Anniversary the 10th: A Bisaster of Epic Proportions Pt4

Previously on National Lampoon's Hill Family Vacation:
Back after a short hiatus for sweeps week we rejoin our intrepid family of adventurers as they arrive back home after a considerably shorter drive than the one which got them to their destination the night before. What could POSSIBLY happen next folks?! Read on and we shall find out as we roll right on into...

Episode 4: The Drive Up... Again (A Chance For Redemption)

Having finally worked out the proper directions through trials and tribulations previously described, the drive back home was far shorter at 1hour 30minutes than the four plus hours of the previous night. There was a hairy moment there when we passed, once more, through Hornsby and I felt my sanity retain its grip on the cliff-edge of my mind by a fingernail at best, but otherwise the journey home was uneventful.

With P!nk rocking my world through one earbud (so as not to wake the kiddies - both young and old - in the car with me) I navigated our way through countryside to outer suburbs, on Sydney's major tollways, harbour tunnels and finally the local roads of the area I was born and raised in and only recently returned to. After a decade in the Lower North Shore and only a year back in the Eastern Suburbs, this night was the first on which I felt... comforted... upon returning. The first time it felt like coming home.

Dragging ourselves from the car we carried the munchkin (leaving the luggage in the car for the trip back on the morrow) into the house and after depositing her into her bed, collapsed into our own bed and sank swiftly into the deepest of sleeps. It was 4:30am.

The next morning my wonderful wife took the early morning duties of parenthood and left me to continue the slumber of the braindead. At 10:30am she sent the little treasure in to rouse me to action once more. After a quick shower we were out the door again and ready for round two of our battle with fate and the vagueries of circumstance.

First stop on the schedule was Coles from whence I set out alone on my quest to acquire new weapons with which to arm myself for the coming continuation of our struggle. These took the form of professional grade outdoor surface spray spider and insect killer, latext gloves & Aeroguard spray. My new weapons secured I returned to my beloved family and we set out once more on our epic journey. A new day. A new set of follies to follow no doubt.

Once again the drive proved simple and short now that I was acquainted with the proper route (though I did have an irrational urge to close my eyes to protect my fragile psyche whilst we drove once AGAIN through Hornsby) and once again I travelled alone with only P!nk to keep me company as my girls had once more fallen asleep very shortly into the journey.

The countryside slipped quietly by, the mountain descent and subsequent ascent on the other side of the valley were now picturesque in the daylight where the night prior they had been nightmare scenes of encroaching darkness and the unknown.

Arriving back in Wisemans Ferry we, this time, proceeded directly to our lodgings although upon reaching the first entrance, on a hunch - or perhaps a finely tuned sense of the irony with which I am routinely slapped as I go about my business, I decided to go in and take a look around in the day time to see what opportunities this part of the retreat offered that the night had hidden from us when last we were here.

And oh but what view didst meet mine eyes!

A gravel carpark devoid of trees and only thick grasses at the back of each spot which while surely harboring some crawling things, even some of the lesser Abominations, would undoubtedly be clear of the brutes which so filled my nights with visions of terror. A car park 100 yards down the road from the scene of my unmanning of the previous night. I grimaced and shook my fist at the surrounding woodlands, wishing that I was head of a large, multi-national logging venture, poised, ready to lay waste the refuge of The Hated Ones.

Turning the car around I returned to the road and proceeded to the scene of the crime. In the warm light of a magnificent country valley day... it didn't look any better a prospect than it had the night before. And now I could see all the webs enclosing the grounds like some arachnid-enchantresses shield cast over the house. However, determined to make the most of the daylight and the sense of possibility and hope it offered, I concentrated on maintaining a positive outlook and set about identifying problems and diving solutions to them.

I saw now in the light that the drive path leading off the the left which we had, the night before, assumed lead to another property did in fact simply stop at another parking spot the same distance from the main driveway as the one right in front of the house. Whereas the night before we had believed we must park the car in the spot right in front of the house and under the Abomination infested tree, I now determined that I could park the car on the main entranceway to the two spots, steeply inclined though it was. I pointed the car nose down and toward the road, stumbled out of the car, nearly fell down the incline and onto the roadway, recovered and set about retrieving the child and the luggage and delivering them both up to the house.

Traversing the grounds leading up to the house was like walking through an obstacle course of terror but the house itself was fantastic. Alot of light, high ceilings, open plan living, dining & kitchen. Spa bath! Fabulous! And now, armed as I was I could set about setting up my defences for the coming night.

But before I could even go back for a second load of luggage, the cruel hand of fate once more intruded itself upon us. And in the cruelest way yet.

Mari came out of the hallway leading to the back rooms, ashen-faced, walking with the stunned gait of one caught in a waking nightmare. I feared the worst; a daylight incursion by one of the sun-hardenned bretheren of the Abominations.

But before I could cast about for my weaponry she spoke the words that will haunt me to the end of days: "The water is brown! Coming out of the taps. We can't use the spa bath!!!!".

This last came out in a wail so haunting and terrible it caused the hairs on the back of my neck to not only rise but shrivel and turn to ashes - thin little hair ashes - upon my back. Regardless of the activities and entertainment offered by any destination we may offer our patronage, the most important thing is the spa bath.

For Mari is so enamored of them.

A planned trip to the Gold Coast later in the year, driving for two days, staying in a beach side apartment on the 29th floor is really just an elaborate way of giving Mari something nice to look at while she sits in a spa bath.

And now that which had enabled my dear wife to endure the hardships our combined incompetence and my unmanliness had inflicted upon us in the past 16 hours had been most cruelly snatched away from us in the moment of our perceived triumph over adversity. And Josie too had been keen to go for a swim in the huge but now useless bathtub.

Oh woe were we.

Ever the quintessential pitbull (actually I think of her more as a tenacious terrier), Mari sprung into action and rang the lovely people who had stayed up so late to provide directions and guide us to their, albeit spider-infested, door, to demand a refund so we could move to the motor inn which would undoubtedly have reliable plumbing (and which, we had found online before we left, also had spa baths). It turned out to be lucky that I had not yet gotten any way into retrieving the luggage as I was informed upon the conclusion of the conversation that we were moving not to the motor inn (how I had yearned for it in the brief moments of hope just past) but to another of the houses offered by the retreat. At least this one was right next to the carpark that would offer even better protection from incursion for the car than its present precarious perch astride the steep incline of the drive.

Tune in next time when we move over to the other house ("Enchantment"), get settled in, discover some dark and disturbing hints about the inhabitants of WF and set out in search of the Swiss restaurant that was the reason I chose Wisemans Ferry in the first place. Don't miss:

Episode 5: Reasonable Precautions (plus Tea-time for Hitler)