Today was fun… Everyone surfaced at about 9AM today, and we decided to all go to swimming after breakfast ‘before it got too hot’. Since there was my friend from Pacific Power and her family, and one of her friends from school and his family, what sounded like a quick task turned into a major undertaking, particularly since the kids were aged 6, 4, 3 and 9 months. We eventually got to the beach at about 12:00. This is after looking for ice for the esky containing just water for everyone.

The third shop we went to had ice… This was actually the fishing co-op, and when they found out we were ‘locals’ then we were only charged $3 to fill up the esky. I think that is great value. We endued up at Norah’s Head on the central coast, just near toukley, and found a couple of parking spots just near the boat ramp. This was just amazing – and perfect. Getting to the beach we set up a small tent for shade, and ventured into the water.

The sand on the top of the beach was fine, but the sand under the water was really course. Whilst setting up the tent I made the mistake of walking on the dry sand without shoes as the sand was really hot. Getting into the water was a pain since there was seaweed blocking the shallows. Getting past this was simple, and pretty soon it was moving south of where we were anyway. As the beach is in a bay there were no breaking waves, just swells coming into the beach. This meant that swimming was not as much fun as surf beaches but it was fun none the less.

I ended up swimming for probably an hour, which we all decided was enough. So we packed up and found a club on the lake just north of The Entrance to have lunch. This was a great place to relax in air conditioned comfort. There was actually a great view to the south to the Gosford area where we could see the smoke building up. Then after a couple of hours we headed back to the house where we heard the F3 was closed.

Nothing more could be done than to check the RTA www site and then go into the pool monitoring things until the F3 re-opened. Which I guess was an hour later. All in all it was a fun time. I will have to go swimming more often – both in the pool and in the ocean. I forgot how much I loved it.