The Kronikles of Tony and Ruth
Day 34 - Wednesday 2 August 2006
The sun is trying to bust through the high grey clouds and it looks as if it might. Anna Bay is our destination. The Stockton Beach Sand Dunes are located there. If you can’t go to Africa to experience The Sahara, these awesome dunes are a good substitute. Stretching to Newcastle, a mile wide in places it offers the surreal experience of being totally lost and disorientated – take a compass! Ruth and I walk in and walk out although there are enterprises offering four wheel drive buses, cars, dune buggies, motorbikes etc. for hair raising trips through the steep, shifting sand mountains. Once amongst the dunes it is so bright that I cannot read the display on my mobile phone. Further, it is very quiet - the sand absorbs all sound. Watching a bus make its silent way into the dunes gives one some idea of the size of the dunes – the vehicle is but a speck crawling on the sands.
The car park is overflowing with scrubbed, neat Asian tourists heading for the 4WDs. Returning to Nelson Bay we divert to a lookout offering expansive views of Port Stephens. There are hills, headlands, bays, towns and sailing ferries spread out below us. The lunch at Hog’s Breath is bloody awful. Coffee at the Little Beach marina is better. The ex – enz (see note) owner is chatty and informative. Herself and her husband bought the marina for fun and profit. Six months later he died leaving her to learn how to manage the anchorage. That was 10 years ago and she has boxed on improving and expanding the business. She suggests visiting the working lighthouse. Visitors are encouraged to talk to the keeper and the radio operator. There is an attached museum.
The view of the harbour entrance from the lighthouse is gobsmacking. The two keepers are forthcoming and informative. The museum absorbs our interest for about an hour. If you happen to be in the area - go there!
Before din-dins we take a couple of aperitifs at the Services Club. I believe that NSW has a better policy on poker machines. Here the large amounts of revenue derived from the machines are ploughed back into the community. The Services Clubs are large, sumptuously appointed with inexpensive food and drink prices. In Victoria nearly every hotel has pokies, the rooms are poky (pardon the pun) and the profits go to the owners so they can sail their friggin yachts around the Whitsundays.
Dinner: eat chook, drink wine then go to bed for a very uncomfortable night. It’s too hot, then it’s too cold, the sheets keep slipping off and the mossies are circling. So bloody irritating! You know, one of those nights when you could punch a hole in the wall.
Note: enz – New Zealand i.e. NZ
Ruth - Stockton Beach |
More Stocton |
Port Stephens |
