We're off to Neurum Creek Bush Retreat for the weekend and joining us are our mates Razzle & Doreen.

We didn't leave until nearly 5.30pm and the Razzles were just ahead of us after they stopped in to put the new tyres on their Hilux (our mates are preparing to do a 7 week trip through Cooper Pedy, Victorian Dessert, Simpson Dessert and numerous other places in a couple months)  are we jealous, you betcha!!

It'll only take us about an hour to reach Neurum Creek Bush Retreat which is great.  We headed out through Beerwah, up the range through Peachester onto the D'Aguilar Highway towards Woodford, hung a right onto Neurum Road and followed the Hema GPS.  We were all booked in by 6.30pm, map of the campground in hand we headed to our site which was the further-est away from everyone - yep, we all picked that one on purpose. When you check in you get a campground map with some directions given to your campsite, a couple of rubbish bags, rules for camping with your dog and stickers for your car (so they know you have paid).

Dors & Razzle had arrived about 10 minutes before us, so we organise ourselves into spots and setup (I will admit it was just a tad difficult seeing our campsite in the dark and trying to scope out the flattish spots with a torch, but we all got there eventually with the help of some firewood for levelling chokes).  Drinks in hand, a bit of chatting then dinners got under way by about 8pm. That would be the another drawback of arriving late in camp, that first evening becomes a very late night!
We had some chicken pieces marinated in a dry rub of salt, garlic, mustard powder, paprika, basil, thyme, coriander seed and pepper with some maple bourbon balsamic vinegar.  After dinner we sat chatting under the stars and realised the time had gotten away from us and it was best we went to bed.

Saturday 28th March, 2015

Our own private driveway into
our campsite

Nice private spot

We heard the light pitta patter of rain earlier this morning, Razzle dashed out of their camper to collect the chairs left out last night, but all went back to bed.  6.50am and Boris was ready for a pee, so up we got and were greeted by a deary overcast day with light rain.  We got coffee organised and the showers proved to be a little inconvenient holding up breakfast for a bit as we didn't have the big awning up, but eventually it stopped and we had our pancakes.

There was no rush to do anything this morning anyhow, just take our time and relax. The side awning worked out perfectly for all of us to sit under and chat during the showers. Eventually about 11am we decided to go for a walk around the campground and have a look, since we didn't really get to see any of it on our way in last night.  It was quite muggy, so Boris was going to enjoy a bit of a lay in the creek no doubt.

One of the swimming areas

Another swimming area

Beautiful creek

Playtime in the creek

Stoney Creek Frog

Looking down the creek

Walking through one section of
the campground

We had the last campsite at the end of the road, with it's own little driveway and heaps of privacy (well private that is until someone decides to drive down the track, even though it says no vehicle access campsite only).

Our Spot

Razzle & Doreen's spot

Our site overlooked the creek with a path leading down to it and had a fireplace, had about a 100m walk to the toilets and about 150m walk to the first swimming hole.

Lamb Stew over the fire

Afternoon nibbles

We had an enjoyable but early night under clear skies.  It was cooler tonight, so sleep should come easy.

Sunday 29th March, 2015
We all arose about the same time as yesterday, but to clear blue skies and a little wind - much nicer. We didn't have to vacate our campsite by 11am as there was nobody booked in, so it was a very leisurely start to the day.

We did the full on Sunday morning breakfast, you know coffee, bacon, scrambled eggs and toast.  Very yummy.  The boys put 5 red claw traps in the creek yesterday afternoon, so after breakfast they went down and retrieved them - nothing in them, so know red claw for smoko. Decided we'd hang around and have lunch, then pack up and head home.  Now, we really did nothing this morning except relax and talk, lunch ended up being salami, dips, cheeses, olives and crackers because nobody was really that hungry.

We headed home around 1.30pm. Even the road in and out to Neurum Creek Bush Retreat is pretty. We took a back road between Woodford and Commissioners Flat Road at Peachester, made it more interesting then travelling along the highway again.

Looking into the camping area

Office

Entrance

Neurum Creek Bush Retreat:
Price:  $12.00 pn/pp + $2.50 pn/pp for your dog (power extra $8.00pn)
Facilities:  Campfires, toilets, showers, shade shelters, firewood, camp shop, water, large grassy campsites, creek to swim, fish, kayak, bins.
Would we come again:  Yes, it was peaceful, relaxing, it's a huge camping area so you won't get camped on top of. If you like 4wding, Mt Mee State Forest is just next door.

Kenilworth TJM 4wd Weekend - Day 2

Sunday 8th February, 2015.
Up again fairly early this morning. We'll be doing the more "challenging" track drive today, so should be interesting.  Chris next door came over for a chat this morning while we were having our coffee.  Just simple cereal for brekkie and start packing some stuff away (we'll leave the camper off until we have done today's track).

Back over to the TJM tent around 9am for our track instructions for today and once again we lined up to get our vehicle numbers (a few less cars today as some people didn't want to damage their cars if the track was to challenging).

