My summer holiday adventure - a photographic account (contains references to craft)

A summer holiday adventure - with a heavy emphasis on the 'adventure'. But first for those of you who care nothing for adventure and only of craft, I start with the craft reference:

Project #4: Fetchings II


I used some wool I bought last year (I keep saying that don't I). They're a little too big for my hands and seem more manly to me. Not sure who will be the benefactor of these yet, I'm still thinking (they're not really Mr S+L's cuppa tea although he makes a great model - um no those hairy arms are not mine).

Now on to the adventure. Let me start by saying we're safe... and we're not on fire (!).

It all started on Tuesday evening, we packed up the Valiant and started our adventure down the Great Ocean Road via Portarlington to Johanna Beach. We were heading off for a couple of days of relaxation in quiet surroundings with maybe the odd not-so-adventurous adventure like berry picking, walking amongst the rainforest treetops or pointing at the odd koala and echidna in the wild.

And so our holiday began, we were in a great mood, singing along to the ipod, the Valiant purring with Mr S+L at the wheel



Goodbye for a couple of days we said to Melbourne


as we drove off into the sunset!


As we drove along still happily singing along to the ipod I started knitting my fetching. We called the hotel to make sure we could get some dinner when we arrived. "Yep, of course, no problem at all you'll have plenty of time" the friendly voice on the other end of the phone said.

We continued along the road and just as we officially got to what I shall refer to as 'the middle of butt fuck nowhere' the ipod stopped and Mr S+L turned to me and said I think we just blew a fuse. 'Oh well' I thought nothing major, this has happened before, the Val has only one fuse, we'll just call rd side assistance and they'll send someone out with some fuse wire and a pair of pliers. So we coasted to the side of the rd (no accelorater when the fuse goes). There was a little puff of smoke coming out of the airvents, but nothing out of the ordinary for a single fuse blowing in a car that age - so I felt justified in finishing my row on my fetchings - wouldn't you?

Well by the time I finished my row the smoke hadn't finished and it had started to turn black...and actually instead of going away more of it just kept coming. It was time for me to down needles and assist under the bonnet.

That was until Mr S+L announced that he thought there was a fire under the bonnet. Never mind about assisting I called the fire brigade as I ripped everything out of the car (starting with my bag of knitting containing my newly-purchased-just-arrived-this-week-noro-silk-garden-yarn) .


The smoke kept coming as Mr S+L announced he thought it could be near the fuel line! Eeek!. So I hastily moved our wool belongings 5 ms up the rd to safety (der 5 ms wasn't gonna save us if she blew) as Mr S+L ran for the 600ml bottle of drinking water to douse the by now obviously dangerous electrical fire under our bonnet.

Luckily it worked and not long after the fire went out every piece of equipment driven by electricity in the Val went off at once - wipers, lights, radio and the dreaded Valiant (fog)horn. Hilarious. Poor Val.

So this is the view we had while we waited for the fire-ies and the rd side assistance to come rescue us.


By the time the fire-ies sirens were seen on the horizon the fire was well and truly out thanks to Super S+L, so the fire-ies well they just kinda stood around and admired the car commenting how great Valiants are (to which we replied 'wanna buy a metallic green one?').

Anyway the happy ending to the story is that we got towed to where we were staying, the next day the Rd Side assistance people gave us a hire car and a cab fare back to the hire car depot and we paid to have the car towed back to our mechanic to assess the damage. And we continued on with our foreplanned adventures the next day.

Picking berries




catching a glimpse of some fauna in their natural habitat




walking among the treetops

I was freaking out up there in that photo. Here we were standing on some cantaleaver 45 m up in the air only held up by some wires - the platform was shaking and so were my knees . Yikes.

Feeding the chooks and collecting eggs from them in return


At our temporary place with an amazing view


And despite the firey start to our holiday we've come home rested and relaxed.