Location: Manning Valley
Date: August 2011

August 30, 2011. The other day I took a trip out to Old Bar Beach at the mouth of the Manning River, about a 15 minute drive from Taree. I was hoping to get some pics of kite surfers. I'd seen them there before but on this occasion there were none. So as I stood there thinking what a waste of time my little trip was, I heard a noise behind me. It was a kookaburra that had landed in a tree. "Stay there, ya mongrel!" I ordered and rushed back to Bluey to get my camera. Surprisingly, the bird did as it was told and even allowed me to take several shots. Normally, kookas are a bit flighty. They can be gone in seconds. Then a woman pulled up in a car just below the tree, and the bird stayed. "He's probably after my chips," she said. So I figured the kooka was used to people, especially picnickers who might be tempted to share some of their fare. Anyway, I was pleased with the opportunity to get a bunch of close-ups of a kookaburra. It was worth the trip after all.

Then I drove back to the main beach area. There wasn't much happening, so I took a couple of generic pics. One was of the side of the surf club toilets. You've heard of a Kombi with a toilet. This is a toilet with a Kombi. Across the road is a large sports ground which is home to the annual Kombi Festival, at which an attempt is made each year to break the record for the most Kombis at the one place at the one time. The next one is due on October 1st. Click here for the photo album.

August 21, 2011. The weather's been a bit crook lately, raining like buggery. But today, the day of the Old Holdens Show & Shine at Cundletown, just north of Taree airport on the old Pacific Hwy, the clouds cleared for a while and the sun shone. I guess God must like old Holdens.

It was a small show... just the local club, most of whose members are rev heads. The majority of the cars were 1970s vintage (like my former old bus, Tough Titties) but there were also a couple of 1960s... an EH undergoing restoration and an HD X2. This was no place for Fords, but one came anyway... driven by the local coppers so nobody complained. "They're here to keep us in line," said one of the Holden drivers. "So who's keeping them in line?" I asked, and the bloke nodded in agreement. Cops are not all that popular with rev heads.

The old EH had notes written on replacement body panels, one of which was a fender. NFG it said, which means "no f---ing good".

Because of the rain earlier, I didn't arrive until after lunch by which time some of the exhibitors were leaving, so there wasn't a lot to photograph. Most of the Tough Titties lookalikes are 2-door Monaros. The black SS is a Holden Torana, based on the English Vauxhall. Toranas did pretty well on the racetrack in Oz.

As I left, I snuck in a few pics of the old Cundletown post office which opened for business in 1893. Click here for the photo album.