For the past couple of years, we have headed south just prior to Christmas to the Big 4 Caravan Park at Kiama. Initially we made the trip ourselves but in 2011, we invited several other friends from the Winnebago RV Club to join us. At the conclusion of our 2011 gathering, we all agreed that we would reconvene in December 2012 but possibly at a different location.
One of our friends who live in the Illawarra area suggested we try the council caravan park at Bulli Beach. We know little about the area and after learning that we could stay for seven nights for the cost of six and as “seniors”, we would also benefit from a further discount, we made a booking for five sites. The advertised cost per night was $31.00 which makes the weekly tariff $217, it cost us $144 for the week. When comparing this to the cost of Kiama ($252 for a week), Bulli became very attractive.
For us it would also be another challenge with having to descend with the caravan in tow into the Illawarra Basin from the adjacent escarpment. We decide to make our decent at Stanwell Park rather than what we believed would be a steeper decent at Bulli Pass or the much longer option of Mt Ousley.
Rather than documenting our trip on a “day by day” basis, we will adopt the approach of a summary on this occasion.
We spent a week in Bulli with three of the group arriving on the Monday and departing on the following Monday. Another couple joined us on the Friday and departed on the Sunday and the final couple joined us on the Saturday and departed on the Monday.
We had very mixed weather during our stay. It rained on the day of our arrival and that added a new dimension in setup. With the motorhome we would have simply moved from the cabin into the house, we were unable to do that with the caravan. In reality, this was the first time in our six years of travel where we experienced rain upon arrival. We have packed up in the wet on several occasions and the type of vehicle is irrelevant in those situations. We had only one day of full sunshine during the week with the other days having different degrees of overcast. We also experienced the effects of a southerly change whilst camped. Of the seven days we were there, our awning was out for less than half of the stay.
The caravan park was excellent value for money. The amenities block was clean and the camp kitchen excellent. The electric BBQ’s were free but much to our surprise, there was a cost associated with hot shower water. That did not worry us as we were connected to town water and have an excellent shower in the caravan. The caravan park is located directly behind the beach with only about a walk of 150 metres required to the sand. The beach is also patrolled. The caravan park is also located next to the local cemetery but we did not have any interference from the residents. We must admit that there were several occasions when we considered a visit to the cemetery in the dark but no one was game.
During the stay the “Boy’s“ got together for the usual maintenance normally performed on the RV’s when a group get together. One of our friends had recently acquired a caravan (they also traded their Leisure Seeker) and time was spend playing with the electric things (satellite TV antenna and other things) and a small water leak coming from the fresh tank was also repaired. We helped to install bonnet protectors and headlight covers to our friends tow vehicle and 24 hours later did the same to our tow vehicle.
It was never our intention of spending time driving around the Illawarra area during this stay but we did manage an afternoon trip to the Sea Bridge near Stanwell Park and also went to the lookout at Stanwell Tops and later had afternoon tea in the recently refurbished Tea House that overlook Wollongong near Bulli Tops. The Sublime Point Café / Restaurant / Function Centre has been refurbished and recently reopened. The coffee was excellent as were the home-made cakes we enjoyed. Check out their website at http://www.sublimepoint.com.au
As we have done in the past, a trip to a beachside location must include the mandatory meal of fresh local prawns. We all enjoyed a feed of king prawns which were sourced from Kondakis Seafood which is located in the Stockland shopping centre at Corrimal.
The final part of this trip that needs to be documented is the return journey to Sydney. Whilst we had the opportunity to return home using the same route, we decided to use Bulli Pass to return to the highway. Our tow vehicles is a 2.4L diesel powered Nissan Navara towing a load of just over 2.5 tonne. We struggled up the hill arriving at the top in second gear and giving consideration to dropping to first. If we were climbing this hill more than once a year, we would need to give a lot of consideration to a vehicle modification including adding a power trip to increase the vehicle’s power.