Travel Australia Podcast by The Feel Good Family

Exploring Australia's Central Gemfields: A Road Trip Adventure in Fossicking and Discovery

• Paul & Katie Guerin • Season 9 • Episode 1

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Ever dreamed of unearthing treasures beneath your feet? Join us as we embark on a thrilling 2,000-kilometer 'Road To Riches' road trip to the Australian Central Gemfields, where the promise of precious gemstones beckons. From the welcoming embrace of Gemtree campground to the exhilarating adventure of fossicking with seasoned guides Richie, Connor and Laura, this journey captures the heart of exploration and discovery. Surrounded by breathtaking landscapes, we delve into the rich history of the area, sharing the joy and laughter that comes with the hunt for garnets and zircons, especially through the eyes of young Jasper.

In the heart of the red dirt, we savor the simple pleasures, like freshly baked scones and tea, underscoring the hospitality that Gemtree is known for. We also delve into the nuances of fossicking, highlighting what keeps enthusiasts returning year after year. It's not just about the gems; it's about the camaraderie, the stories shared, and the memories forged in the outback's embrace. Whether you're a seasoned fossicker or a curious first-timer, there's something magical about the allure of hidden treasures waiting to be discovered.

Before you rev up your engines for your own adventure, heed the wisdom of experts like Bodie McCormack, Tony Davys, and Adam Meredith. From essential vehicle maintenance to the indispensable benefits of a Tyre Pressure Monitoring System (TPMS), we discuss everything you need to ensure a safe and memorable journey along one of Australia's most remote highways. Embrace the challenge, indulge your sense of adventure, and remember to take care of yourself and your loved ones as you journey into the unknown. Let us inspire you to dream big and explore with confidence.

Plan B Box YouTube Episode – https://youtu.be/xeUGVj9HZzA?si=GIserdfqhAuHDCN1 

Vehicle Checks – https://youtu.be/mVeiF9_CypI?si=AtLmdohjyPbdLmwW 

Check out the Gear we love on our website - https://thefeelgoodfamily.com/gear-and-discounts/ 

Watch our TV series Feel Good RoadTrips on the 7Plus streaming platform - https://thefeelgoodfamily.com/feelgood-roadtrips-channel-seven-tv-series/ 

This episode is proudly brought to you by our mates at Stratus Outdoors, Protect The Adventure.  Keeping plastic bottles out of landfill by turning them into quality camp gear. Take advantage of our 15% Discount - https://www.stratusoutdoors.com.au  (ENTER FEELGOOD DISCOUNT CODE)

Be sure to Subscribe to our YouTube Channel and join us for all of the road trip adventures! Check out the footage from our latest episode on our YouTube channel – https://youtu.be/au_88wMkxWs?si=B6ngu2iRGdkKn6Dt 

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This podcast is brought to you by our great mates Stratus Outdoors, creators of the toughest and eco-friendly outdoor equipment designed to last a lifetime.

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Oh, I love their camp gear, especially the all-day chairs. They're not only comfy, they are lightweight, super stylish and they're made from recycled materials.

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These are people that actually really do care about the environment. And to take advantage of your 10% feel-good discount code with Stratus Outdoors, head over to our website on the gear page. Stratus Outdoors protect the adventure.

Speaker 1:

Welcome to Season 9, Episode 1 of the Family Travel Australia podcast. We are Paul, Katie and Jasper from the Feel Good Family. Join us as we explore this great country, Australia, its people, places and cultures cultures.

Speaker 2:

Yes, welcome to the Family Travel Podcast, where we share the latest in RV industry news road trip travel, caravanning and camping, product reviews, where to go, what to do, and so much more.

Speaker 1:

Thanks for joining us this week we start Season 9, baby and our 2,000-kilometre road to riches road trip. We kick off in the Australian Central Gemfields fossicking for precious gemstones. Woo-hoo, will Katie get new jewellery, or will she not?

