Olsen's Adventures

  • Home
  • Olsen's Adventures

Olsen's Adventures A family of 4, keen for anything adventurous taking a break from the mundane 9-5.

So here we are, finally got the car back on the road proper job after engine failed.What a whirlwind couple of months! ...
15/11/2024

So here we are, finally got the car back on the road proper job after engine failed.
What a whirlwind couple of months!
It’s been absolutely hectic stressful. To say trip over is heart breaking.
To arrive here after spending 6 months planning, packing and preparing. Leaving the comfort and peace of my beautiful beach house, uprooting my little family in the hopes of an epic adventure to now be without a house (for a bit), my sentimental belongings scattered all over the place and having to worry about many things that me and my family really shouldn’t have to worry about. I’ve put my fitness and career goals on the back burner, the whole family suffering from numerous illnesses, multiple breakdowns, mechanical issues from not just one car, but the ones we’ve been lucky enough to borrow has had us all on a knife’s edge.
One day I will find out who that bloody Murphy is (aka murphies law) or whoever has negatively manifested this s**t storm.
I’ve failed my family. I’ve uprooted our lovely routine and home to reconnect and get away from the unrelenting work load from home life and the business and the full time job (not to mention the unpaid ones too) for a well deserved time out that ended up turning into triple or quadruple the workload. I’ve got no idea what condition our house or garden will be in when we get it back.
I hope that reconnecting with friends and community after basically being cortisol zombies wont take as long as it took to settle in the first time round.
The worst part is I took the kids away from their friends and settled routine in the hopes of greater learning but instead having to go back on promises of adventure. They copped so much of my burnt out stress that they didn’t deserve. Having to tip toe around a house that isn’t theirs and being confused as to why they aren’t delighted in when they come downstairs at 5am in the morning. I have a lot to answer for and perhaps I should just do what everyone else seems to do and get stuck in the comfort rut till such time as retirement or there are no more jobs to be done.
I failed.
It’ll be back to short trips away in between school and spending more time packing, unpacking and traveling than actually enjoying our destination. The next stop is Weipa for some work and hopefully a couple of weeks of whatthef**kwas thatwejustwentthrough!
Then it’ll be the next foreseeable future of trying to restore my house, my garden, my routine, my fitness and trying to locate where all my belongings ended up in my mad panic for adventure. All while raising a couple of littlies and running an electrical business. Wish me luck! Or just send lots of wine, either way… 🤣

Update time! So we’ve been very quiet the last month. We had a number of curve balls, lemons, whatever you want to call ...
18/10/2024

Update time!
So we’ve been very quiet the last month. We had a number of curve balls, lemons, whatever you want to call them, hurled our way.
About a month ago we were on our way to take Axel to a steam train event when we ended up stuck on the side of the road, broken down. The big blue beast got carried home on a tow truck.

We were literally 3 days away from collecting our new adventure/tradie trailer and find out the engine was cactus. We had a good few weeks of “what now” and how do we move forward.

We had planned our work and travel for the next month, with parts ordered for several clients and no vehicle to get there! Our evacool fridge decided to s**t itself for the 100th time, (lovingly nicknamed evafail), waiting on insurance to come through, juggling 2 kids with borrowed cars and hustling like our life depends on it (which it kinda does).

We also ran into some unexpected issues (and potential costs) with our house being rented that made me question renting it out in the first place.

Yesterday we finally had confirmation of new engine ordered (repair was not viable due to cost).
Repairs are underway and we should be back on the road in a few weeks. A very nerve wrecking couple of weeks to say the least!

On the upside, as my husband says, when you get lemons, make lemonade! So we did! We made a few running/biking events that we wouldn’t have made normally. Kids got to play with their friends, we celebrated Astrid’s 2nd birthday. We got Axel organized for big boy school next year. And thankfully consistent work to keep us rolling along. We were extremely lucky and have a roof over our heads with Brads Mum and cars to get around where we needed it. Turns out car hire in a rural area is prohibitively expensive. A work Ute for a week up here costs $1200 to hire.

We’ve had some changes in our plan, a huge dent put in our trip funds means we may need to do smaller bite sized trips of Oz. With only a couple of month before Axels first year of school, needing storage space for our electrical gear and family commitments has made a longer haul near impossible for us this year.

Onwards and upwards…

Just thought it put an update up. House is rented and taken care of now for a few months. We’ve been here, there and eve...
11/09/2024

Just thought it put an update up.
House is rented and taken care of now for a few months.

We’ve been here, there and everywhere for a couple of weeks while we wait for our new tradie trailer to get built.
Hopefully another couple of weeks and we can fit it out. Turns out the trailer we had was not quite big enough to fit tooling and camping gear 🤣 what a change from prekid just Ute and rooftop tent!

To help fund this, Brads doing a slog of work back at home for a few weeks.
He’s also completed the last component of his off grid solar qualifications.
He now has more feathers in his hat that he knows what to do with!
I’ve been busy keeping the kids quiet, entertained and out of the way. We’ve been ever so thankful we’ve got a tin roof over our heads with friends and family but it has been challenging with young kids and homes that aren’t theirs to run a muck (and make messes) in. We’ve made do with lots of car naps while I get a breather (or face a late nap at 5pm and kids in party mode to 11pm 😅). The local playgrounds(where available) and beaches have been a savior.
We’ve all also battled through several weeks of coughs and colds to boot!

Since we’re literally just winging it, our plans constantly evolve and change.
Our next plan is to do some work at a friends property up at cape York as soon as we can get the trailer and parts organized. From there, depending on finances we’ll either head to central Queensland for more electrical work or stay local while we fulfill some family commitments.

