29th August 1989

We've just finished our 1st meal out of our camp oven and we're rugged up sitting inside the shack Brian built in the winter of 1983. The fire’s roaring and the smokes going right up the chimney.
We arrived here yesterday morning at approx. 11am, driving from Armidale, where we had stayed overnight. After a walk to the dam (heaps of kangaroo and wild pig tracks) and along the shortest side of the property Brian began to clean out the shack (which still contained gear he had left here 4 years ago) and I put up the 3 man tent.
We found a huge red back spider with 3 large white eggs under the car seat which were immediately stomped on!!
We set off for Coonabarabran (15km from track turn off) where we had a huge steak and vegies at the Imperial Hotel at 2pm and then we rushed around for all the supplies we needed plus I had heaps of mail at the Post Office, much to my delight.
Back to Lot 9 Stannix Park Estate at 4pm we then rushed to organise our camp before dark which was not long after 6pm. It was freezing so we had a fire going outside the shack which we spent the evening sitting around watching the 12 volt B&W TV which runs on the car battery. To bed around 9pm we then spent the night partially freezing despite 3 blankets and huddling together.

Crawled out of the tent after sunrise and got Blue (our budgerigar) out of the car. He has just begun to say ‘G’day Mate’ quite frequently and it is recognisable. He seems to enjoy listening to all the birds.
There are lots of varieties of wildflowers which I hope to press when I get organised and have time to do it! Numerous bees are all around so I think I will organise a beehive in the future.
I spent the morning over breakfast and then organised the shack and all our belongings whilst Brian built a shelter next to the shack for our shower. I also chopped up the vegies etc for tonight’s dinner.
After lunch we set off for 'Coona' again to buy hot water bottles!!! fill our containers with water for drinking etc and buy things we had forgotten yesterday. We also went to the police station to find out about getting a gun licence – as we noticed large areas where wild pigs had been digging up roots etc. when we had walked around the property behind the dam.
Home again – the rush was on for wood and getting dinner organised. I hung out the clothes we had washed at the launderette whilst in town. Brian chopped wood for the evening’s fire which we made in the shack – much warmer!! Then we set up coals for the camp oven which provided us with a yummy meal! Vivian