Our adventure began, with a weekend away wth 30 or so other families try, Cool Stuff we saw in Australia in Tabulum, about 2 hours west of Byron Bay.  Our friend Natan was having a 40th birthday with a camping weekend on a property, and we were using the weekend also as our farewell, our testing of car and caravan, and a general warmup.

The drive there was somewhat eventful.  Having never towed a caravan, let alone one overloaded, and with an overloaded car.... we were soon swaying all over the place.  Increasing tyre pressure to 40pounds up from 32 soon stopped some of the rot, but it was clear we were too heavy for comfort.  The only other problem was, we were not sure where we were going. Luckily we met up with our friends the Plessers, and convoyed with them the final 50 kms. The tar ended with 15kms of dirt and a last 50 metres up a sandy incline.  We hopped out to inspect and watched our friend Gil launch his ute up the hill.  Launch, literally as his front wheels were at least 2 feet of the ground as his roared over the top.

Towing a caravan, we elected for 4wd, low 2nd, and just crept up nice as you please.  I'd not driven an automatic for 10 years, and never an automatic 4wd, but this was just great.  We camped a little away from the rest of the group for no particular reason, and then proceeded to enjoy the next 3 days.  Natan and crew had organised a camp kitchen - we all kicked in money and were fed for 3 days.  Awesome.

We played in the river all day, with various people on child minding duty.  At night we danced to many differernt tribal tunes, with many of the campers being djs and with a sound system and decks set up. 

Some things we learnt.

a. Caravans are better to sleep on, when flat.

b. Best not to leave anything behind, but if you take everything, there is nowhere to put anything, and no way to find anything.

c. if you do a poo in the woods, mark the spot, so the next person doesn't dig a hole in the same spot.

d. Cows, are big, and sometimes they wander into your campsite, and say moo very loudly in the morning when they are going to get a drink from the river.

We floated down the river on lilos, the gentle rapids werefun but not dangerous.  Someone set up a flying fox , Link header across the river which the kids (including the adult kids) had a blast swinging along it.

The weather was mainly fine, the company was mighty fine, and it was a fine way to start our adventure.