Into Autumn

March 2012 already and instead of preparing to go into hibernation for the winter, intrepid Team Turtle is preparing to sail forth once more into the unknown wilds of Australia.

Well, it sounds good, but our plans for this year are not quite as intense as 2011 ( The Adventures of the Turtle Trekkers ) and we will just be doing a few smallish trips away.

Now for a catch up on what we have been up to over the last few months.

During The Deckie's (Louise) stay in Gosford hospital back in October/November it was recommended by her specialist that she have a operation to ensure that she would no longer suffer from this nasty affliction again.  After one false start in January, the operation - a bilateral meatoplasty -was performed on 15 February.  The stitches were removed a week later and the next appointment was not for another three weeks  We were very fortunate in that we were able to camp in the front yard of number one daughter on the Central Coast until The Deckie was well enough to return to Coffs Harbour.  That has now happened and The Deckie is well on the road to recovery especially with the specialised nursing care from The Captain (Alan).

In the meantime, and after a lot of careful consideration, The Captain has decided to reconfigure Team Turtle!  We had realised that poor old Tuf Cat is just far too big for the waters up in the Top End and as we would love to go back there we would have to downsize.  Fortunately, Tuf Cat will remain in our possession as she is brilliant for boating off the New South Wales coastline and will just go into storage until we require her.  We have purchased a Stacer 399 Proline aluminium boat, a new Yamaha 2 stroke 30hp motor and The Captain has been constructing a car/boat trailer!  The new boat will be winched onto the top of The Turtle whilst we are travelling and The Rav can be towed along utilising the new trailer.  Once we are in a spot for a while, we will take The Rav off the trailer, winch the boat down from the roof and put it into The Rav's spot and then use The Rav to tow the trailer.  All very simple and straightforward!!

Eventually, the Li'l Pussy will have to be sent to another loving family, much to the chagrin of The Deckie.  Li'l Pussy served us well on our big adventures but there will too few times in the future that we could take her for a swim and she would be very unhappy being on land all of the time.

At this stage, our plans for the next few weeks are to attend The Deckie's Mum's 85th birthday party, The Captain to attend another boy's fishing weekend near Nowra and then for Team Turtle to explore parts of the South Coast.

Happy travels!