Travel – Being a tourist in our own backyard.

Travel is one of the things we love to do but sometimes like everyone we forget to look close to home. For many years we have seen highlights of the Jumpers and Jazz Festival in Warwick, a town about 90 mins travel from our place. Every year we say ” we should go to that”. Well this year we did and had a fantastic time.

What is Jumpers and Jazz?  The festival was initially created as a positive community response to a major CBD streetscaping project of Warwick by the local council. It was a fun way to bring in tourists and increase particapation in the arts. Now lots of groups create some beautiful trees in the main street.

As well as all the amazing trees, they have lots of Jazz performers up and down the street. On the weekends there are a couple of stages set up with performances most of the day.

Everyone can join in the fun with a full programme including many classes where you can try all sorts of craft. One of the many activities available was the heritage train rides. Ron has always loved trains especially the old ones so this was a must do on our travel list. The only one with tickets available was on the Friday night. We started with drinks and nibbles on the station platform and watched as the train arrived at the station. Once on board we settled in for a ride to Hendon and back, about 90 mins. While enjoying the ride we were entertained by a couple of singers playing some great music. We also had one of the volunteers telling us all the highlights and about the trains history.

Road Trip – do you love them or not?

When you go on a road trip are you a planner or do you just go and see when you finish?

When we set off on a road trip we like to have a bit of an idea where we are headed and when we want to arrive but we don’t like too much planning.

Over the years we have explored much of Australia by car. As we travel from Brisbane to Sydney several time a year we like to explore different routes. There is the main highway which is the more direct and of course the quickest. Once you have driven it a few times it becomes a bit boring. As they have improved to road over the years and by passed many of the smaller towns there are not many places to stop and have a coffee or just a walk round.

So more often than not we start off on the main highway and take many of the different tourist routes along the way. This way we see many of the smaller places and also find some very interesting a diverse places to have a coffee or lunch. We also find many different places to stay overnight.

Sometimes we take a completely different highway and travel further. I think over the years we have driven on every road between Brisbane and Sydney.

Last time we were heading off my sister asked where we were staying the night. My answer was, not sure. She then asked how long we would drive before we stopped again my answer was, not sure. As a person who likes to plan every detail she couldn’t understand our carefree attitude.

Over the years we have taken many road trips. We have rarely booked any accommodation in advance and we have never had a problem. We have stayed in some very interesting places. Some we have gone back to many time and some were a once only!