Easter 2007 – Houseboat Day 1
05 April 2007, Thursday – The start of a much anticipated trip.
12 of us decided to go on a Houseboat trip together this Easter and have been preparing for this trip for months! (We had menus, shopping lists, meetings and discussions, even uniforms!) Finally the day has arrived and we were all so excited about this trip.
12 of us decided to go on a Houseboat trip together this Easter and have been preparing for this trip for months! (We had menus, shopping lists, meetings and discussions, even uniforms!) Finally the day has arrived and we were all so excited about this trip.
Rows and rows of houseboats waiting for the Easter crowds to board....
Roger, Ian, Pei and Jit proceeded to Shipper Drive at Coomera for the briefing at mid day. (After the briefing, Roger had given me a call and instructed that all of us that are still in Brisbane are to finish our shower first before starting our journey to Coomera. There are only 2000 litres of water for 12 of us for 5 days. Our initial reaction was – WHAT?! )
Roger, Ian and Pei took time off for a pose during the briefing session...
Heng Onn, Haw, Shy, Esmond and myself reluctantly worked full day on Thursday before each of us met up according to plans. Heng Onn will meet up with Haw and Kareen at Kelvin Grove, before picking Christina up from home. Shy and myself will meet up with Esmond at the Valley before leaving for Sunnybank to meet up with Heng Onn and gang.
We split up (Christina and Kareen shopped for groceries at Woolworths at SunnyPark, Heng Onn and Haw went with Shy to his place for shower, Esmond and myself returning home for shower and last minute packing, loading the boot with our purchases bought the night before from Welcome Supermart) before meeting for dinner at Little Singapore at 8pm.
After dinner and dessert (bubble tea!), 3 cars (Heng Onn, Shy and Esmond) travelled in a convoy and headed for Shipper Drive at Coomera. We had originally planned for 2 cars but have had too much luggage and groceries to bring that Shy was activated to drive another car.
When we arrived, the gate to the pier was locked and we were told that we had to wait for Security to come and open the gate for us. Luckily, not more than 10 minutes after the call, somebody with a black jacket on a bike came rolling along. The gates were opened, cars were parked and we started unloading our goods into metal trolleys.
Roger and Jit came to meet us at the car park and couldn’t believe their eyes when all the goods were loaded into the trolleys. We needed 4 trolleys for all our stuff! 4 full loads!
Then we were informed that due to safety reasons, the houseboat has been anchored off the pier and we needed to go in batches on a small motorboat across to the houseboat. We were a little sceptical but were still upbeat about it and had proceeded towards the pier when we were told that half a trolley load of stuff had fallen in the water.
For a moment, we were all stunned and couldn’t really register what we’ve just heard. It wasn’t until the information was repeated and seeing some bags of groceries floating in the water that came to realise that we’ve lost some of our stuff to the water!
We frantically try to recall what we’ve put into that particular trolley and realised that they were all stuff bought from Asian grocery stores (which is not readily available there! Aaargh!). Meanwhile, Roger and Jit boarded the motorboat to scoop up all that were floating in the water.
When that’s done, we boarded the motorboat in 3 batches and headed for our houseboat. We re-packed all the stuff into cupboards, eskies and storage areas before we settled down for a briefing (which is where we learned that we had to take very very short showers – 1 to 2 minutes water running time – once a day, due to limited power from the solar panels, the TV can only be turned on for 3 hours a day maximum, how to use the toilet and discharge it when the septic tank is full, etc etc)
After the briefing, we had to draw lots to decide who gets which room for the trip. Heng Onn picked out 5 cards from UNO and let each representative from each couple draw a card. In the end, the rooms with double beds go to Pei & Jit, Haw & Kareen. Rooms with double deck berths go to Heng Onn & Christina and Esmond & Rachel. Pearl & Shy takes the trundle in the living room, while Ian and Roger will each take a sofa.
Once everyone is settled into his / her own rooms, we went to the upper deck where we shared some beer and have a game of UNO. By midnight, we were all tired from our long day and headed back to our beds for sleep.
We split up (Christina and Kareen shopped for groceries at Woolworths at SunnyPark, Heng Onn and Haw went with Shy to his place for shower, Esmond and myself returning home for shower and last minute packing, loading the boot with our purchases bought the night before from Welcome Supermart) before meeting for dinner at Little Singapore at 8pm.
After dinner and dessert (bubble tea!), 3 cars (Heng Onn, Shy and Esmond) travelled in a convoy and headed for Shipper Drive at Coomera. We had originally planned for 2 cars but have had too much luggage and groceries to bring that Shy was activated to drive another car.
When we arrived, the gate to the pier was locked and we were told that we had to wait for Security to come and open the gate for us. Luckily, not more than 10 minutes after the call, somebody with a black jacket on a bike came rolling along. The gates were opened, cars were parked and we started unloading our goods into metal trolleys.
Roger and Jit came to meet us at the car park and couldn’t believe their eyes when all the goods were loaded into the trolleys. We needed 4 trolleys for all our stuff! 4 full loads!
Then we were informed that due to safety reasons, the houseboat has been anchored off the pier and we needed to go in batches on a small motorboat across to the houseboat. We were a little sceptical but were still upbeat about it and had proceeded towards the pier when we were told that half a trolley load of stuff had fallen in the water.
For a moment, we were all stunned and couldn’t really register what we’ve just heard. It wasn’t until the information was repeated and seeing some bags of groceries floating in the water that came to realise that we’ve lost some of our stuff to the water!
We frantically try to recall what we’ve put into that particular trolley and realised that they were all stuff bought from Asian grocery stores (which is not readily available there! Aaargh!). Meanwhile, Roger and Jit boarded the motorboat to scoop up all that were floating in the water.
When that’s done, we boarded the motorboat in 3 batches and headed for our houseboat. We re-packed all the stuff into cupboards, eskies and storage areas before we settled down for a briefing (which is where we learned that we had to take very very short showers – 1 to 2 minutes water running time – once a day, due to limited power from the solar panels, the TV can only be turned on for 3 hours a day maximum, how to use the toilet and discharge it when the septic tank is full, etc etc)
After the briefing, we had to draw lots to decide who gets which room for the trip. Heng Onn picked out 5 cards from UNO and let each representative from each couple draw a card. In the end, the rooms with double beds go to Pei & Jit, Haw & Kareen. Rooms with double deck berths go to Heng Onn & Christina and Esmond & Rachel. Pearl & Shy takes the trundle in the living room, while Ian and Roger will each take a sofa.
Once everyone is settled into his / her own rooms, we went to the upper deck where we shared some beer and have a game of UNO. By midnight, we were all tired from our long day and headed back to our beds for sleep.
The pier at dusk....
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