Summer Holidays

In between rain storms Rhonda and I managed to get three nights away up at "The Camp". A much different place in the holiday season and a time we do not ususally go, however, with all our pre-Christmas family happenings we thought we needed a few days away.

Now usually we go up to "The Camp" in the off-season and mid-week and often have the whole shebang just to ourselves.

The contrast was terrific.

Boys on bikes in swimming gear heading down to the water:

Kiddies on mini-scooters daring 'the hill':

Big boys with their toys:

Families simply enjoying the cool water on a 35c day (95f):

And of 'cos, Denny-the-Dog enjoyed a cooling 'belly wash' in the reserved swimmers-only area:

It was nice to see some water back in the dam:

and:

This is, essentially, an "Irrigation Dam" and in dry seasons it provides water to farmers down stream on the Lachlan River to irrigate their crops. During the drought is was emptied down to 5% and it has filled to 95% in merely six weeks. Think of the havoc all that water would have caused downstream, in areas already effected by the current flooding, if the dam had not been there to catch the opportune rain. In Autumn the State Water Authority will begin to empty it again. At capacity, it contains water equivalent to three x times the capacity of Sydney Harbour, one of the biggest deep water harbours in the world!
The rain bringing on the flowers:

And the campers out as family groups:

We arrived to a four hour black-out following a fierce storm but then got in three nice days until another storm chased us home.

We hope to go back in a week or so and plan to take the two grandsons (5 and 8) for a few days and they ARE going to learn "How to fish!"