Speaker 2:

You can fossick until we do.

Speaker 1:

That's pretty well the case, actually. I tell you what, though? We get a haul out here.

Speaker 2:

So good, and this is just an area of Australia that we have never really discovered before. So to be here, to be somewhere new, the thrill of that is almost as good as the thrill of finding precious gemstones. It's like a lost treasure hunter.

Speaker 1:

I love it. I'm like a little kid out here and we are staying at Gem Tree Perfectly named, isn't it?

Speaker 2:

It is perfectly named and this is a fabulous spot and really you feel completely remote and I think you're only about 140 kilometres northeast of Alice Springs, so you know, if you do need supplies, you do need to go into town. In fact, alex, the owner there at Gemtree, said to us oh Richie, he's going to take you out for some king. He's just got to duck into town this morning, though for a few things, and off he went into Alice. You're really not that remote, but the landscape out here begs to differ.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely. It is the start of the plenty highway, where there is plenty of nothing.

Speaker 2:

There's plenty of absolutely incredible landscapes and plenty of moments where that overwhelming feeling of freedom that you get when you are traveling through these remote parts of Australia hits you like a sledgehammer, and for me it's addictive. I love this feeling that I get when we're out in these places and there's nothing but nothing. You're traveling companions, you pop your windows down, you've got the dirt and the dust flying behind you because you're on 400 odd kilometers of dirt road. It is incredible.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, absolutely love it. Now we do actually have another family who is in effect in convoy, tagging along with us during this first leg of our epic road to riches road trip yeah, fantastic, dn ben and their three beautiful children are coming along with us, which is so awesome.

Speaker 2:

Look, to be honest. We put the call out through many of the traveling australia groups on facebook and said we're hitting the plenty. We're looking for some travel companions, anybody heading to the East Coast and want to go the less traditional route and these guys put their hands up.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it's actually a great point, katie not in our show notes here is that we, you know, following on from my health scare, we decided that it would be a good idea just to have a bit of a backup plan for some reason. If you know, something were to to go wrong or south, or there was another health issue and I wasn't able to continue on with the family, then at least I knew that there was some other way of katie communicating and getting another group or another person to be able to assist her and Jasper. So it was really born out of this idea of making sure that we had a backup plan. But it ended up so much better to be able to share this first for us as a family with another family who are also in the same boat. So, yeah, great idea If you've got this sort of remote travel plans on your horizon, then put the call out.

Speaker 2:

I tell you what we had plenty of people who said pick me, I want to come along Absolutely and, as you'll find out over the next series of podcasts, we have an absolute hoot of a time, with plenty of interesting moments that happened along the way. But look, if you're a travelling family with children, then having other children and other children's toys for your kids to play with is an absolute godsend.

Speaker 1:

Oh, look, that's it. Toy envy Everyone. Even when you're older and you're an adult, you still want the other person's toys, funny stuff, all right. Now let's talk about Gemtree, fantastic remote campground. If you want that authentic outback Aussie bush camp, this is the place.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it's a real blend and what I loved about it is that that's right, paul, you feel like you're a million miles from anybody. A million miles from anybody, even out in the campground. You know it's dirt and those incredible Aussie trees that can survive out here in this harsh environment. But you still have the luxuries. You've got power and water if you want to hook up to that, you've got your amenities blocks, you've got your laundry. There's even a swimming pool, which I've found incredible. And when you first arrive, you sort of come through the main entry area. There is a little fuel station there, which is great. You can fuel up if you need to, and the main reception slash cafe also has an adjoining little gem shop, and this is a great little teaser. It whets your taste buds as to, okay, what are we out here for? And there's a beautiful selection of gemstones and, you know, incredible rocks from this region and, I dare say, all around the world, on display here at Gemtree as well.

