BUSY FORTNIGHT

Sorry about the late posting again but it has been a very busy fortnight and we had another trip to Sydney for the dentist which always puts us back. Only one more to go - We hope!!!

The week of 30th November and it started out as usual and then got busier towards the end of the week. We had to get a lot of our work done in four days as we needed to drive back to Sydney on Friday and head back on Saturday so that we could catch up on normal stuff that we do on the weekend.

Monday Maree went out training on the mail run and took lots of notes which we compiled into a run sheet for when we do it on our own.

Mostly normal happenings on Tuesday and Wednesday on the bus run but as we are getting closer to Christmas the amount of mail moving through the post office is increasing dramatically.

After we finish the bus run we head down to the post office to give my sister a hand with the sorting and stuff that is done in a post office.

On Tuesdays and Thursdays we do the sorting for the mail run that we will be doing which is all part of the training process and helps us to keep the names of the properties and road names at the front of mind.

Doing a country mail run is different from doing a normal mail run as the properties maybe metres apart or kilometres apart so it is important to get the drops right first time as we found out when we did the run on our own during the following week. More about that later!!!

Thursday and Maree did one of the charter jobs that we won for the high school and took about 12 kids up to one of the old mine sites, where they had a learning session. After catching some "zzz's" while she was waiting for them she picked them up and returned them to school. 

Which brings us to Friday and trip back to Sydney. We stayed at the grandkids place for the night and as it was Maree's birthday on that day and Jacqueline's the day before Tiffany took us all out for dinner at Sizzlers and we had a lovely time at dinner and afterwards.

Saturday and prior to going to the dentist we needed to do some Christmas shopping and other things that needed doing.

We bought a whole heap of decorations, amongst other shopping, so that we could decorate out the bus to add a bit of Christmas spirit to the journey each day for the kids. More about that shortly.

Went to the dentist and fuelled up and then straight back home to Barraba as we had a lot to do still at home. Planned to do the trip in one leap but as it turned out we were tired so we stayed overnight at Muswellbrook and headed off early on Sunday.

Another top at Tamworth to pick up some other requirements and then back to Barraba.

We arrived home at about 12:00 noon and then picked up the bus from the relief driver and around to my nieces place for the weekly wash.

We spent the afternoon cleaning out the bus and decorating the inside of it

On Monday 6th December and as each school kid boarded the bus they were into the spirit straight away and were very excited especially our disabled 12 year old who really showed excitement and was mesmerised for the whole trip to school.

When we picked her up in the afternoon she was so excited sitting in her wheel chair and waving frantically at us as we pulled up.

She is normally a very placid kid during the trip and to see her so excited made the effort of decorating the bus so very worthwhile.
We stuck a couple of additional decorations in the bus today so that she gets the same kick along tomorrow morning and start the week of on a high for all of us.

The excitement from the all of the kids made it worthwhile as some of them were skiteing with other kids in the afternoon that they had the best bus service.

On the afternoon run back up the mountain we gave all of the kids a small present which excited them more so and for the whole week they have been talking about the decorations and the presents.
It was a good day.

I have included below a couple of photos of the colourful birds that we see every day up here. The one on the left is a pet that my brother-in-law has on his property and the other is a wild one that lands on his arm and is fed by him.

When he has had enough he flys away and turns up at next day for a feed again. It's absolutely amazing to watch.








Back to this week. Monday and Maree went out on the mail run for her final training run prior to doing the run solo on Wednesday. Tuesday was not too bad as we did the bus run and sorted the run for Wednesday and normal domestic duties around the van.

Wednesday was a disaster for us as we did the run solo and made a couple of crucial mistakes that cost us a lot of time. The road was a mess also which slowed us down and the volume of mail had increased so that we had to do more drops than usual.

We missed a couple of drops and had to back track to deliver them and back tracking on a rural mail run means that when you go back over the run you may have a turn around of 7 or 8kms or more which of course takes time.

Long and short of it was that a normal run takes about 6 hours took us about 8 hours but we did the right thing and delivered all of the mail. The post mistress was not happy.

We learnt a lot from that day. Thursday was a busy day as Maree did a charter trip to Tamworth with the school and spent the whole day doing that and the afternoon bus run whilst I did the mail sort and assisted my sister in the post office for the day.

Friday was busy for the both of us as I did the bus run and Maree did the mail and all the time the mail keeps building as Christmas closes in.

Friday night and the watering hole was a welcome respite despite the fact that they rigged the raffles and did not let us win a prize this week.

Saturday night and the local watering hole had their bowling presentations so they have a party with entertainment which we were invited to attend.

We decided to attend and we had a fabulous night as the band was a two piece male and female couple with our type of music. As luck had it we were put on a table with 3 other couples who were older than we were but extremely active on the dance floor to the extent that we could not keep up with them.

It was a great night and what started as a quiet Saturday night turned into a 1:00am get to bed night completely worn out.

Walking back from the watering hole at that time of the morning is not usually an issue particularly in December but tonight it was our luck that a fog was moving in and it was difficult to see past your nose.

Well probably a bit further than the nose. We thought that it might turn out a pretty thick one in the morning but don't know what happened as we slept through it being burnt off.

As the mail has been building there was an additional drop of mail scheduled for Sunday morning so it was all hands on deck at 9:00am whether you were hung over or not!!!! - We were -  but soon sweated that out of us in the sorting room.

There was no sign of the fog so we both thought that we may have dreamt it - but I know I saw something foggy!! 

A couple of hours or so sorting and it was off to wash the bus and then back home for a quick sausage sizzle and read the papers, a nanny nap and clean the inside of the bus and the windows, washing and ironing and it is now 8:00pm and we are scratching our heads where the last week has gone.

I took a stack of photos on my phone of the night before and when I tried to download them I could not find them so I will keep looking for them and post them when I find them.

For those interested and for those who want to make sure that they are not at home when we arrive, here is our holiday itinerary.

From	To	Date	Date To	NIGHTS
TAMWORTH	BATHURST	27/12/10	27/12/10	1
BATHURST	CANBERRA	28/12/10	31/12/10	4
CANBERRA	ALBURY	1/01/11	2/01/11	2
ALBURY	KANGAROO GROUND	3/01/11	7/01/11	5
KANGAROO GROUND	LAKE CHARM	8/01/11	9/01/11	2
LAKE CHARM	BALRANALD	10/01/11	14/01/11	5
BALRANALD	NARRANDERA	15/01/11	15/01/11	1
NARRANDERA	GOULBURN	16/01/11	16/01/11	1
GOULBURN	NOWRA	17/01/11	18/01/11	2
NOWRA	SYDNEY	19/01/11	24/01/11	6
SYDNEY	CENTRAL COAST	25/01/11	26/01/11	2
CENTRAL COAST	BARRABA	27/01/11	27/01/11	1
			TOTALS	32

SEE YA SOON



BILL AND MAREE