Thursday Dec 20 - and was up early again and packing. We were away by about 9am and headed down the Mallee highway - we passed through Managatang and even saw the race course. At Pyangle we stopped for petrol and discovered that the driver's side rear where was quite hot. I decided to proceed on to Swan Hill where we stopped to enable it to cool down - we had a cool drink and browsed through a newsagent shop and by the time we got back to the car, the wheel had cooled significantly. We trundled on to Kerang where we had lunch - the wheel was no too bad when we got there, but was quite hot sitting in the sun when we were ready to leave. We spent about ¾ hour there because a guy in a car stopped to ask us about the van, as he was considering buying one - we talked to him for some time before heading on through Cohuna and finally to Echuca.
We navigated through town with Bob's map, and remembering Brian's advise to "turn at the water tower". Once finding ourselves in Bob's road, I was a bit apprehensive about going too far, as it is quite narrow road and did not look forward to have to turn the van around or reverse it out. So I stopped at a house on stilts, and with a shed, and walked in - I was sure it was not the right place, as it did not look like I remembered. A lady came out to see what I wanted, but was little help. (I only had a couple of lot numbers for Bob's place, and now all the letter boxes have street numbers on them).
Just down a bit further I recognized the place and Bob came out and we drove in and parked the van where he indicated. We erected it, and he decided to do the spraying right away. However, as it looked very much like rain, and even a few drops fell - we man-handled it into the shed. Bob sprayed it there. After making the beds in the flat, we showed and went up to the house where we enjoyed a nice chat, drinks followed by dinner which was very nice of Betty, Bob's Mum. We came back down to the flat at about 8:30pm and read for a bit before going to bed.
Friday Dec 21st - and off first thing to find the Ford Dealer, and have the wheel looked at. We went to the info centre and they directed us to the Ford Dealership which is on the Northern highway (to Bendigo).
We sat there for some time, and they took a look, and did a few things. Bottom line is that the wheel is OK - maybe the brakes adjusted a bit tightly, but no damage to the wheel. After that we went to the supermarket. Also bought some flowers for Mrs Smith, and some wine for Bob.
When we got back, Bob had removed the door from the van, and straightened the bent pieces and generally "panel beaten" the aluminium plate. He did a great job, and has now put the door back into place and instructed me in what I was doing wrong and what to do in future. He also got us a replacement running light and fitted that. We very much appreciate his help and it makes us realize how much we don't know about this caper, and how hopeless Ted and I are with general maintenance of the unit.
I took the flowers up to Betty in the house, and chatted for a while, after which Ted and I came back to the flat for lunch.
We are now "resting" - Ted is reading and I am doing my photos and this diary. I have worked on and completed another DVD of photographs - this one is the NSW trip of June/Aug this year. So far, I have made dvds - Antarctica, Gippsland, NSW, Norfolk Island (long and short versions) and one called Holidays Vol 1 (Heathcote, and 3 Shepparton trips), and have being doing this trip as I go.
Saturday Dec 22nd - Ted and I packed up the van, then we went off to the Visitors Centre to see if there was any place we wanted to go - I enquired after the miniature railway I had heard about at Moama, and after we went there, we discovered that some of the track has been damaged, so obviously it is not running. We drove around for a couple of hours and visited Rotary Steam Park, and followed Goulburn Road until it just petered out. We had a nice lunch as The Wisteria in the old historic Port of Echuca. We scouted around to see if we could find a service station with convenient air, but none to be found.
Continued to work on photos in the afternoon and after dinner, Bob "visited" and we talked, and looked at photo dvds, and he showed us a dvd or him kite boarding.
Echuca Hotels
