Having spent a month in the city with only one weekend away, doing everything we had to do, we needed to escape to the country. The Brisbane Sunshine Wanderers were having a chapter gathering at Kalbar so we decided to join them. They are going on a safari to Toowoomba to a mini rally so we might do that too.
While we were driving south on the Centenary Highway, a woman joining the traffic from a slip road drove right into my space forcing me to brake severely. A horrible scraping noise developed and I had to find a place to pull out of the traffic. Two young men in a ute stopped behind us and told me that the trailer had come off the tow ball and was dragging on the chains. With their help, I recoupled the trailer, which had not suffered any significant damage, and continued on my way.
I remarked that it was such little dramas that made up the rich texture of life on the road but Jean felt that she didn't need dramas like this no matter how small.
We arrived at Kalbar in time for happy hour with the few motorhomers who, like us, had turned up a day early.
We spent the day chatting, eating and drinking. Many more people arrived some we knew already and some were new friends.
In the evening we all played "Queens" Trivial Pursuit. Since some of the questions were very obscure local geography, we didn't do as well as we normally do but it was fun.
We went in to Boonah to do the laundry and to buy some things. One of the things was a chain to tie the trailer safety chains up to the tow ball to keep the trailer tow bar from touching the ground when the tow ball connection fails. This is a legal requirement because the trailer tow bar only has to dig into the road surface to drag the whole rig into a disatrous situation. Very few trailers come fitted with a legal hitch. I had been planning to modify mine but the priority was low because I didn't think that I would ever forget to lock the tow ball. I had committed the unforgivable offence of neglecting the need for redundancy in everything that affects safety. I was exceeding lucky to have got away with my mistake on this occasion given that $15,000 worth of Terios lives on the trailer. The accident raised the priority of the modification to the highest level and the rig is now both safe and legal. I'm also confident that I will not forget to thoroughly check the trailer hitch before every journey.
In the afternoon we had a "Queens" garden party. Some came in fancy dress which was the intention but we dressed up in our best clothes and went as Sir Robin and Lady Something. When we won the prize for the croquet competition, I was dubbed by the "Red Queen" using a croquet mallet on my bald head
In the morning, the chapter had a meeting. Apart from a little inflamed interaction between a couple of people, the meeting was well run and informative for the members of the chapter. Many people were upset by the "politics" and there was a suggestion that the chapter revert to having meetings only every three months so that most gatherings would be entirely happy events. It is sad when disagreements about how things should be done turns personal and the aggravation spills out onto other people. When a chapter breaks into two groups with differing agendas, the smart thing to do is for the two camps to agree that one lot should form another chapter but that only works when there are a significant number of people on each side of the case.
In the afternoon I flew a kite while the others played disk bowls.
At happy hour we had a briefing for the safari which will take us from here to Toowoomba over the next few days. I marked up a map with the overnight stops and someone else offered to scan it and print copies for all those who need help with the navigation.