hawks nest

With so much happening last term and the year speeding up, we were keen desperate for a few days away these holidays. Time away is such a cure all for the stress and sameness of the everyday for me.

So last week we headed off to stay in Hawks Nest, a coastal town a few hours north of Sydney we've never visited. Its a beautiful part of the world, like so much of the Australian coast. We really loved it and will definitely go back some time.

My highlight was seeing whales up close for the first time! We saw humpback whales off the beach twice! I've only ever seen them before as puffs of mist on the horizon, so it was a rare treat. The first time we turned into a coastal lookout in the National Park and suddenly there they were, flashes of white and black a few hundred metres out to sea. As the afternoon sun got lower they came in close and breached a couple of times, just shot up head first with fins waving.

Just before this Mr Flowerpress had narrowly missed standing on a common death adder, that scary looking snake above, it even hissed at him! So our next encounter with nature was a great distraction!

We felt really spoilt then when we turned up for our morning swim the next day and one was swimming at our beach with us. This time I actually got a photo of the whale's back as he made his way across the bay.

Another beautiful spot was Dark Point with sand dunes which stretch for hundreds of metres. Here's a pic of me and my beautiful boys imagining we are stranded in the Sahara! We had fun running up and sliding down all this beautiful soft sand.

The next afternoon we got out of the rain at Bingo at the Golf Club. I had to talk the family into it at first but once we got our Bingo Dabbers and sheets, and J won the first round they were hooked! We'll definitely be going again some time.

Add to that some long walks, fish and chips, local Chinese, a couple of op shops and some board game action and it was the perfect break. We are feeling recharged and (almost) ready for the busy times ahead.

I hope you all got some relaxing times, or have some planned for this long weekend. Are you a road tripper? Do you know any great places we should try? Preferably with whales and bingo, and no snakes!