Day 2 Hema Cloud Map

Lined up & ready to move out!

So right from the start proved to be challenging for some when we were lined up in the muddy track awaiting our turn to ascend the first rather vertically steep looking hill. The guys in the car in front of us got bogged in a mud hole and we had to snatch them out backwards with little space to reverse before we would sink into the mud hole behind us - thankfully it all worked out well.

A muddy start to the day.

Look at the start of the first hill

The track in
(photo courtesy of XRay Vision)

It was taking a while to get all these cars up the first hill, especially with an epic rescue that occurred half way up the first hill.  

Stuck Landcruiser

A Landcruiser got a little sideways on little landing part of the way up the first section of the hill, nobody could come down to get him so they had to join about 6 snatch straps together and slowly pull him up the remainder of the hill. Once we got up the hill we realised they had very little room to manoeuvre a car around up here.

Back to our ascent up the first hill, holy mother of mountains it was steep, dropped away on both sides, loose rocks, gravel and wheel ruts.  Craig and the little Gaylux gave it their all and we bounced our way up to the top.  

We've collected some mud on the way in

Now we are one of four cars waiting on a small parcel of land to ascend the 2nd hill. You have to wait until you are called up by the car in front, as there just isn't room to park at the top of each section, or if you need assistance you don't want someone barrelling up the hill behind only to have them smack into the back of you - safety first.

The car in front going up the 2nd hill

Below is a video of our arrival at the top of the second hill (Craig was surprised to see someone at the top of the hill and took the wrong line, then we slide backwards for a bit until we finally stopped, I felt comforted when Craig said he'd lined the back of the tray up with a big tree in case he couldn't stop us from sliding....... !!!!!!!) Video courtesy of TJM Maroochydore

Reaching the top of Hill #2

When we got to the rather steep vertical type descents, poor Boris couldn't stay on the seat poor little bugger, he kept sliding down into my foot well unless I held onto him!

And the first downhill descent

Trying to show you the angle

A bit grubby

The mud was soooo icky!

Another descent

Hopefully you get the angle

Hopefully you get the angle we were at

Still going down

Convoy parked up in the forest

Back end of convoy

Having a break

While we were parked up having a break, Boris was having a fat time running up and down the length of the convoy saying hello to everyone and getting as many pats as he could.  However, there was one little girl from the car in front of us who was dying to give him a pat and cuddle and Boris the little shit kept looking at her and running past.  I called him over and told him to let the little girl pat him and this was the result:

Come over for a pat

Getting a little closer

And she got a very big cuddle from Boris

Us somewhere on the track
(photo courtesy of XRay Vision)

We got back to the showgrounds around 2-2.30pm and proceed to completely pack up and load the camper onto the track.  It was extremely hot and muggy by then, made it very uncomfortable for all of us.

We stopped and enjoyed the TJM sausage sizzle for lunch, thanked them for a great weekend, stopped off to chat to the other Travelander campers that were there (yep, we only saw it Sunday morning), then finally got on the road heading for home.

It was a cracker weekend, we met some new friends and had a really enjoyable time chatting with everyone with met and a great time driving the tracks that TJM Sunshine Coast organised for us.  We will join them on their future weekend events for sure (as long as they are dog friendly anyway). Hopefully we'll catch up with some of our new friends on one of them.
Below is a link to the XRay Vision video that they took of the weekend, if you are interested in watching it. It's about 13 mintues long.

XRay Vision video of the TJM Weekend

Kenilworth TJM 4wd Weekend - Day 1

Friday 6th February, 2015

Doing something different for our first weekend camp in 2015 - we're joining other customers of the TJM Sunshine Coast store for a 4wding weekend in Kenilworth.  We'll all be camping at the Kenilworth Showgrounds tonight & tomorrow night, going on a 1/2 day drive through some tracks, cooking competition on Saturday night & then a more challenging 1/2 day track day on Sunday, finishing with TJM supplying a sausage sizzle for lunch before heading home.

We wouldn't normally go out of our way to camp in close proximity to a heap of people, so lets see how we go then.

We actually got on the road early for once!!  (I know right, how excited do you think I was). About 3pm we were on our way to Kenilworth and since it's not that far from home we took all the back roads to stay off the highway as much as possible.  We arrived about 4pm and headed straight to the TJM tent that was erected on the oval at the showgrounds.  Signed in, got the info from Jeff on where we could camp.  Decided we'd plug into the power for the weekend, easier then putting out the solar panels and probably safer for the solar panels to stay packed away with all these 4wd's coming.

Unloaded the camper for the weekend and erected the big awning over the galley, it's going to be hot so lots of shade is going to be appreciated.  Beer in hand, Craig took Boris for a walk around the oval and a bit of a play - he's a patient little dog, waits while we setup camp then he knows he gets his attention time.

Boris's time

What a good looking little man

I wander who enjoys this playtime
more?

