Dubbo Zoo 2004 & Ironman 2005

One thousand years ago (september 2004) we hardly ever went on holiday, we were so busy working and surviving the week that we didn't think about holidays - it was almost like they were not important. Every year we went to Forster for the Ironman for one week. And twice (over 13 years of friendship) we went away for the weekend with our best friends. One weekend we went to Dubbo Zoo. It was a really fun weekend.

Fashion obviously wasn't a high priority. J was obviously experiencing hair tolerance (as in I would plead that he doesn't shave it off and he took pity on me and didn't for a few months).

But our kids grew up together. The seven of them, although not spending week days together, did spend every sunday together as a bare minimum. They were very close. When we left they actually thought that they were cousins.

Dubbo Zoo is a great place for bike riding. We cycled around (and a few of us raced the others back to the hotel (and we won thanks to the one way road system around the zoo). It was a lot of fun and I can't for the life of me work out why we didn't do more weekends away.

We always knew she was going to walk all over us - but we had no idea how much.

But she has big shoes to fill.

These twins entertaining themselves thoroughly at home.

Not that they caused that much mischief together. (This was at Forster).

Or left their big sister out of anything. (This is just before reading a book before bed).

The twins on the verandah of our unit at Forster. We rented the same unit for 7 years (until 2nd last Ironman - the last was moved to Port Macquarie) - it was situated in the middle of the cycle/running circuit - perfect location when you need to watch some of the race while your babies napped (and this was not counted as seeing him - he had to see us for one of those sightings).

C girl with her camera - a lot can be said for giving a 5 year old a camera.

On a dolpin watch tour - they obviously didn't get chips too often. We did see some dolphins.

The last ever photo of my baby as a baby. 2 days before turning the big 2 years old.

I think it is really obvious they are related - isn't it (love the eyes).

We always enjoyed the swimming in the ocean (that's as deep as we got -it was April)

With J's sister and husband (now), we had supporting down to an art. We saw him a total of 12 times during the race - yes we had to run on occassion to see him between the end of the ride and the start of the run, but he knew we were behind him - always greeted us with a smile (plus when the race is 10-12 hours long, you've got to make it as interesting as possible for the kids).

After a 3.8km swim, 182km bike ride and 4 km left to run (after 38km), he always stopped and said hello.

This holiday marked the end of an era for us. I had finally resigned from where I had started as a graduate and had 3 maternity leaves, but otherwise lived and breathed the place in every waking moment (even on maternity leave). I had been there 11 years and it took a year to get over the grief of leaving my friends (I loved the work challenge, made even more fun by working with people I really liked). I moved to a promotion , supposedly the job of my dreams . But it was too many hours, the company were doing too many things I couldn't live with and I realised I wasn't ready to deal with that side of business. This week in Forster was a turning point for our lives - and the start of "family holidays". In this photo, none of us had a passport. 18 months later, we had moved overseas to live (after volunteering).