(written by Nancy

It rained hard overnight but the tent performed well – no leaking inside.  The tent siter did a better job last night so we both slept pretty good.  The rain had stopped by the time we woke up this morning but it was still overcast and relatively cool.  We packed up and ate breakfast in the camp kitchen – the usual oatmeal and coffee – and left before 9.

 We rode into Nelson Bay, about 13k, along Gan Gan Road, which was a nice quiet road off of the Pacific Hwy – through Tomaree National Park.  It started to rain a bit while we were in Nelson Bay but only a spit, for our friends in Oregon who might be worried.  We wandered a bit trying to find the ferry wharves but finally found the right place just in time to catch the 10am ferry from Nelson Bay across Port Stephens to Tea Gardens.  It was a pleasant hour ferry ride – not too choppy – and the sun worked its way out along the way. 

We stopped for morning tea/lunch in Tea Gardens – Dave got his bacon and egg roll fix at the Cornerstone Kitchen.  Not sure this was the pie shop that Ross pointed us to (thanks for the tip Ross!) but they did have a sign out front that said ‘The Best’ bacon and egg roll and it was very tasty.

From Tea Gardens we took Mungo Brush Road, which took us into Myall Lakes National Park.  It was a great road – relatively flat with very little traffic.  The road skirts the ocean and doesn’t really connect up with any other cities very easily so most of the traffic was sightseers.  We saw an echidna (sorry, no picture) and stopped at a couple of viewpoints.  We were stopped at The Hole in the Wall viewpoint and within about 5 minutes a Huntsman spider had made its way onto the top of my back panniers to hitch a ride.  Thankfully Dave saw it before we took off…

 The road crosses a small inlet at Bompah Point and a ferry operates to take cars across from 8-6pm.  We decided to call it a day (all that ferry riding and stopping for morning tea and lunch takes time…) and are camping at a campground right at the point.  It’s actually a resort of some sort but has some camping right down at the edge of the Bombah Broadwater lake.  We thought it might be pretty quiet but we have had several visits from a group of young girls camped a few sites away – they wanted to sell us some pieces of old firewood for $1.50 so they could get some money for lollies.  We told them unfortunately we couldn’t carry any more stuff on our bikes. 

It is dark now and there are tons of bats squeaking and other birds swooping around outside.  Good thing I know that there aren’t large mammals that can kill you in Australia (at least until we get to croc country) otherwise all these noises might make me just a bit nervous…  Actually, maybe it’s just the British tourists in the rented campervan a few sites down from us…

Tomorrow we continue along this road (now called Bombah Point Road) for about 15k until it meets back up with Pacific Highway.  A portion of it is unsealed – hopefully will not be too rough on the bikes.  The plan then is to take the scenic Lakes Way, which goes through some national parks and is supposed to be very pretty.  There are several campgrounds along the way – let’s hope they will not all be full for the school holidays!