Quite impressed with what the Kenilworth Showgrounds has to offer campers;  grassy campsites, fire drums, power, toilets and showers, pool, skate park.  There is also a dining room/kitchen available for groups.  All of this for $16.00/night powered or $13.00/night unpowered. The oval where we camped is a large area and there is also some more space on the other side of the cricket oval to camp.

Camping area at Kenilworth
Showgrounds

We chatted with our new neighbours as they arrived, while having some afternoon refreshments. Dinner consists of Lemon, Mint & Parsley Couscous served with some yummy lamb kebabs & chicken kebabs that I put in a lovely yogurt marinade last night to fiesta. Nothing happening tonight, so after dinner we cleaned up and headed to bed. Big day tomorrow.



Saturday 7th February, 2015
Up with the birds this morning and greeted by beautiful blue skies.  Bacon & Egg burgers for breakfast this morning and then we assembled under the TJM tent for our track instructions (Kenilworth hills via Charlie Moreland camping area and to Booloumba Creek) - yah!  We all lined up and got our vehicle numbers (29 cars was the total I think) and then we were off on our 1st adventure for the weekend around 9am.

Hema Cloud Map of Saturdays Track

Coming through Charlie Mooreland
Campground

Car behind crossing the creek

Convoy crossing the creek

One section of the track

picture perfect scenery

A little surprise along the track

Giving a helping hand

Just so pretty

About 3/4 of the convoy took a wrong turn, we all pulled up and waited on instructions to get us back to the rest of the flock.  It was a pretty spot we stopped at and there were thousands of butterflies around.

The lost sheep

Waiting.....

Beautiful butterflies everywhere

The flock is re-assembled

Great tracks

More prettiness

Little downhill descent

Front of the convoy heading home

Back of the convoy heading home

Pretty creek

A spot of lunch, chatting with the people in the cars surrounding us in the convoy about the drive, having a look a the photos I took on the computer, we sat in the shade and had a few drinks with our closest neighbours (father & daughter from Brisbane who share the love of fishing & camping, so gorgeous). Tonight is the big night of the camp cooking competition, which I've entered for a bit of fun. 

About 3.00pm the cooks around the campground started organising their hopefully winning dishes.  I'm doing our Mungungo Butter Chicken (when we camped at the Mungungo Pub last year, Trish the publican was kind enough to share her recipe with us for her butter chicken, which I've tweaked a little bit).  While I busied myself browning chicken and what not, Craig was walking around to our new friends campsites asking what they were cooking and announcing to them they may as well not bother as my curry was going to win - he's a shocker, yet such a cutie.  Mind you he had beer in hand and I think it was mostly to do with socialising then anything else!

Craig decided to "pose" for a photo for the
TJM photographer so it looks like he's
hard at work on the cooking comp....
(Photo courtesy of TJM)

Judging is at 7pm tonight, there was a fair bit of banter with Chris and his daughter next door, little bit of taste testing and helping Chris adjust the seasoning a bit - I know right, helping the competition as it was!  All in good fun.  Craig finally arrived back from his wanderings and we continued our afternoon drinks & chats with the neighbours as they came and went.  All in all it was actually a really fun afternoon (the lady who's name I cannot remember got on the giggle juice as Craig calls it with her friend early in the afternoon and burnt her rice 3 times, it was hilarious even to her).

Take the camp oven & rice over to the judging table about 6.55pm (Craig did the rice, he's very good at the absorbsion method now).  Even served up some poppadoms (the ones you buy ready to go from the supermarket).  The idea is that all the competition meals will feed all the campers tonight - hope there's enough!

Some of the crowd including Colin
the winner at the back left in black shirt

more of the crowd

Simon from All 4 Adventure & Hilary
from TJM

Our rice burning neighbour

We had Jason & Simon from All 4 Adventure (4wd TV series if you don't know who they are). 

Simon & Jason from
All 4 Adventure
(Photo courtesy of TJM)

They started at one end and went along the table, there was even a couple of desserts in there.  I don't envy the boys having to judge all those meals but they did.  

The judging table

They've started judging

Tasting the neighbours curry

Tasting my curry!

Think Jason likes my curry
(I like the tongue poking out)

Not sure if Simon likes it or he just got
spice hit

They came back for a second tasting of our neighbours lamb curry and also my curry - hmm must be close!!  So the results were:

First Place goes to Colin with his Beef Curry with Dumplings - Prize:  Auspit
Second Place went to:  Our neighbours daughter & myself (yah!!!) - Prize:  All 4 Adventure shirts.
Third Place went to:  The young fellow who did a lamb roast & veges on the coals (good effort I say).

2nd place winners with Jason
(this is one of the rare times you will
see me in a photo!)
Photo courtesy of TJM

A terrific amount of fun was had by all tonight and the raffle tickets bought by everyone supported the Royal Flying Doctors.

After judging everyone tucked into the meals, our camp oven was empty!!  As you can imagine after everything was cleaned up there was a bit of comedic banter going on around the various campfires.