Speaker 1:

What I think is good about the Gemtree gem shop is that you're going to leave with something you know. If you don't have any luck which you'd have to be blind not to be able to find something the selection of raw and then polished and then finished jewelry products that are on display and available is awesome, and so you're going to leave with some sort of treasure.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, absolutely, that's so right. Look, we would highly recommend, if you have the time up your sleeve and you don't want to rush through here, book onto one of their Fossicking tours. Now, out here in this particular region, not far from where you'll be camping, there are the Zircon Flats and then there are also the Garnet Fossicking areas and, look, you can go out and hope for the best and well one even try and find where to fossick in the first place. Or you can book onto one of the tours with the team. It's brilliant, because then you're going out not only with the guide, but they provide all the gear that you need, they've got all of the expert knowledge and they take you to the secret spots.

Speaker 1:

I love that you just rock up. It's early in the morning so you can beat the heat. Because it's central Australia, you know it's the hottest, driest country on earth. Very fortunately, the temperatures dropped dramatically in the last 1,500 kilometres from Darwin.

Speaker 2:

It's got cold though.

Speaker 1:

We had the heater on Unbelievable. But you're going to be looking at hot, hot midday temperatures, even mid-morning. So, heading out early in the morning again, they load you up with all the gear and, in effect, you're tagging along. So you're driving in your four-wheel drive following a convoy and your tour guide leader out to these secret spots where I think you could say you're guaranteed to find something. It certainly felt like that and look to find something.

Speaker 2:

It certainly felt like that and, look, we booked onto both. So, first up, we headed out to the Zircon Flats with Richie, and this was excellent.

Speaker 1:

They call this guy Mr Zircon.

Speaker 2:

Yes.

Speaker 1:

Now he wasn't really impressed when I said that to him. He goes oh no, it's a lie, mate. And then he pulled out some of his previous hauls. These were like nuggets.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, amazing, absolutely incredible. He ran us through exactly what we needed to do. Now, look, zircon, is a little bit more effort for reward. You have to grab your trusty pick, feel like you're one of the seven dwarfs and get smashing the earth. Basically, what you're doing is digging into the side of an area that's already sort of been, I guess, excavated a little bit into where the ancient creek beds are, because that brings the flow of these gemstones down, and so there is a little bit of you know hard yakka required to get your dirt. And then, obviously, you're piling that into buckets, you're taking it up, you're sieving it, you're sieving it again, then you wash it. Then you wash it again, then you flip it out like a pizza coming out of a pan and you sort through it. Now, hot tip, you need the sun to find these gemstones, because even after you've washed them and you've washed them again to make sure that all of the dirt and the muck is off them they just look like bloody rocks on a table.

Speaker 1:

You need the sunshine they look like a pile of dirty old rocks. Yeah, yep. I'm like this doesn't look that enticing.

Speaker 2:

That's right Hard work for this.

Speaker 2:

So it is hard work, it is hot work, and I love how Richie said. Straight away he said oh, look at Jasper, he's got the eye for it, he's got his eye in. And once you start to find them and recognize what they look like on the table, then you're like oh, there's one, oh there's one. And what the sun does is, when you hold that stone up to the sun, it reveals it in all of its beauty. It basically shines the light through it. And then you know for sure yep, that's a zircon.

Speaker 1:

I love that. Richie said where's your phone? Pull out your iPhone, Turn the light on and then he gets this little dark stone that he found and sticks it straight onto the light and straight through it, this beautiful red ruby color. Now there's 17 variants, I believe, of color that you can find in Zircon. So it's pretty amazing the spectrum of colours, and we found quite a few of those.

Speaker 2:

Well, we did. And why did we find so many? Because certain somebody in our family is addicted. So even when the rest of us had all had enough, there was still someone saying I'll just get one more bucket, We'll just check one more bucket.

Speaker 1:

I know I could have stayed out there. It's like time just disappears or your value of caring about time disappears or anything. Who needs water and food. Yeah, I loved it. And then when I found that one that was bigger than Mr Zircon, I was like check this out, Mr Zircon.

