THE ADVENTURE BEGINS...

It is hard to believe that our big adventure is about to begin....
It has been three years in the planning...
We have been counting down the weeks all year.
We are finally on holidays... not just for a week or two but for six months...
We were a day late gettting away but we are finally on the road....
Decided to take a photo of our speedometer before we left...

Our neighbour  obliged us by taking a few photos of us just as we were about to leave....

Is it the battery?????

 We were ready to hit the road around 10am but when Ian and Kathy went to start their car, it just wouldn't start.  It would tick over but not start.  It all seemed to be a bit bizarre as Ian had started the car and hour earlier without any incident whatsoever when he reversed back to hook on the van...

The long and the short of it was that their battery had died so we had to wait for the RACQ to come and bring them a new battery.

It was a lot drier this time when we headed west..

 In the end it was after 11am when we got away.  We had a good run to Emerald.  We stopped at Duaringa for a cuppa, but other than that it was straight through to our friends the Brays where we were staying for the night...

 By the time we got to Bray,s and checked the van we realized that the DC current to the fridge was not working....  This is a major problem for us as we need the 12 volt to work as we are traveling, so it meant that we would have to stay in Emerald for at least another day.
Karen had some friends who came out to see if they could give us a hand but neither Steve nor Brad could find the problem.

We were hoping that it would be something simple and we could be on our way as soon as it was fixed.  That was not to be.... Steve went between the Plumbers and the Auto Electricians and day and didn't get home till after 4pm.    Apparently we needed a new 12 volt fridge element and it had to be ordered from Melbourne.  Also the Plumber was going to be out of town for two days so Thursday was the earliest we could have it fixed, so it means that we have had to stay in Emerald until it can be fixed on Thursday.

Well since we had no choice in the matter, we decided to make the most of it and do some sight seeing out and around Emerald. 

Ian, Kathy and I had a very relaxing day at Bray's resort, and we had a lovely day just chillin out...

Bray's Resort

Kathy enjoying dipping her toes in the pool

Their outside kitchen and entertainment area

Great place to relax with a cuppa first thing in the morning...

 We love what they have done to under the house....

 We are enjoying our time out here....

our home away from home in Emerald

Yesterday we decided to do some sightseeing and we headed out to the Gem fields to do the Miner's Heritage Underground Tour..

We left around 11am and headed out to Rubyvale... We arrived in time for lunch and enjoyed a lovely lunch at the Rubyvale Hotel....

 We had a little wander around town before we headed out to the Miner's Heritage Building.

 After wandering around Rubyvale we headed out to the Miner's Heritage Complex and went on the underground tour of the mine and watched people fossicking for the sapphires and zircons.  It was all very interesting..

The entrance to the Miner's Heritage Museum

 We went in and bought our tickets for the last tour of the day, and whilst we were in the little shop checked out all the beautiful jewellery and lovely cut rocks.  A lot of them were like the Thunder Eggs.

 After having a good look around the shop we still had another good half hour before our tour was due to start so thought we would go out and watch a couple of families who were fossicking for sapphires...

Ian,Kathy and Steve checking out  the washing troughs where you wash the rubble

 One of the owners came out and was showing us all how to look through the rubble for the sapphires.  it was really interesting, and we learnt a lot.  We would never had known  what to look for if we had not seen this demonstration.

 We then watched a family as they looked for the precious gems, and we were able to help them spot the shiny rocks which were the gems..

 By now it was time to go on our tour underground....

 The tour lasted for about 45 minutes and then we had some time available to check out the museum at the end of the tour before signing the visitors book and climbing back upstairs to the the shop

Signing the visitors book.

 We finished the afternoon by having a cuppa in their picnic area before heading back into Emerald...
We actually had a great day,  it was not in our original plan but we still have been enjoying our time in Emerald...