Killeah State Park
Trip Start
Jul 12, 2006
1
120
230
Trip End
Jun 18, 2007
Shell Harbour,
Australia
Wednesday, December 6, 2006
Batemans Bay
. It didn't take too long before we spotted one about an hour out of Sydney. We stopped for a quick shop at Coles and the bottle shop before getting back on our way. The drive out wasn't too spectacular really, driving through the burbs really. We saw some signs for a place called Shellharbour late in the afternoon and decided it had a nice ring to it so pulled off the main highway and promptly got lost in a maze of roads. We didn't actually get lost because I'd been noting down the route we had taken, like a good little girl guide. But as luck would have it we took a turning down a road with a big sign pointing us to an information station. We thought it might be shut but Lee ventured inside to have a look. It was located inside a huge building with a very very busy car park. It turned out to be a sort of working mens club thing with a ham raffle on, hence the busy car park. Apparently ham raffles are popular around Christmas, so the lady in the carpark told us. The info person gave Lee a lot of leaflets and pointed out Killeah State park, which was a short distance back down the road we'd just travelled. Sounded spot on to us, camping in a State Park. The park booth was shut so I gave the number a call and not long afterwards we were driving towards a little cottage at the back of the park in search of Gary, the park warden. $20 was paid and we drove around the park and choose a suitable spot, as far away from the school trip as possible. We were both quite excited actually, our first night camping in the van
Beach at Cape Conran
. But first things first, food... a fire box was provided and Lee set about making fire while I sorted the chairs and table out. Off he went into the wooded area to get firewood, back he'd come after a short while with armfuls of twigs and branchs to burn. Once we had enough wood he set about lighting the fire. Scrunching up a brochure and some leaflets we'd picked up. It was pretty windy but, bless him, he did try, and try, and try. I think some of the paper caught light but just smoked a little and did nothing to the wood on top. Now, if you can imagine the scene - State park, not too many people around, us crouched over our fire box with some matches trying to start a fire and the daylight starting to fade, when from over the wall pops a man. "You got it started yet?" he enquires. We have to admit that we're having a slight bit of trouble, "What you need is Woof... hold on a mo" and with that he strides off, across the park and over to his tent site then returns with a bottle of blue liquid in his hand, marked poison. "This is what you need, you're in Australia now, you need some Kero". He pours some of the kero on the wood, Lee chucks a match to it and it burns a treat. "It's called Woof Wood" he says, "because when you put it on wood and light it, it goes woooof". We thank him profusely as we load wood onto the lovely warming glow of the, now burning, fire. "No worries, can't see you going hungry can we?" he says as he strides back to his site. What a lovely man, a top Ozzie bloke. The fire went a right treat, it lasted us all night and provided us with heat to cook pasta and the Bolognese sauce we'd purchased to go with it
Broken down campette at Sale
. It also lasted long enough to keep us warm while we ate and drank in the dark of the night. The Sun goes down by about 9pm and out fire wood was dwindling. Lee sent me off in the dark to look for more but I was too scared about deadly spiders to venture too far and came back with two twigs and a piece of cane I'd found on another site. Hardly enough to keep the fire going to be honest, so we decided to make a dash for the toilets and head to our van for the first night's sleep on our adventures. Mental note from now on - never put the light on in the van when the doors are open, otherwise you get big, huge hideous bugs in your van. They were horrible. About the size of a ten pence piece, big flying beetle type bugs. Horrible. Not only were they in our van but they were also all in the toilet and shower block. Yuk Yuk! That's one thing I'm not to happy about really, the amount of deadly insects and stuff they have in Oz. I keep checking under the toilet seat and in the shower because I really do not want to run into one. 
