7^th September: Gingin

Fathers' Day today. All three children rang and had a conversation with their father which gratified him a great deal. It was reasonably fine this morning and so we washed. However, I have had to use the dryer to finish them off. (The undies in the van with the fan heater which we dug out from under the bed!)

This afternoon we went driving across to the coast where the wind was ferocious! The surf was very angry on normally calm beaches. At Guilderton, originally a fishing village and now also going upmarket from little fibro huts to four bedroom, brick weekend “shacks”. But it is a pretty place with the Moore River trapped by a sandbar. This was where, in 1931, 40 17^th century gold guilder coins were found in the sand dunes. The presume they came from the Dutch ship The Gilt Dragon which was wrecked off this coast in1643. 69 sailors reached shore but disappeared never to be sighted again, 7 men sailed in a small boat to Batavia (Indonesia.)

Then we went on to Two Rocks and Yanchep. This is where Alan Bond planned to defend the America's Cup when he won it and so he planned a huge development called Sun City. There is a very fine marina built on the edge of a big inner reef lagoon with massive walls to keep back the raging surf. It was well patronised and now the development is finally going ahead. Very large houses all crowded together! Yanchep is much changed also with huge, monotoned McMansions built on long, narrow pieces of real estate so that there is barely 3 feet between them. It is on all sand behind the frontal dunes and very ugly! These little plots of land start at $280,000 and,looking at it, there must be a tight covenant in the contracts. Nothing grows and is really is a concrete jungle!

I remebered a park full of Lemon Scented Gums, a pool and lots of black swans which were stealing lunches out of school children's bags. We couldn't see it anywhere until I asked to go to the Yanchep NP. There it was! The lake was dried up and sludgy, ducks had replaced the swans but the trees and the old Yanchep Inn were still there and it ws still a lovely peaceful place to be!

 

It was raining and very windy as we drove home but Gail and April cooked Glen (and me) a nice meal in the camp kitchen for Fathers' Day. Gail had bought him a lovely bottle of Cabernet Shiraz and despite the cold blustery conditions, it was a lovely meal!

Monday Morning:

What a foul night!

I don't think any of us really slept. The exceptionally strong and gusty wind squalls really battered us and in the midddle of the night the awnings were rolled up. The van was being buffetted remorsefully by the madly gyrating awnings and nobody slept! The rain came in bursts and I was so glad we had packed everything up before we went to bed! An awful night!