It’s funny how your early memories get all mixed up.
I know we went on many family holidays when I was a child, most of them driving holidays. The memories I have of those early holidays are all jumbled together. I can only remember snippets of things or isolated incidents.
I remember our old car. The car that drove us all over Victoria and further.
I don’t remember the make or the model but I know it was small and white and had red vinyl seats that your thighs stuck to in the summer.
I don’t remember how on earth we managed to pack everyone and every thing into that car and drive around the country, no air-conditioning and only my father’s choice of classical radio to break the up the sounds of arguing kids.
I remember pads of paper and pencils and playing ‘paddocks’ and ‘eye spy’.
I remember being crammed in behind the drivers seat. Having no leg room is the price you pay for being the smallest.
I remember the holiday when that car died.
I remember holidaying at the Grampians in an old and musty smelling holiday house that I was sure came straight out of a novel. I remember meeting up with friends on the last day there to try our hand at rock climbing.
I don’t remember how old I was, or if I actually tried rock climbing but I remember sitting in the back seat as my mother drove down the track near Mt Arapiles. I remember a thump and a bang and I remember a huge boulder suddenly being under my feet where the floor of the car should have been.
I don’t remember the choice words my father said when he found out, but I am sure there were many.
I don’t remember the car being declared un-fixable or the adults working out how we would all get home and what we would do with the car. But I do remember that we stayed an extra night, our friends making room at their camp site.
I remember it was the first time I had ever slept in a tent.
I remember all the kids were crammed in like sardines, but I got to sleep nearest the door, with the most space. The price everyone else pays for having a little sister who sleep walks.
I remember people talking about the mouse plague but I didn’t remember that in the middle of the night when I was scared of the strange creatures that were falling on to the roof of the tent and then skiing down the side to plop onto the ground and scurry off.
I remember helping the other kids to dig deep narrow holes in the sandy dirt to trap the hundreds of mice, but I don’t remember if we ever caught any.
I remember our old car being hauled home on a trailer but I don’t remember if it was ever fixed or if that was the end of the red vinyl seats.
I remember many things from our family holidays. All jumbled together and mixed up. I remember good things and bad things, funny things and crazy things. I remember things that have since become family legends, stories that have been retold so many times I can’t remember if these memories are my own or someone else’s.
We are working in our own memories. I hope that my kids have wonderful, random, mixed up, holiday memories too.
What is your favourite family holiday memory?
The wonderful people over at KidSpot put me in their Top 50 Bloggers list! I do have to wonder what on earth they were thinking when they included me among 49 other amazing Australian Women bloggers, but hey I’ll take that moment of insanity on their part and say thank you! Todays post enters me to win a family holiday to Dunk Island!! You can vote for me and help me win if you like, or you could check out some of the other awesome bloggers and vote for them. There is no sign ups, and you can vote once for as many bloggers as you like, just click and vote. So go check out the list and I’m sure you can find someone on there that you know really needs a holiday!
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