The next stop on our journey down to Melbourne was Jingellic. To get there we drove down to Gundegai where we joined the Snowy Mountains Highway, we love this route which takes us through Batlow and the apple growing country. The landscape is usually very green on this trip but, even this high up, it has been a very long, hot, dry summer so we drove past mile after mile of brown fields and paddocks broken up by huge lush green apple orchards covered in gauze. I thought this was to keep the bugs out but apparently it is to shade the fruit from the harsh sun. It is hard to believe that snow falls not far from here in winter. 
After passing through Tumbarumba we reached our destination for the next couple of nights. We have stayed in Jingellic before and, although it is a bit of a detour from our route, it is well worth it. The camping is free with the pub on one side of the camp area and the Murray River on the other. It was very busy in the evenings but emptied out during the day as caravanners moved on only to be replaced by a new set of Grey Nomads the following evening. The Grey Nomads are a huge community of retirees who have sold their homes and spend their lives on the road spending their childrens' inheritances and we see them everywhere. They seem to vanish during school holidays (many of them do house and pet sitting duties) then they reappear as soon as the kids go back to school. They are very proud of their Grey Nomad status and often have statements on the back of their vans like 'Bruce and Darleen. Adventure Before Dementia.'
 We spent two days in Jingellic and did pretty much nothing but read and paddle in the Murray, it was great. It was so beautiful I could have stayed for much longer but there was a purpose to our journey so we had to press on. The next job was to drop Monty at the kennels we had booked. This was in Sunbury and took us into Melbourne a different way, across the Macedon Ranges which were massive, undulating plains (brown again). Sunbury itself was a funny place, it is just a commutable distance from the city and there are endless new estates being built. All the new builds are huge McMansions as they are known in Australia, supposed to show wealth by sheer size alone, taste does not appear to come into it. 

Anyway, we arrived at Shaun and Zoe's and managed to park the caravan outside much to the horror of some of the neighbours, and the next day met up with Shaun's parents at the Avalon Air Show. 

 The air show was sensational, I had expected the flying displays to go on for about an hour then the rest of the time to be spent looking at planes but no, the flying went on for the entire duration of the show. It was staggeringly impressive, I can't begin to say what I enjoyed the most during the daytime it was that good. However, there was a real highlight when darkness fell.
We had seen a glider being towed up at dusk and forgotten about it when suddenly it lit up in the night sky. It was covered in LED lights and performed a beautiful balletic dance perfectly matched to music while shooting fireworks out of the ends of its wings until it reached the ground, unbelievable! You will have to take my word for it because I couldn't get a decent photo.
Next day was the engagement party which was a huge success. Congratulations Zoe and Shaun!