Speaker 2:

Does size matter? Does it when it comes to gemstones? It does, I dare say it does. Yes.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, that was an excellent afternoon and a really great introduction to gemstones. What this is all about out here. Now, what is amazing is that, as we mentioned, you can come out to these fostering areas on your own. You do need to get yourself a fostering permit, which you can do online, depending on which state or territory you are around the country. You can do that on the government websites and generally they're very inexpensive, for a long period of time to get yourself that foster king permit. You don't want to be caught without one.

Speaker 2:

But coming out with these guys was excellent because, even though they brought us to the main Zircon Flats area, they sort of took us a little bit further away from where most people come out and found us this secret little spot where we got a decent haul. But I was really surprised, paul, that you are able to come out and free camp out in many of these areas, on the gem fields as well. And on the way home the guys even took us to an old mica mine that was in operation out here for many, many years until unfortunately fortunately, depending on your view on mining of the earth in a more commercial way they hit the water source.

Speaker 1:

Amazing and it flooded the mine. But we're talking back at the turn of the 19th century, like it just. Yeah. Amazing how long ago they were actually out here in the middle of nowhere.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it is amazing and I really liked this area because it was so. I mean it's beautiful. It's like this big dam in the middle of you know, this arid country. But the mica is beautiful as well how it grows, I suppose, or forms beautiful as well how it grows, I suppose, or forms in miniature slate-like clusters and just climbing up over it and seeing it all still there in the ground, yeah, really cool.

Speaker 1:

Really fantastic. It's like a large open-cut mine. But you've got to think they did this by hand. You know?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, Amazing Wouldn't that have been a sad day. When they hit that spring and the mine just filled up with water, I would have been like, righto well, we're all retired, what's next?

Speaker 1:

Oh no, tragic. Yeah, let's find garnets, which is what we did.

Speaker 2:

Yes, exactly. So the next day up early and off to go and hunt some garnets and to be honest I have to say, I had no concept of what a zircon or a garnet looked like before we came out here.

Speaker 1:

No, and they're incredibly hard. I believe zircons might be rated as the second hardest gemstone, but the oldest gemstone on earth. Yeah, there you go. Amazing hardest gemstone, but the oldest gemstone on earth.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, there you go, amazing. And so off we went a totally different spot, to Fossick for Garnets. We went with Connor and Laura, two of the lovely caretakers, a young couple who are also traveling Australia working their way around. And how on earth they landed here in the middle of, you know, the central gem fields, is beyond me. But boy, they were fantastic. Their knowledge was great and their passion was awesome.

Speaker 1:

Oh, they are full fossickers. They travel with gear. They're fossicking their way around the country.

Speaker 2:

Bloody awesome. I love it. Well, connor was a wealth of knowledge. He took us out to a spot that I honestly don't think you would find on your own, and there was ourselves and another family on this tour this particular morning. And you know, look, you have to be prepared to get down and dirty. You're going to be anyway. I mean, you're out here in the middle of red dirt country. So Jasper was covered red dirt from head to toe. In fact. I put a few images up on our socials a couple of days ago and there's one close-up of Jasper's face, and, bless him, he looks like you know those pictures.

Speaker 1:

He's a pig in mud, you know, like he's the happiest kid on earth.

Speaker 2:

He is. He absolutely loves it, but he looks like, you know, one of the coal miners that you see. You know that's been down under the ground for a million years and he's got dirt all over his face. It makes the whites of his eyes and his teeth look really good, though I have to say A miner, miner.

Speaker 2:

A miner, miner, so he look. He happily played in the dirt for most of the time that we were out here. He fossicked a little bit and then decided playing with the kids from the other family was far more fun. But Paul and I loved this garnet experience because it's not as backbreaking as having to pick into the side of the creek beds to find those zircons. You literally are just shoveling loose dirt off the ground from certain areas obviously these guys know the sports into your bucket and then you're doing the sieving and the sieving and the washing and the washing again to try and find these garnets that look, when you hold them up to the sun they could be mistaken for rubies.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, the deep, deep red colours, some of them more like a sort of burnt orange, but we did find a handful of both zircons and garnets that were keepers.

