Mt Isa Show

What an epic weekend!  Our tent is very quiet tonight; after two day’s of performing three shows a day everyone is beat! It is a healthy tired after spending most of the day outside in the sun doing lots of walking, running and talking.

We had the privilege of once again working alongside Australian Circus King – Roy Maloy.  Roy holds six world records in circus including walking on stilts 76ft high and also laying on a bed of nails and having a 1/2 ton block of ice lowered on him with a forklift, then smashed with sledge hammers! 

We first met Roy at the Winton Show where Chana assisted in one of his performances; this time Jessica got her moment of fame!

In appreciation for her help, Roy made her a balloon Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle!

 

 

 

 

 

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The girls and their dogs did some awesome shows!  Everyone we spoke to loved it even those who were not “dog people” said it was very entertaining and great to watch.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And our crowd ….

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Superdog Trick Show Again!

Life has been so busy that this blog has had to take a back seat!   Last time I updated here we’d not long sold the bus and bought the Hiace Van!  Now that was way to long ago!  We still have the van and the tents.  Are we enjoying it?  Well, some days we do and some days we don’t, just like the bus!  It is often harder to find a place to set up as we now need grass so if we cannot find a place to set up we have to sleep all 9 of us and the dogs in the van!  We have done it a few times, but it’s not the best nights sleep.  The kids sleep well, but us adults are not as flexible as we once were and a night in a squishy seat takes it’s toll! <insert creaky sounds>   When we do find a place to set up it’s usually a place we can stay for a few days.  Setting up and packing down every day is not my idea of fun! 

This is us camping at the Winton Showgrounds where we performed with the dogs. 

Speaking of the dog shows … don’t forget to check out the Superdogs facebook page and give it a “like”.  They are doing really well and getting lots of positive comments from all who see them performing or practicing.  At the Winton Show even the other entertainers took time out to watch them saying they’d never seen anything like it before!  Another stall holder told us that everyone he spoke to was either coming in to see the dogs or leaving talking about them! 

This is the first performance at the Winton Show, by the last time we had a much bigger crowd! Exciting stuff!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I was going to put a video on here, but seeing as I’m writing this outside reception area it’ll have to wait. Or check out the Superdog Website which has links to all the videos.

Not sure when I’ll get to update here again, but we regularly put updates and photos on our facebook page so if you haven’t “liked” it yet, we’d love to have you join us.

I’ll leave you with a bit of humour to brighten your day.

Why the Change

Several people have asked us why the change?  Why did we go from an all under one roof 38 foot ex school bus to a Hiace commuter and tents.  Well, here’s the blog post where I endeavour to answer those questions!

Let me go back 4 years when we bought the bus … we’d done 1 year in a Jayco Eagle towed by an 8 seater Falcon station wagon!  When we got pregnant with Jireh, it was time to upgrade our rig to something we’d all fit in to travel.  At the time a bus seemed the best option.  Michael got his MR license, bought the bus and moved into it all in the same week! 

Fast forward 1 year, we’d had enough of the bus!  We found it restrictive on where we could go, it was costly to keep on the road and Michael did not like driving it!  We put it up for sale at that time with no interest at all! Over the past three years we’ve periodically advertised it with varying interest.

Our decision to change rigs was not a sudden one!  We’ve talked about it for years and made lists of the pro’s and con’s of different types of rig.  Each time the decision was the bus had to go!

Another reason we decided to change was to facilitate our oldest daughter with getting her drivers license.  As she approached her 16th birthday late last year we knew the time had come that The Auroara needed to sell!  So with renewed effort we advertised her again.  We had a lot of interest while we were based in Newcastle, but nothing came to fruition.

We’d almost resigned ourselves to the fact that it would never sell unless we dropped the price ridiculously low!  We talked about it and decided that the price we had it at was the lowest we were willing to advertise her for.  Then the now new owner came, looked and willingly gave us the price we had asked for!

So recapping on our reasons for the change:

1.  We didn’t like driving it

2.  The cost of driving it

3.  We want to explore different, not bus friendly places

4.  We want to facilitate our oldest daughter to get her drivers license

If you have any other questions we are happy to answer them.

Change

I asked a question of Facebook recently “Change is good, right?”  Most people said it was and that one could not move forward without it.  One person said that if it was change for changing sake then it was not good.

On Monday, 4 March 2013 a guy rang up asking if we still had our bus for sale and could he come and look at it please.  A couple of hours later, he’d looked at the bus, told us he’d buy it and given us a $500 deposit! We’ve had the bus advertised off and on for about 3 years, had a lot of tyre kickers, a few fraudsters and then finally 1 genuine buyer!  It took us all by surprise!

