Author: Mr A
Location: Huskisson, Jervis Bay, NSW
What goes in must come out right? I’m referring to the fact that we had managed to get the Zone RV into a tight spot in our friends’ garden – surely it must be able to come out the same way? It was tight…very tight…and of course the hand held radio Catherine uses to help direct me chose this moment to play up. Finally we managed to back our way down the drive and were on our way, with great memories of a wonderful weekend.
We were soon at our first stop, the Fresh Food Market at Nowra, a pricey but good source for stocking up. Our friends Chris and Karen happened to be down at Bowral on a Porsche club run, so they diverted via Nowra and it was all into the Zone for a catch up. Who needs a coffee shop?
A short drive down the coast took us to Jervis Bay Holiday park, our home for the next three nights. It was a very tight squeeze into the site. I had given our towed length when booking, but somehow this hadn’t been taken into account. However, we had a view of the river and with some careful manoeuvring soon settled in. We decided to check out the ride into Huskisson (Husky to the locals), it was a great little bike path and we were in town within 10 minutes. What a pleasure to have some cycling infrastructure!
We also noticed that the town looked pretty much the same as it did years ago when we last visited. After our shock at how Orange had changed (and not for the better), it was a relief to see at least Husky has not been exploited by developers with a friend on the council.
This morning we launched our sleek sea kayak onto the river right by our camp, so convenient. We headed downstream and were soon in Huskisson again – the second purely person powered visit 🙂 We coasted out into Jervis Bay proper, which even on an overcast day looked simply stunning.
Brunch was calling so we headed park to our launch point and I fired up the Weber. It was our first bacon and eggs of the trip, and won’t be the last I can tell you! Catherine toasted some sweet potato slices instead of having bread…not bad.
Then we decided to head upstream and with the wind briefly behind us hoisted the sail. That’s right, a sail on a kayak. After a 20 minute paddle Catherine said “Oh look some caravans…oh…there’s ours!” We had paddled around an island and come right back! Ah well..time for Google maps assistance…and off we went again this time managing to head up the river.
It really was awesome, massive sting rays were lurking in the water, their blinking eyes the only clue they were there.
After we got past some houses we didn’t see anyone else on the river. Very tranquil, its what we love about kayaking. We saw heaps of water birds, including a kingfisher flashing his bright blue wings as he chased some lunch. Cormorants aired their wings in the sun, an eagle flashed overhead chased by a crow. We felt at peace with the world, remembering that this was a Tuesday morning and how privileged are we to be enjoying this life.
We paddled back to camp and decided to head into Nowra, we wanted to buy a Soda Stream and this would be our last chance. We drink a lot of sparkling water and wanted to be free from picking up our 6/7 bottles a week and then creating all that plastic waste, often in areas with no recycling. We tested it out and were pretty happy with the result.
Yesterday we had picked up our first dozen of south coast oysters, so a glass of Adelaide Hills Chardy just went beautifully with those, sitting in the sun watching the river flow (is that a song?). Dinner was selected from an Asian curry cookbook we had decided to bring along. It was a dish called Kukul Mus Kari, a Sri Lankan chicken curry. Pretty fancy…pretty delicious. Mrs A does it again.
We wandered outside to catch the last light of the day, the river was still flowing, I hope it always does.
