Sister Maggie has come to meet the babies, travelling from the US. A good excuse for us all to have a few days at the beach! This is also the dress rehearsal for our drive with the babies down to Steve’s family for Christmas.
We pack the car: twenty baby suits for the two of them for three days, 160 disposable nappies in two packets, sheets for them (the cottage is supplying portable cots), sheets for us, a sheepskin rug, baby pouches, a baby rocker and some food. We‘re not bringing the double pram, port-a-cot, or anything for a bath, but our stationwagon car is packed full. I squeeze in the back seat between the two baby seats and make myself as comfortable as I can for the two hour journey.
Lara and Rhea both soon nod off and I try to change my position to avoid getting cramps. Next time I’ll put a jumper behind my back, I think. This is not going to be very relaxing when the journey is three times as long at Christmas.
We arrive at the beach at around 5pm without needing to stop. The babies are only little, turning three months at the coast, and need to be fed every three hours or so, but we make it all the way without their crying for a feed. I feed them when we arrive, making an interval of four and a half hours! We can hear the waves crashing on the beach opposite, and the tall, mottled, chalky white spotted gums of the National Park have their usual restful effect. We eat the hearty lamb shanks Steve made at home, give the babies two more feeds and sleep with them in our room.
Over the next few days we take the babies for walks along the beach. It’s almost deserted, a perfect eighteen degrees, and the water sparkles invitingly. After a winter of rarely venturing outside the house, the glare of the sun is overwhelming for them: they squint and soon fall asleep. We protect them from the sun with a sarong and towel over our own hats. Next time I think, I’ll bring an umbrella.
The following day and the day after, I swim twice while Maggie and Steve look after the babies back at the cottage. The water is numbing at first, but then just as sparkling as it looks. I watch the white foam sizzle around me.
We eat fish and chips on the veranda while shooing away the neighbouring kangaroos and rosellas who have obviously both developed a taste for human food. One of the kangaroos has a tiny joey.
Our days are crammed with good food: mum’s mushroom lasagne, my cauliflower soup and the local home-made beef followed by apple and raspberry pies with yoghurt that I so look forward to when we head down to the coast.
Next time I won’t have the babies sleep in our room. We move them the second night, after they have woken me with their grunting and snuffling. They wake in the night a bit earlier than usual – 4am and 4.30 instead of 5am – and it’s a bit harder not having the familiarity of home, where I feed them in their room for that early morning feed and we have a bassinet for them to sleep in during the day. But it’s refreshing to get away and I appreciate home all the more on our return. And this coast is a special, relaxing, unspoilt and beautiful part of the world that I’m glad the babies have experienced so young.
I hope there will be many more trips.
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