So we went off on our third weekend with TJM Maroochydore to Inskip Point. The weather was going to be less then perfect, but who cares we were going to be away camping! This time we had some mates joining us, Dave & Tracy Hawthorne, Simmo & Leigh (and Leigh's son Rex), Razzle & Doreen. We took Razzle little boat along as well, so the boys could "catch" some mud crabs - bahahaha.
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| Friday afternoon traffic, you gotta love it! |
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| Half way there |
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| Check out the wild flowers |
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| So pretty |
There was a little confusion when we arrived up there as TJM weren't setup in the camping area where they said they would be, so after a little driving around a couple of camping areas, we located them on the left hand side camping area on Pelican Bay
We had to move along the beach a bit from where TJM had setup base camp due to the roof top camper the Hawthorne's use and our campers height requirements when opening up, but once camp was setup we wondered up the beach to let them know we were there.
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| 3/4 of our camp |
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| the other 1/4 overlapped |
I think due to the inclement weather that we were due to experience that weekend, people were put off coming along, so numbers were down but we had our friendly cook off mate Dumpling man/Pumpkin man (aka Colin) and his lovely wife Karen turn up plus Hilary and her husband Andrew and the guys that own TJM Jeff, Leanne & Scott..... obviously.
There was a bit of socalising on the Friday afternoon after all parties arrived, including the friendly banter about the upcoming cooking competition on the Saturday night.
We all had dinner and chatted amongst ourselves, at some respectable time during the evening all the girls went to bed but the men stayed up. They should not have stayed up because it all went downhill or should I say someone went downhill from there and got very sandy and now has the new kickname of "Crumb Sausage"......
Saturday 14th November, 2015
Everyone was up at a reasonable hour and we were greeted by a glorious sunny blue sky, that will unfortunately change for the worse later on......
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| Beautiful morning |
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| Pretty little flowers |
The fellas went out and tried their hand at fishing and crabbing during the day, while we girls just enjoyed the relaxing, chatting, swimming, walking Boris & Mitch. There was also some napping in the hammock.
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| Snoozing |
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| peace & quiet |
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| No words needed |
Righto.... around 4pm it was quite evident we were going to get clobbered by a half decent storm and obviously the sky was enough to drive the boys back in and now they were dragging the boat across the sand to get it back to shore (just a little bit funny, hehe)
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| Impending storm...... |
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| Boys dragging boat in |
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| Still dragging in the boat |
At some stage during the dragging in of the boat 2 of the boys planned to push the 3rd one into the water, but unfortunately for the 2 planners it backfired and they ended up drenched. They were still giggling like school girls about it when they got up to camp. Of course we girls had organised the most important part of the afternoons events - afternoon nibbles.
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By 4.20pm the sky looked like this.......
By 4.30pm it looked like this:
Now this almighty storm kept brewing for another hour giving us an awesome lightning show. About then Colin & Karen came down for drinks and a chat. 5.30pm and then the heavens opened up on us and nobody was going anywhere in a hurry.
O.M.G. it was torrential......
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Our friend Dave decided he'd take advantage of this rain and take a shower (you'd almost have to say it was a communal shower, being we were all there under the awning with him!! )
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Yep folks it was pretty scary and horrific seeing this scene unfold in front us, I can tell you that!
The storm hang around for about an hour, Colin & Karen took a run for it back to their camp. As the weather calmed down, Craig had started cooking his marinated chicken wings and the judging for the cooking competition has been put back to 8pm. Now that everyone has cleared out and gone back to their campsites to start cooking, I can get started myself.
I'm cooking Mongolian Lamb with Tumeric Rice for the competition, lets see how I go this time. We finally get over to the TJM tent by the 8pm deadline, after a couple of trips with everything.
You would not believe it......... I got 2nd place again!!! At least our friend Tracy H won 1st place with a Thai Chicken Curry and Dumpling Man (aka Colin) got 3rd place with a Curried Prawn dish. We didn't get to sample all the dinners though as the wind started to whip up and the sky was not what you'd refer to a calm. The TJM guys suggested everyone head back to their campsites at this point to make sure they wouldn't blow away. Due to this rushed judging and dinner there are no photos of all the food.
We picked up as much as we could and carried it back to camp (whatever we couldn't carry we left with the TJM guys to look after for the night) It was already raining quite heavily as we walked home and when we arrived we had to put a few poles back up on the awning and tighten up the ropes. My God this going to be a doozy of a storm.
It was an uncomfortable sleep for a while until the storm passed. Some of our friends stayed up at the TJM camp and played cards for a bit, Tracy H had to go to the loo so had to brave the rain so while she was walking she kept going back to their tent. Doreen made it back to their tent and Razzle and Dave H came back eventually under chairs (now that would have been an hilarious sight).
Sunday 15th November, 2015
What time we all arose the next day I'm not sure, some were slower to rise then others and some weren't feeling as chipper as others either....... An overcast morning greeted us but no rain for the time being. A good breakfast and coffee to get going, then back over to the TJM camp to collect our bits we left over there and see if anyone suffered damage. Everyone was packing up early this morning to avoid getting caught in another downpour and packing away wet canvas.
The boys did catch a couple of sand crabs yesterday, so Tracy H cooked up her Chilli Crabs for everyone to have a taste of for smoko.
Our little party headed off home around lunchtime, stopping at the Goomboorian Petrol Station for a spot of lunch (Razzle not feeling very well and was vomiting). Off we set again toward home. Doreen had to stop again for Razzle to be sick, so they fell behind a bit. We got home a bit after 5pm. It wasn't a very pleasant drive home with light rain & drizzle.