After that it’ll near Christmas and it’ll be fairly hot and wet season will be upon us so we may head south or again, if work opportunities present themselves we stay local. By then we’ll have to keep an eye on how our tenants are going with their 6 month lease and review from there.

Regardless, we’ve achieved a much needed mental reset. Somewhat stressful at times as we now wait for invoices to be paid rather than a “regular” income, but we’re having an adventure doing so!

In the meantime, I’m still managing to keep fit and healthy with local hikes, walking and the occasional running event where I can get a babysitter. On that, don’t take your “village” for granted ❤️

Our last bush camp last night before we headed back for work. Kids loved playing in the creek. Burdekin river is always ...
17/08/2024

Our last bush camp last night before we headed back for work. Kids loved playing in the creek.
Burdekin river is always a good free camp with plenty of space, just need to be able to drive on really soft sand 😁

We are back in phone reception after a couple of days of bush camping. Kids loved the freedom of being able to dig, run,...
17/08/2024

We are back in phone reception after a couple of days of bush camping.
Kids loved the freedom of being able to dig, run, play with no other campers in sight.
Was a challenge keeping them semi clean with limited water. Lucky we have an excess of clothes!
Did a fair bit of speccing (looking for shiny rocks) and found 1 small sapphire and some fossils.
These photos are from tomahawk creek fossicking grounds.

Had the best stay with friends near Springsure, the kids had an absolute ball
15/08/2024

Had the best stay with friends near Springsure, the kids had an absolute ball

Today the rain came in. We have had a s**t of a couple of days, all of us with some form of cold, raining and cold. The ...
11/08/2024

Today the rain came in.
We have had a s**t of a couple of days, all of us with some form of cold, raining and cold. The kids have been stir crazy but we’ve kept them entertained with movies (a heaven send with the rain) for a limited time mind you...
The caravan park here has no dryer, so a bit of an issue with the wet. Lucky Rubyvale has a laundromat. But again, only 1 dryer…
There’s no fires here except for a communal fireplace, and before the rain it was all a bit hard with the owners. It’s going lovely now!
There’s a pretty good playground 10 minutes down the road. And kept the kids busy while the laundry went.

We learnt this trip to pack a big tarp (even though it normally doesn’t rain here!)
Less toys. They just end up all over the tent floor.
More wine.

The most challenging parts have been eating out. Eating at camp hasn’t been an issue with our current routine.

Some pictures from the sapphire gemfields. Times are scary at the moment, I’ve only seen one other “young” family so far...
09/08/2024

Some pictures from the sapphire gemfields.
Times are scary at the moment, I’ve only seen one other “young” family so far in the caravan park we are staying at.
Gemfest this year is still picking back up from Covid times, and can I say that we would have been better off having a meal at the pub than the market food. I do understand, food price goes up so the vendor price goes up, but it’s not a surprise that people aren’t generally spending their money…

Let me say it’s been quite awkward with littlies, they cry, whinge, one still in nappies, the other still learning to clean himself. Very noisy, wake early and generally don’t sit still. I feel very judged at times, other times the older ones are reminiscent of their own families long grown up.

Overall we are finding our feet, early dinners, take turns with toilet trips, kids have a bath before we do and utilizing the camp kitchen where we can (which conveniently has a tv to distract kids while we cook). Our biggest challenge has been to stay calm when the kids are having big emotions and teaching them boundaries.

Still better than sitting at home!

(I also added an old photo of me holding a priceless sapphire from the last gemfest pre kids. That stone now stays locked safely in a cabinet for visitors to see)

Never a dull moment, here’s bush mechanic Brad taking the tyre off the bead so he can replace the stem valve. Has been r...
05/08/2024

Never a dull moment, here’s bush mechanic Brad taking the tyre off the bead so he can replace the stem valve. Has been re inflated and is holding well.

Kids are tuckered out for the evening. Even after years of small trips away, I still struggle with the afternoon/evening...
04/08/2024

Kids are tuckered out for the evening.
Even after years of small trips away, I still struggle with the afternoon/evening witching hour. From about 5pm to sometimes past 8pm depending on travel times is a total disaster. Whinging, crying, fighting children. I’ve been progressively cooking dinner earlier and earlier but doesn’t seem to help. Then the showers (usually at caravan park communal ones) is a constant of don’t touch this, don’t do that, don’t go under the door, don’t lick the walls!

What’s worked for everyone else?

Feeding the animals…
04/08/2024

Feeding the animals…

Camp set up for the week! Thought I’d take a pic before the kids destroy the tidy… 😅
04/08/2024

Camp set up for the week!
Thought I’d take a pic before the kids destroy the tidy… 😅

The last time we drove this road, our eldest boy Axel (now 4) was still in my tummy. We also had an old (1988) 75 series...
04/08/2024

The last time we drove this road, our eldest boy Axel (now 4) was still in my tummy. We also had an old (1988) 75 series hj75 single cab cruiser. Leaf springs 😅
The car we now have that Brad painstakingly rebuilt from a $1k wreck was on a trailer towed behind said cruiser.
A bit of a trip down memory lane…

Off we now head to sapphire gemfields for the local Gemfest festival.

First day of phase one Oz adventure. Had one flat tyre between Townsville and charters I think thanks to one climbing bo...
03/08/2024

First day of phase one Oz adventure. Had one flat tyre between Townsville and charters I think thanks to one climbing boy… was a cold night at Belyando crossing!

Address


Website

Alerts

Be the first to know and let us send you an email when Olsen's Adventures posts news and promotions. Your email address will not be used for any other purpose, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Contact The Business

Send a message to Olsen's Adventures:

Videos

Shortcuts

  • Address
  • Alerts
  • Contact The Business
  • Videos
  • Claim ownership or report listing

  • Want your business to be the top-listed Media Company?

Share