Camping at Friendly Beaches

After Bicheno we travelled down the east coast of Tasmania to Freycinet National Park.  We made it down the dirt road with our caravan and we were greeted with this lovely view of the ocean.  There aren’t a lot of spaces in this campground that would suit a large van, we were lucky to get there when we did.  Camping here was free with a national parks pass and a ranger came around at one point to check that we had one.  I don’t seem to have any pictures of our camping spot which was lovely other than that dirty sand that’s almost like ash.  Fortunately we have a great mat that the sand will fall through, but there’s no hope of keeping the kids’ feet clean when we’re in a place like this! We saw some wildlife while we were here, also.  I heard some rustling outside one night and found a possum sitting on our table rifling through the rubbish that we hadn’t gotten around to putting away for the evening.  That meant possum poo on the mat, which the kids always find entertaining.  There was one little wallaby that hung around, at least I suppose it was the same one, and I managed to get close enough with TurboBug that we could offer it a carrot.  He sniffed it but wasn’t interested. (The wallaby, that is.)  TurboBug was fascinated and watched him quietly.  One or two of us even saw a wombat.  The elusive wombat remains an animal I haven’t seen in the wild so I hustled out for a look but it was gone.  After we set up that first day we headed down to the beach for a peek.  It was beautiful.  More white sand and plenty of exploring.  The water was calm enough here for the kids to go in, but it was cold so they didn’t spend too much time in the water. The kids busied themselves right away making sandcastles. LadyBug was enjoying herself so much.  She was literally dancing in the waves. If TurboBug sees a sand bucket he knows just what to do, and he gets quite annoyed with anyone who gets in his way.  Just stand back and let this kid fill the bucket with sand and no one will be harmed.  He also spent time digging holes which we’d fill up with water.  He didn’t mind at all that every bucketful disappeared as quickly as we poured it.  That just meant we got to fill up the bucket again! These two love to pretend they’re surfing.   They maintain a surfer stance while the water crashes around them, then jump the wave and switch to the other side. Sandcastle cities started appearing all over the hillside. We took a walk down the beach and found a fairy house.  It was finished with quite some detail including a front porch, furniture inside, and trees for the garden.  My younger kids are still not quite sure whether to believe it is an actual fairy house or not.  🙂 I love seagulls.  I may be the only person to ever utter that sentence!  I love to watch them, some of them are quite beautiful. More pictures of the beautiful area. I love it when toddlers learn to smile for the camera.  It makes for interesting expressions sometimes.  At this beach the kids were much more interested in playing than exploring.  They had quite the sand fight. Dad fished.  He even got up early every morning and fished some more.  His grand total was one flathead and one mackerel.  His first ever ocean fish, so I think he quite liked Friendly Beaches as well. The sand was so fine here, so so soft and so beautifully white. Toward the late afternoon some of these jellyfish started washing up on the shore.  They were fascinating.  Such a striking blue colour.  They’re called Velella, also known as ‘by-the-wind sailors’ because they have a little sail on top that helps them catch the wind and move across the water. We left our sandcastle cities in tact, mostly.  The kids couldn’t resist smashing a few.  In our later trips to the beach it was great fun to observe which were still standing.    Back at the caravan we pulled out a drawing book I brought along and the boys were engrossed with it for ages, drawing cities and little worlds. We even got some schooling done here. One last look… Sigh.  Tasmania, what lovely coasts you have!