Vagabonding Field Report: Jervis Bay and Huskisson: grey nomads and toe licking possums.

Cost/day
Green Patch camp in Jervis bays Booderee National Park is cheap as Chips, there is nothing here that asks you to spend money, only the camping pitch which is around $30 to $40 a night. This is money well spent for a beautiful haven of wildlife, woodland and beaches. If you have yourself a supply of food, you won’t find yourself spending a cent more. Barbecue areas exist but may need a good hose down before cooking!

Huskisson however is a small fishing town with various Whale Watching and Dolphin tours around the area. Various restaurants and shops line the Main Street. So you might find yourself spending a little more enjoying the area.

Describe a typical day
Jervis Bay is not a roller coaster of excitement which is the beauty of the National Park. It is a calm, tranquil, secluded piece of New South Wales.

From our camper we cooked ourselves some bacon and eggs and sat at our camping table and submersed ourselves in our surroundings. Wallabies bumble about undisturbed by your presence. Various parrots and other colourful birds swoop around the green canvas of the trees that make up the woodlands. We entertained ourselves for a while before grabbing a towel and heading for the beach.

Jervis Bay has many walking trails around the different sections of the National Park. We wandered for a good hour taking in the fresh air and luscious greenery and calm before settling on the beach.

We were told that it was the whitest sand beach in the world (although I’m sure many other beaches may say the same) and it was certainly the whitest sand we had ever seen. It seemed so pure and clean, untouched by any other elements. The sand crunched under our feet, reminiscent of fresh snow fall under boots. The beach stretched across the cove from the rocky edges that held several fisherman to the merging edge of the woodlands. The beach was almost deserted and blissfully quiet. So we sat watching the waters lap the white sands, we let the sun beat down and read our books.

Later that day we had booked ourselves on a trip out into the waters with the promise of some Humpback Whale Watching, so we took our camper for a quick drive to Huskisson. A large speed boat waited for us and we climbed aboard and set off out to sea. The rough nature of the waters made for a great deal of fun on our search for sea life.

A very knowledgable tour guide talked us though the story of the bay – yet another discovery of Captain Cook. For a while it seemed we had paid for nothing more that a boat ride. Everyone’s eyes were peeled and eager to spot something but to no avail. The odd wave gave a little excitement of a possible whale spot here and there. Then after a long wait and from out of the blue a large juvenile male whale wanted to give us a show. For almost twenty minutes we watched from almost 50 feet away this beautiful creature diving from the waters and blowing water to our amazement. Many of the tourists clambered over each other for a good picture.

Before long the whale had grown tired and moved on as did we. We were on our way to a small rock that was home to a large family of seals which again we were excited to see. At about five minutes into our journey a small asian lady spotted some unexpected sea life, from each side was the fantastic sight of a pod of dolphins as they followed the boat at great speeds. They threw themselves from the water in synchronised acrobatics. We watched for a good ten minutes before another magnificent show was over. The trip was turning out to be more than we had expected!

To end the tour we approached the seal rock where we found many seals sunbathing, unaffected by us being there. We watched as they went about there buisness; it was great to observe them as they dived into the sea and swim happily. We listened to their playful calls and snapped many photos. Before long It was time to head back to shore.
br />

Back on land we had ourselves a fish and chips by the sea and bought some meat for our evening barbecue.

On our return to Jervis Bay,
we settled for the night and enjoyed a beautiful unblemished sunset. We sparked up a barbecue and enjoyed the company of an elderly Australian couple that had pitched next to us. After a long day we retired to bed.

What’s the strangest thing you’ve seen lately?

The local wildlife here has to be the tamest I have seen in Oz, or anywhere for that matter! The local parrots were very fond of our bananas and would gather in the trees around our camp. At any given opportunity they would swoop in numbers and attack our food bags. Watching a brightly coloured bird try and fly off with a banana is amusing in itself. However even after sundown there was no escaping the hungry undeterred wildlife. As I sat tucking into a burger I couldn’t help ponder what the sensation was around my toes. With a torch in hand I had a startling moment when I noticed a possum happily licking my big toe! To say I was quick to leap up from my chair was an understatement! Although as quick as I was to jump up, so were the surrounding gang of possums just as quick stealing a loose sausage from our plate and running off for a late night snack. They were just as cute and amusing as they were devious rascals so we had a good laugh with them.

Describe an interesting conversation you had:
We were very fortunate to have been pitched next to a lovely elderly couple Steve and Leslie. You couldn’t have found a happier pair of folks. We spoke for sometime about our travels, England and other general chit-chat.

What was interesting was they described themselves as the “Grey Nomads” part of a generation of retirees who, in their own words, wanted to “spend our children’s inheritance on ourselves”. They had quite simply sold their house, bought a camper and hit the road.

They had more knowledge than we could take in. They gave us great places to visit, taught us some great amusing Aussie lingo and they shared many stories and made us chuckle all night. The beauty of meeting this great couple was their firm idea of choosing not to live out retirement as a pensioner with nothing more to contribute to the world. They made sure every penny and every piece of hard work and graft in their nearly 70 years paid off. They made sure they had earned the right to be happy and enjoy their freedom.

This really opened my eyes to the Australian culture. On reflection it seems that the English culture seems to be that you work your entire life, grow old and die (not all English OAP’s live like this but a large percentage) and hitting retirement means you hang up your hat and become useless and boring.

The Grey Nomads of Australia are abundant and it seems to be the best years of many of their lives. Steve and Leslie were full of life, happy and above all seemed unburdened by getting old. I wish them many more happy years. A truly inspiring couple.

What do you like about where you are? Dislike?
It was peaceful, calm and full of amazing wildlife. Our trip to Huskisson was an amazing day out and shouldn’t be missed by any travellers to the area.
The only dislike is the lack of clean BBQ areas.

What new lesson did you learn?
That getting old is inevitable but life is to be enjoyed how ever many years you’ve seen. Steve and Leslie really opened my eyes to the idea that even in my golden years there shouldn’t be a reason I can’t still be living the life I’m leading now. Just be happy and enjoy the fact your still breathing.

Where next?
Phillip Island!!!

Follow me on Instagram: Evolvedsky