Speaker 2:

Absolutely Very, very exciting. And you know that is what you're out here for that experience, that thrill of finding something, and then that you can see how you know the old timers come out here and then you know, 100 years later they're still out here fossicking because it is addictive?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, absolutely, and the owner operator of Gemtree, alex, his family, have been out here for decades.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, that's right. He grew up not far from Gemtree.

Speaker 1:

That's right. So they are invested in the land. They're really in the country and sharing it and their story is just what they do and we love that. It was just such an awesome experience and Gemtree definitely a place whether you're a fossicker or not to go and get that authentic outback camping experience. Put it at top of your list.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, absolutely, to go and get that authentic outback camping experience. Put it at top of your list. Yeah, absolutely. And look, if you don't want to trek out to the gem fields, what's awesome is that they do have a little fossicking area there at Gemtree where you know, if you've got little, little little ones or you just don't want to get out there into the gem fields yourself, you can fossick through. I called it buckets of rubbly stuff, but I've since learned I'm pretty sure it's called wash, isn't it?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I think that's right.

Speaker 2:

Because that's what you do with it you wash it. Coming back from mining our garnets to have freshly baked scones and a cup of tea a Devonshire tea at the cafe was one of those moments where you're like hang on a second. I just was out there getting down and dirty in the middle of nowhere, and now here I am sipping a cup of English breakfast tea and eating one of the most delicious scones I've ever had.

Speaker 1:

It is. It's a strange realization when you're sitting there. I mean, there's nothing fancy about this cafe. It's kind of like whatever leftover chairs they could find over time.

Speaker 2:

Rusty, yes definitely very rustic. But look, those scones were amazing and they do full meals as well that you can order, and they have, I guess, a little selection of convenience grocery items that you can purchase as well.

Speaker 1:

In peak season they do full-on cook-up barbecue dinner nights that you can book onto and they book out. It's hard to believe, but they'll easily get 100 people out here a night.

Speaker 2:

Campfire oven meals and they have entertainment and they have a bar that they open up in peak season as well, and obviously peak season out here is across the winter months in Australia.

Speaker 1:

All right, now we are about to hit the Plenty Highway and this really is the start of our road to riches. All told, I think it's 76060 kilometers. 480 odd kilometers of it is complete dirt road and it varies from very sandy sections to really sharp hard rock sections, but relatively flat the entire way as you pass through different mountain ranges. And and in fact, the beauty of the scenery was the most surprising element of this road trip and we'll share that as we're traveling. We kick the plenty off next week, but it made me really think it'd be good to share what our top five off-road outback vehicle preparation things that are essentials with you if you're planning to do any kind of remote travel. So here they are. Number one is to have a plan B box.

Speaker 2:

Yep, absolutely, with just the spares and essentials that you may need when you're out in the middle of nowhere and can't access it.

Speaker 1:

Yes, and all the detail around any of these items you'll be able to find through previous YouTube episodes that we've done. So Katie will make sure that the links to all of these things are in the show notes.

Speaker 2:

Fantastic.

Speaker 1:

Plan B box Thank you to Bodie McCormack in Sandgate, just sort of northeast of Brisbane there to share for me, specific to our Land Cruiser 79, a few other things like a top and bottom radiator hose, but certainly all the fluids and the different belts or uni belts or drive belts and all of the bits that may have gone wrong over time with other people's vehicles. So talk to your mechanic to help you really get your plan B box. But there are a series of essential items that should be for every vehicle so you can check out that YouTube clip on our pre-travel servicing, maintenance and plan B box.

