Since we needed to stay in Brisbane for our citizenship ceremony on Australia Day, 26 January, we decided to do a trial run of loading up Suz (our hearty 4WD) and camping. Jon and I are not exactly sure when we last went camping, but we’re pretty sure it was a long time ago and it was definitely not in the middle of summer.  We decided to head back to Bribie Island where we learned to drive Suz on the beach. We went on Monday, 20 January and returned on Wednesday, 22 January.

Packing the car went pretty well. Then again, there wasn’t much room to spare and we’ll have more stuff for our 2+ month trip so we’ll see how loading up goes tomorrow! The drive out on the beach to our camp site was blissfully uneventful. We went straight to our camp site and setup camp. It was a bit earlier than the official check in time of 2 pm, but no one was at the site so we moved in. It took over an hour in the midday heat to get things sorted which left plenty of time for some afternoon relaxing.

We decided to use the cold showers 2 camp sites away for a rinse off just as the skies were darkening. We quickly took showers and scrambled back to our site just before a massive thunderstorm hit. I’m still not sure if it was the biggest thunderstorm I’ve been through in a while or if it was just that we were out in the wild in a tent during it, but I think it was a pretty big storm. We had the tent all sealed up with ourselves inside wondering what was happening outside as the rain poured and the wind blew. Finally it passed and we’d escaped unscathed. Phew.

The next day we walked from our camp site up to an area of historical ruins from a fort established to protect Australia from attacks in WWII. It was a beautiful walk up and back along the beach and through the wetlands behind the ruins. The bugs were only super bitey for a little bit.

We had some rain showers in the afternoon, but nothing like the thunderstorm the night before. We were able to just sit under our beach umbrella and relax.

Our camp site was over the dunes from the beach and I knew that high tide didn’t even reach the dunes, but that didn’t stop my sleep addled mind from thinking that some waves were going to come crashing over the dunes in the middle of the night when the wave crashing noise got significantly louder. Luckily that was just my imagination. We survived and mostly loved our two nights of beach camping. Woohoo!

Unfortunately, the worst part of the trip was yet to come as I bogged Suz in deep HOT sand about 100 yards from getting back to the regular road. One guy stopped to help, but ended up not having a hook attachment to be able to pull us out so we were digging away in order to use these tracks we have to drive out, but we needed to do a lot of digging and the sand was hotter than I knew sand could get and we were both wearing flip flops and sweating buckets. Luckily another stranger stopped and this guy was able to pull us out and into the parking lot very quickly. Such a champ and now a fellow Aussie…

That’s right, yesterday, we officially became Australian citizens by attending a ceremony and getting our citizenship certificates. It was quite an elaborate ceremony at Brisbane City Hall with 592 fellow immigrants getting citizenship.