Charli, Author at Aussie Destinations Unknown

I Shot Them in Their Undies!

by Charli | Jul 22, 2018 | Adventures, Adventures Family, Chats with Charli, Destinations, Destinations Couples, Destinations Family, Kids Comments

Taking photos of your mum and dad in their undies is not something you do every day, especially in the middle of the Simpson desert. But, when they are wearing the coolest undies, Knobby’s – it’s Okay!

We had to hike up and over Big Red to the next sand dune, and at the top of Big Red the view was stunning! It’s the highest sand dune in the Simpson Desert.

On one side you could see the whole of Bashville and all the caravans, stage and food vans set up and on the other side, you could see the red sand of the Simpson dessert behind the flat plain that was at the bottom of the dune.

We (the kids) ran down Big Red while mum and dad walked, and we went all the way to the other side of the flat plain that we could see from the top of Big Red.

On the way, there was a sign that had an arrow pointing forward to Big Red and one to the right to get Birdsville (or left from the direction that we were walking!) so we put Aussie Destinations Unknown and LKI stickers on it.

Once we finally got to the sand dune they wanted their photoshoot on, mum handed me the camera and they started posing and jumping in front of the camera with their Knobbys on. I was looking around to make sure nobody was there, seeing the craziness that was going on!

This is probably one of the weirdest things I’ve ever done, but to be honest it was kind of fun because I felt like an actual photographer.

I shot them from different angles, together and mum by herself. I took pics from the front and from the back and I made sure the horizon was lined up like mum had said.

On our way back to the van we had to climb Big Red again – So Aylah, Cooper and I all raced each other down the dune. Luckily there were no stacks and faces full of red sand, although that would’ve been really funny (unless it was me).

When we got back to the caravan, we looked back through the photos and they were awesome! You’ve probably already seen some of them, but if you haven’t, they’re on Aussie Destinations Unknown Instagram and Facebook and I’ll put some in this post too.

If you love me, you comment below “good photography skills Charli”.

Haha, nah I’m kidding, but if you really want to, nobody said you can’t! Lol. Well I got to go now, I hope you like the pics. See ya!

Bigriggen by Charli

by Charli | Mar 7, 2018 | Adventures, Adventures Couples, Adventures Family, Chats with Charli, Destinations, Destinations Family, Kids Comments

Okay so mum said that I had to start blogging so here I go…(don’t judge me, this is my first time)?

Mum woke me up this morning at 6:00 (way too early). She didn’t wake me up like a normal mother would; she sat beside me on my bed and shook her wet hair all in my face and whispered “Time to wake up”! over and over again. I looked at her and laughed and then cuddled up in my blankets wishing I could sleep in for once. I eventually dragged myself out of bed and got dressed, ate breakfast blah, blah, blah all that stuff.

After all that, we all got in the car and started towing the caravan the hour and a half to Bigriggen Bush Retreat.

Reading my book

But before we were even 10 minutes away from the house, of course dad had to stop and get a coffee ☕️ We all read our books most of the way and Aylah listened to her music (pretty loudly too!)

Once we finally got to Bigriggen, we found our spot and set up the caravan. The kids laid the mat down and set up the table and chairs and mum and dad did the usual setup stuff. Once everything was all ready, Cooper, Aylah and I got on our bikes and rode off to check out the place. It’s huge! It was so muddy and all the mud and grass was flicking up all over my legs, and as I was turning around on my bike, I hit the tree and fell over, right on my butt in the mud ? Mum tried to get it on video but she failed (thank goodness).

We came back to the van and changed into our swimmers and walked down to the water hole – it was beautiful and the water was really cold. It was lovely and calm, apart from the rapids. The rapids were really strong and they pulled me down the river and over the rocks. I kept tumbling down and tried to stop myself from going any further – it was almost impossible! When I tried walking back up against the rapids, I kept falling back down. Once, I finally got up and Aylah fell over and knocked Cooper over which made me fall and get dragged all the way back down again! ???‍♀️

We went back to the van and played some board games and then we got the frisbee’s out. Dad got the drone out, and mum joined in with us.

Mum and dad’s friends came that night with their daughter. We all had dinner and sat around talking, We toasted marshmallows on the weber as we had no camp fire and it started raining. There was quite a lot of lightning too.

Going down the rapids on the mattress

Everyone woke up the next morning at about 7:00 apart from me, I slept into like 7:30. I’m usually the last one awake! We all got up, had breakfast, and went back to the water hole. This time we had an inflatable mattress to go down on! It was so much fun.

Then we dried off and got ready to leave for a 3 hour hiking trip to a water hole.

Before we could start hiking we had to go up a steep 4WD track. Dad went up some really rocky, steep hills, and it was really fun until we heard a big bang from under the car. The front drive shaft broke. We had no tools or anything to fix it so dad and Vaughn had to go back to Boonah where there were shops so they could buy tools.

Waiting for them to buy tools to fix the car

Obviously we couldn’t go anywhere with our car so luckily Vaughn was with us and they could take his car. We waited, lying on towels on the steep hill, talking and mucking around for TWO HOURS until they came back with the tools. It took them another half hour to fix the car. They had to take the wheel all the way off!

So long story short, we didn’t end up going on the walk to the water hole, we just sat in the middle of a hill on a rocky road.

We drove back to the caravan to pack everything up and drive the hour and a half back home.

I guess you could say we had an exiting yet interesting weekend. The important thing is we had fun even when we were stuck in the middle of nowhere or getting dragged down some rapids!

I really liked Bigriggen and would like to go back again. I would like to have a camp fire next time, and we will take more inflatable things to go down the rapid on!

Playing 5 Second Rule