Speaker 1:

Number two is what is referred to as under bonnet, under body, and this was from tony davies, who is the australian four by four treks four-wheel drive instructor. He's a savannah tour guide and we tagged along on one of tony's amazing tours up to cape york and this time last year we were the only ones towing a caravan and wow, what a memory, what a trip that was. But to get all of this information from an expert who actually trains people in safe driving of four-wheel drives was just priceless and his underbody and underbonnet talk and walk was excellent. Again, there'll be a link there for that. But really you don't need to be a mechanic, you just need to know if something looks out of place.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, that's what I love, because this is one that anybody can do, no matter your skill set, no matter your occupation, no matter your gender. This is something that everybody can do and, as you said, paul, you don't have to be an expert. You've just got to know what things look like when they're working properly so that you can know what things look like when they're not.

Speaker 1:

And I guess if you're checking every day before you kick off and hit the road, then you've got to pick up something. He also checks his when they finish a day. That's right. He's doing it first thing in the morning and first thing.

Speaker 1:

Once you pull into camp when you arrive. So it could be a bit overkill, but we definitely check before we travel each morning. You're really just looking at all of the fluids. You're checking your battery terminals that they haven't rattled loose on the corrugation. You're looking under at the entire drive chain. You're looking at your suspension, seeing if there's anything hanging down. Is there anything out of place? All right, so that's underbody, under bonnet. Number two, number three, this one from our chief firey down there in Hobart, adam Meredith. We were out there in Uluru, katajuta, curtin Springs, and he talked me through what the fireys do every morning with their trucks, particularly around tyre management and tyre maintenance, and it's called the four Cs and that is check when cold, check the caps, check the condition and check the contents.

Speaker 2:

Simple stuff.

Speaker 1:

Basic and if you're doing that every day, then you're going to very quickly see if there's a problem.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, that's right. And look, Adam opened our eyes all those years ago, didn't he, paul, when he explained to us that, you know, a huge percentage of road accidents occur because of something to do with your tyres, and I think it's something that a lot of us can sort of take for granted or, you know not, not really think about the yep. They're there on the car, that's all you need to do, you know? Yeah.

Speaker 1:

And this is whether you're on the blacktop, the bitumen, or you're on the remote off-road areas as well. Uh, we're traveling today and it's actually the first thing I'm going to do is go and just check everything. But I'm also going to talk our tires and that is just check with the torque wrench. So having a torque wrench, I think, is essential, especially if you're changing tire pressures and you're in these cold conditions, hot conditions and these new, you know, fancy wheels and these alloys do expand and contract. Okay, so probably good to be checking all of these things regularly and check with with your manufacturer what torque Newton meters you should be having your tyre nuts at All right.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, perfect, tightening your nuts, not going and having a little conversation with your tyres. Ie talking to you. Hey, how are you going this morning?

Speaker 1:

tyres. Got it, got it. I see what you're saying. Tighten those nuts, katie. Number four clean your mirrors and your windows. Being visible, having visibility, very important, that's your job, katie.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it really is, and again, it's a super easy one to do and one that you know, not only so that we've got great visibility, but also, too, so that you guys have got great visibility when you're watching our YouTube episodes and you see those camera shots out the front. But probably more importantly too is making sure that your mirrors are clean, because you're going to be relying on these a lot. You know, obviously you don't have your rear view mirror in play when you are towing, so you really are relying on those side mirrors and we just give them a quick clean over. Gosh, when you're out here in these parts, I mean, you need to be doing this basically every day, because it is so dusty and so dirty and it's unbelievable how filthy things can get quickly. So a quick clean over before you hit the road really important.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, number four, visibility. On that as well, make sure you drive with your headlights on. If you are in any way on a remote road, do put your headlights on. You want to be seen. It is so dusty, it's phenomenal, and when somebody passes you, that dust continues on, you know, inhibiting your vision for 20, 30 seconds sometimes, which is a long time to be not seen. So having your lights on essential.

Speaker 2:

Yep great advice.

