It was a hot windy day in Winton for grandson Ben’s 12th birthday. It was 30° and sunny with a hot dry wind.

It was an exited Ben that came over to the motorhome in the morning. He’d had a lovely time with his family opening presents in their van. We gave him our presents and he was excited to get a new basketball and I had been sneaky at Kronosaurus Corner in Richmond and bought him an hourglass that he’d admired in the gift shop. When he opened it he said ‘How did you get that without me seeing Gran?’

I cooked up a huge scrambled eggs and bacon on toast for everyone. Special treat for the birthday boy!

Rich was still in a lot of pain but moving a lot better and he was able to sit up in the chair and read his book.

We spent the morning relaxing, washing and folding and reading.

The Winton Wanderers Caravan Park is quite impressive. They have 80 sites, all drive through. The park is set out in a grid with each row having 10 sites. You drive in one way and drive out the other side. Each site is bordered on each side by garden beds with trees that will eventually provide shade. I don’t remember the park being here when we were last here in 2021 so I’m guessing it’s around 4-5 years old.

The park is set on 100 acres and is only 5 minutes from town. Just near reception are 5 brand new cabins under construction. I wonder if a swimming pool is in their future plans?

There are two amenities blocks with a laundry in each. Unfortunately the laundry in the one closest to us was out of action so Katie had to drive to the other one with her mountain of washing. I love my little 3.2kg Sphere washing machine in the motorhome. Although the loads are small when we are on a powered site with water hookup I can do many loads. With the wind the wet clothes were dry in not time at all. I even changed the sheets. Don’t you love clean sheets?

Ben wanted to go to the skatepark so leaving Pa to continue resting, Katie, myself and the three kids set off to explore Winton. We had a lot of fun taking silly photos at all the signs.

We visited the Musical Fence and the kids had fun making lots of noise. Maddie has really got rhythm! Just next to the Musical Fence is the site of the very first Qantas flight and there’s a sculpture to commemorate that historic moment.

We dropped Ben and Maddie off at the skate park while we had a wander along the Main Street and checked out the shops including the North Gregory Hotel, the Royal Theatre (one of the only open air theatres left in Australia), the tourist centre and other shops. We even found a Riley St! We picked Ben and Maddie up and they’d had a great time at the skate park and no limbs were broken.

Because it was Ben’s birthday we decided to all go out for dinner and, after all showering and getting dressed up, we went out for a birthday dinner at the North Gregory Hotel. We had a scrumptious dinner and the waitress even added some birthday candles to Ben’s fig and pecan pudding so we could sing happy birthday. I think Ben had a great day.