Aussie Roadtrip: Jervis Bay and Australia's smallest territory

After stopping off for coffees at Café Llewellyn, which had been taken over and renamed Drift, we left Newcastle. Phone kerfuffle’s have followed us since we left Melbourne and today reached an all time high. For a large part of the trip we have had 4 phones and 2 sims, with my sim fitting in the two worst phones. My iPhone, having survived the world, began to only function after a burst in the fridge. Occasionally holding it in front of the car air conditioner would help. After many complicated swapping of SIMs and incompatibility problems all up the east coast, a frustrated person (okay it was me) may have put a SIM card in a micro SD slot. That is, jammed it in the slot where it doesn’t belong. This meant a rather longer than intended stop in a Wollongong shopping centre for repairs. To further the pain of the day, I bent my earring whilst removing a SIM card from the iPhone and later accidentally threw both SIM card and earrings into a bin at a lighthouse stop. DOLPHIN SANDS ROAD!!!

In my defence, I had rather a tumultuous morning of illness that involved Rob driving frantically in circles looking for a bathroom. I then had to break up a friendly gang of bikies to get to the toilet. 

In good news, I recovered my plastic pocket containing earring and SIM card from the bin before we left the Kiama Blowhole. (Unfortunately I think the bus driver parked next to the bin probably thinks I am a drug runner.) I also began to feel better late afternoon. 

Should you be interested, the Kiama Blowhole is an interesting site to visit (best done at high tide if you can manage it, although it still makes impressive sounds at low tide) that was first documented by Europeans in the late 18^th century.  It’s called a blowhole because it does a pretty neat impression of a whale when conditions are right.  The site is even topped with a chronologically impaired lighthouse.

Kiama Blowhole

Kiama Lighthouse (celebrating 100 years of the ANZAC)

Despite our best efforts, we made it to the Jervis Bay Caravan Park, which was a lovely spot almost at the mouth of Currambene Creek. Features include a solar heated spa, a pool with a slippery slide large enough for big kids (these two included), boatramp, jacarandas, bottle brushes, ducks, Charlie the dancing corella, king parrots, and a close and terrifyingly loud possum and away from any built up towns.  A highly rateable place to camp or stay although we would like to pose an open question to Australia; when, how and why did it become ‘normal’ to turn caravans into permanent fixtures with decks and other attachments?

TENT PHOTO!

Charlie the Corella

A day to explore Jervis Bay (while being observed by a Royal Australian Navy helicopter) introduced us to many marvels of the area.  Those marvels being beautiful white sands, clear turquoise waters, talkative black cockatoos, occasional cyclonic winds, flying sticks, leaping dry leaves and tremendous heat.  

Black cockatoo

Staying cool on a roasting hot day

Unfortunately the latter elements combined to create that horrifying element of the Australian landscape; an out of control bushfire we could see burning on the far side of the bay near the cleverly named Point Perpendicular.  At one point the only clear landmark to be made out through the smoke was the lighthouse standing tall atop the rocks.  Since leaving Jervis we found out that a live mortar fire exercise from the ADF Beecroft Weapons Range (where a friend may or may not have been training) went on at the time of the fire causing much speculation. Firefighters contained the blaze just 700 metres from homes in nearby Currarong.

Beautiful Jervis Bay waters near Huskisson

Jervis Bay with the bushfire plume in the distance

Lighthouse through the bushfire haze (and you can see why it is called Point Perpendicular)

It was scorching on Huskisson Beach mid-morning. We interchanged 10 minutes reading with 5 minutes swimming and kept up the routine until the sun got far too hot. Taking refuge at café in town for some postcard writing, we enjoyed some cool drinks and avoided the most harmful rays of the day. By the time we had taken a short wander around town, driven towards Hyam’s Beach and lunched at a nearby picnic table, the afternoon sun was not as severe. Chinaman’s Beach (name unexplained on the net) was beautiful but the wind/sand combination pierced our skin and we relocated to our intended destination, the somewhat more sheltered Hyam’s Beach. The shores reputedly have some of the whitest sand in the world. Needless to say we resumed our swim/reading routine from the morning, this time with a tennis ball to keep us distracted from the now increasingly cool waters.

Hyam's Beach

Rob goes exploring (bushfire smoke on the right) - Chinaman's Beach

Rob sitting amongst the rocks - Chinaman's Beach

Sunrise from our campsite

Ducks at sunrise

Jervis Bay is certainly a lovely area and before I knew more about the history of our country I could speculate as to why the ACT snatched part of it up. Turns out that part of Jervis Bay was surrendered by NSW in 1915 to provide Canberra with a seaport. I originally thought the whole area was part of the ACT, but in fact the Jervis Bay Territory owned by the Commonwealth included the southern settlements of Greenpatch, Hyams Beach and Bowen Island. The northern part of the bay is part of NSW. Therefore we were actually hopping between NSW and ACT for the day. Nice to know!