Speaker 1:

Okay, the last one, number five secure the load, Whether it's internal in your cabins or external on the roof gas bottles, max tracks, solar panels, extra tubs of stuff, you know, fuel canisters, jerry cans. Even if you're traveling with, like a Weber or a Ziggy and it's on a tray or a slide out, making sure that's even tied down If you're going to be on these corrugations or these these really hectic roads, just go and check everything. People have stuff fly off all the time and you know, we were on the Cape tour last year and some people lost their entire contents on their roof rack because it hadn't been tied down securely, they hadn't checked it, you know, and it just slowly rattled a little bit loose and then, boom, it's gone.

Speaker 2:

These corrugations are incredible and you've got to think if you're traveling even 100 kilometers over corrugations over that time, that constant movement. We had lids on jars in our fridge when we were up the Cape. That worked their way off in the fridge just from the vibration. We even had jars that had flipped upside down and were back in their same spot but turned up the wrong way from that constant vibration. So you've got to think if you can take the lid of a jar in your fridge then it can certainly undo things that are securing down anything that you've got externally on your van or your vehicle.

Speaker 1:

Even with ratchets, they just they wiggle that vibration and the harmonics that it creates it's phenomenal. Yeah, all right. Now, guys, that's that vibration and the harmonics that it creates. It's phenomenal. Yeah, All right Now, guys. That wraps that up, and again, check out the links in the show description if you want to go and find a little more detail on this information. Another thing I want to say that we just absolutely loved and, Katie, if you could put the link in for this one as well is our Outback Cinema.

Speaker 1:

Oh, yes To kick off our time and our first meeting with Ben and Deanne and their kids was to have an Outback Cinema. So we cleaned the back of the van with our trusty adventure pump and then we projected a cinema onto the back, a kid's movie, a Disney flick, and we had a fire, a couple of drinks, you know. Nothing too hectic but just getting to know you, a little bonding session for the kids and the big kids, and it was fantastic. But we get so many questions how are you setting up this projector? How do you operate it? What gear do you use? All the details. We have one dedicated video on that that you can check out.

Speaker 1:

Awesome, it'll be in the show notes. All right, the takeaway for this week. It's one I've made up, Katie. Oh well, this could be interesting, and it was just about finding ourselves learning these new skill sets and being in these environments and not having a clue, and then walking away, you know, richer for the experience but, also for the knowledge, and it is that travel makes you realize how much you don't know. How good is that?

Speaker 2:

And isn't that the truth? In any form of travel, whether you're towing your home on wheels down the road, like we are, or whether you're hopping on a plane and heading to an unknown overseas destination, it certainly makes you realize that you are a tiny blip in this incredible universe that is so much bigger than we are, than the stresses that we put on ourselves every single day and talk about enriching your life by putting yourself again at your comfort zone and into these incredible situations.

Speaker 1:

Ah, it's where the juice of life is. Sure is, Squeeze it, baby. We love it. Now, in the tyre management. I forgot this and I can see it on my notes. I just skimmed past it, but it's having a tyre pressure monitoring system, a TPMS. We have a feel-good discount code on the products that we love, use, trust and we'll absolutely back. If you want to check those out, TPMS from iCheck, you can get a 10% feel-good code if you are in need of any kind of tyre pressure system or tyre management products. They have an amazing range.

Speaker 2:

Excellent. Jump on our website onto our gear page. You'll find all of the products that we love and use every single day on our travels and all the discounts there for you guys as well, which is a win-win for everybody.

Speaker 1:

Love it, katie Kate, all right next week. Australia's most remote highway over 480 kilometres of dirt.

Speaker 2:

Here we go. Who knows what this is going to be like.

Speaker 1:

It's an adventure, that's what it is. Keep driving. For now we'll say dream big, look after yourself, look after your family.

Speaker 2:

And happy trails. We're a good family.

People on this episode

Head Shot

Katie Guerin

Host
Head Shot

Paul Guerin

Host