Christmas Shopping in Bunbury

I can't believe it's December.  Today we drove into Bunbury, a coastal town south of Perth, to do the Christmas shopping.  There were Santa Clauses everywhere.

We got up early, because of the van.  It has been riding almost touching the bump stops, which for those who are as technical as me, means it would not be good over bumps.  We have been trying to reduce the weight in the van, which is a bit difficult with 8 people.  Grant had planned to have some procedure done in Perth, known as rolling the axle, where the axle was moved to under the leaf springs, adding about an extra 15cm to the height under the van.  At the last minute he cancelled it, because he was advised that kind of adjustment to the van would require a machinery certificate issued in Queensland to validate the insurance.

However, on the way out of Perth yesterday he had the van weighed, and found out the van is loaded a few hundred kgs above it's recommended load weight. This bothers Grant, for good reason, and once we arrived at the camp ground last light, he rang a company that might be able to do the job.  They quoted him a hundred dollars under the Perth price, and were able to fit him in this morning.  Hence the early start down to Bunbury, where we delivered the van to True Track.  The man there walked around the van, looked under it, and said 'It's going to be very high'.  He discussed it with Grant, and Grant realized that the van would end up so high it might be unstable.  However, because this was a spring company, he was abe to offer to add an extra leaf into the leaf springs, which will raise the van just enough, but not too much. We were very excited that God brought us here to the right place to have this fixed.

I spent the day trying to work out Christmas presents for kids - do you get anything?  or nothing?  I bought some presents, then took them back!  I finally settled on a few things, and boy was I exhausted at the end...

Grant took everyone to a playground and a mangrove walk and left me in peace for a few hours.

Once we'd finished, and been to Spotlight,  Bunnings, and Harvey Norman for Joseph to spend his hard earned Birthday money, we were off to collect our newly raised van.  I opened the boot in their parking lot, and out fell the 30 eggs and bottle of olive oil I'd just bought at the shop.  I saved the olive oil with my foot, but it will be scrambled eggs for breakfast tomorrow!

Grant is very happy with the van, and a swim in the Wellington dam once we got home, finished off a very nice day.

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Vicki