I’m sitting on the banks of a billabong at Corindi Park typing this. It’s almost 4pm and the birds are starting to come in for the night. This is our third (and last) night at this little oasis, and if this evening is the same as the past two evenings, the next two to three hours will see literally thousands of birds descend to the trees in and around the billabong. After the birds quiet down for the night, the stars come out, and if the birds number in the thousands, the visible stars must quadruple that at least.

Corindi Park is a private property of 22 acres. The owners obviously love and care for their property very much, and encourage a multitude of fauna to share their land. There’s several billabongs on the property, some with small water lilies and others with big lily blooms amongst the lily pads. Sitting outside our caravan as the sun goes down, watching the wading birds bobbing on top and around the lily pads, and listening to the evening bird song grow in volume as the visiting birds settle in for the night will make a lasting memory.

The billabong is so still, allowing reflections in the water to shine clearly.

The sun rises over the water hole opposite our caravan in the morning. In the afternoon as the sun sinks behind our van, the dying rays light up the trees giving them an orange glow that rivals the prettiest of autumn colours.

Today, we drove from here to Elland near Grafton and visited Abbey. Abbey is the gorgeous red heeler whom we had the pleasure of looking after along with her canine friend Riley, 22 cows, Charlie the rooster and his little harem of chooks, and several wild birds and parrots. For those of you who have been following this blog, you may remember our 6 – 7 weeks on the hobby farm. We remember it well, it was the stand out high-light of our first year on the road. Sadly, only Abbey remains of the two dogs and the chooks. It was around 120km round trip to see Abbey, testament to how special a dog she is. We wondered if she would remember us as clearly as we remember her. I think she did.

Both the hobby farm at Elland with the happiest domesticated animals i’ve ever seen, and this gorgeous property causes one to reflect on life in cities as opposed to life in both the oasis of Corindi Park, and the Nirvana at Elland. What comes to mind are words similar to those in the song by Dianna Ross, ‘Reflections of, the way life used to be’, or in this case, ‘Reflections of, the way life aught to be.’ Cares and worries have no place here, and one can feel their worries drifting away and being replaced by the most amazing feelings of peace.

We are so grateful that the owners of these two properties have allowed us the privilege of having a small taste of their little patches of paradise.