The bus (The Auroara) has been home for four years.  Jireh was bought home from the hospital to the bus.  Serenity was born in the bus … so there were many memories.  When it hit home that she was really sold, it was a bit emotional for us all!  There wasn’t much time to dwell on it though as we now had to source another vehicle!

We’d been looking on Gumtree and Ebay consistently and knew of one that sounded like a go, but it was in Newcastle (we were in Carcoar Dam).  We phoned about it and found out it was gone!  Now what?  The new owner wanted to take possession of The Auroara as soon as possible.  No pressure at all!!

We spent the rest of the day scouring the internet and found a couple that sounded sort of interesting.  I emailed them both and next morning heard back from one of them (still waiting to hear back from the other one!). We phoned him up, made a time to view it, packed up the bus and left.    We arrived in the small town of Bowning, NSW a bit later than we’d expected, had a quick look at the van and decided we’d wait till morning to test drive it.

Morning came and everyone was up early excited to be test driving a car!  It drove nicely, looked ok on the outside and inside so we put a deposit on it! 

The next couple of days were spent sorting out the “stuff” in the bus and dealing with the RTA!

On Friday at about 1pm we met up with the guy who’d put the deposit on the Auroara to do the change over.  His wife said to him, “Do you realise you are buying these children’s home?”  Was sad yet exciting to see her drive away.

With mixed emotions we watch what had been our home for 4 years drive away without us!

Our new van the “Puddle Jumper”, was waiting across the road.  When all the formalities were over, the kids all piled in, we drove across the road and collected out stuff that we’d left under a tree!

Adrenalin was running high as we drove off to start the next chapter in the life of Wheel Education.

 

 

 

 

 

Quick Catch Up

Time has gotten away on me and I haven’t updated here in ages!  Sorry!

 

We had a great time staying at Ariah Park, NSW ($10 per night, power, showers, toilet, camp kitchen with free BBQ) where all the girls learned to swim or gain confidence in swimming.  By the time we left almost all the kids had jumped off the diving board, dived in at the deep end and all (except Jireh) had swam a width unaided. 

When the time came to leave we headed slowly north.  We found ourselves at a lovely free camp between Cowra and Bathurst, Carcoar Dam.  There was plenty of space, clean toilets, cold showers, dam water and a couple of rain water tanks. 

The best part of staying here was having neighbours who we’d already met on facebook - Highway-Dreams Around Oz!  We didn’t know they were there so it was a very pleasant surprise.

The worst part of staying here was the wind!  The camps 6 book stated that it was a windy area, and they were not joking!  In the two weeks we stayed there …. we had about 2 days with minimal wind!

On a trip into Blayney to do shopping we noticed the local district show was coming up and that they had a pet dog show with a best trick section!  With less than two weeks to train, the girls got motivated!  The day of the show was a freezing cold and very blustery but the girls and dogs did well.

The results were:

Sparkie - 3rd in Best Tricks, 3rd in Speed Sit.
Tess - 1st in Best Tricks, 2nd in Speed Sit, 2nd in Best Biscuit Catcher, 3rd in Waggliest Tail.
Lassie - 2nd in Best Tricks, 1st in Speed Sit.

 

Stay tuned for our next adventure!

Mini Tornado

It was a hot and sleepy afternoon.  There was no wind when suddenly the trees behind the bus started shaking!  We ran outside to see the dust and debries being flung high in the air!  The motorhome on the right of the picture suffered a bit of damage to their awning.

This was the best picture we got … taken on the phone!

Jessica grabbed her movie camera and shot the following video!

 

Jessica’s video of the mini tornado that blew through camp today!

It was no longer a sleepy afternoon … everyone in the campground was now awake and outside!! 

Painting out the windows

We’ve had our bus now for coming up four years.  We bought it off a school bus run in Wyong, NSW.

Roll on a couple of years and we wanted some privacy and protection from the sun.  We couldn’t afford to put window tint on so bought some window covering from Super Cheap Auto and got some $12 a sheet of solar shade, a static cling film.  Each sheet covered one window.

After two years we were noticing mould growing underneath!  Yuck and so not good for the health!  So off came the film and in came the heat!

We did a lot of research on what we could do short of repaneling the bus!  Reading on the bus forum we learned that if you use ESP direct onto a clean window then undercoat should stick!  We tried it on a small window and it worked!  

Firstly on the recommendation of the local paint shop, we cleaned the area with mineral turps before applying the ESP.  When the ESP was dry we applied a coat of oil based undercoat, followed by two coasts of Duraguard  Ultra Premium Gloss (a water based, UV  absorbing and antifungal paint with a 15 year warranty).

Here it is after one coat of Duraguard.

The man doing the work!

And here it is … the finished product. 

We are very happy with it. It makes a difference to the inside temperature. Even with the sun shining on the side of the bus, the painted glass was cool to the touch.