Camping on Christmas Eve

One thing that we kept hearing over and over is that as expats, it's a good idea to have a "plan" for Christmas if you're not going home. That way, you won't be sitting around feeling sorry for yourself and/or missing your family. So our plan was to camp along the Great Ocean Road for a few days, and that's exactly what we did.

We rented (hired) a car, threw our surfboards on top, packed our camping gear and lots of food, and headed out on Saturday morning. Zack hadn't been very far down the GOR, so it was fun to drive on the curvy roads and see the beautiful beaches and scenery with him. At one point, we even saw a big turtle doing some flips out in the water.

We checked out a few of the free campgrounds along the way, and we finally settled on Johanna Beach, mostly because it was right next to the beach, and it was gorgeous. We picked a little campsite in a corner, set up our things, and headed to the beach. We had beautiful, sunny weather on both Saturday and Sunday (Christmas Eve). It rained in the middle of the night, but that just made for better sleeping! Zack tried some surfing, but the rips were strong and the waves were too big for us beginners. So we stuck to boogie boarding and playing on the beach. This next shot gives you an idea of how deserted (and beautiful) the beach was. Zack is running along the water with the soccer ball.

Here is a picture of our Christmas Eve dinner. We had some Frito pies. Zack calls them pepperbellies. Basically it's chili on top of corn chips with cheese on top. Since they don't sell Fritos here or anything that resembles corn chips, we used corn tortilla chips. It worked. With some wine, it made for a pretty decent meal. There were plenty of Tim Tams and other chocolate treats for dessert. 

After dinner, we watched the sunset and each opened one gift. With a view like the one seen below after a day spent on the beach in the summer sun, Christmas Eve wasn't too shabby!

Tomorrow morning we're headed to Tasmania for the Falls Fest, a music festival. So I'll have to catch up on more Christmas camping posts and Taz posts when we get back. I guess this is my last one for 2011; I hope you keep reading in 2012!