At Death's Door

Well I knew it was bound to happen sometime on our trip and so I suppose sooner rather than later is better – how to spell the word diarrhoea!

We moved south to meet up with Johann and Ian at a place called Pearl Beach for a party and for Johann to reunite us with all the things we had left in Sydney – bras, knickers, hats etc. Pearl Beach is a posh little holiday-home place with nothing so infra dig as a campsite, so we set up house on Patonga Beach a few miles away. Unfortunately it was fully booked for the weekend so we could only stay for the Thursday night then had to move on. Luckily people we knew from Sydney owned one of the holiday houses near to where the party was to take place and we were given camping rights for the duration.

Pearl Beach reminds me of some of the Cornwall villages Sandra and I visited in November – whilst physically very different, the bottom line was money – you had to have it to buy into the place. Consequently, of the 500 or so houses built into the heavily wooded landscape, only about one third of them were permanently occupied.

Unfortunately we never got to the party. I had been feeling unwell for a couple of days with a cough I couldn’t get rid of, a feeling of utter exhaustion and a queasy stomach resulting in not eating any food for a few days. As the cough got down into my lungs I knew it was a chest infection – and, judging by the colourful gunge I was dredging up, it was serious. Probably pneumonia and possibly terminal! Sandra in the meantime also had a queasy stomach and was confined to trips no more than two minutes from the nearest loo. It was in this sorry state we had to refuse to take up our invitation to the party.
We have decided to stay here for a few days, with easy access to the loo, until we are both 100% fit. It’s a hard life being a grey nomad!














Top photo - Patonga Beach
Next - Pub at Patonga Beach
Next - Holiday Home where we camped in the garden
Next - Pearl Beach