Our holiday at the beach

We had a great time at our beach holiday on Phillip Island. We rented a holiday house at Cowes for a week, spent a lot of time at the beach just mucking around, playing cricket, excavating canals, moats and dams in the sand, and took drives and short walks around the Island.

When we first arrived in Cowes, we thought our holiday was doomed to disaster because as we rocked up to the holiday house we had originally booked – and paid for in full – we discovered that it was still occupied – by the owners! – and so not available. However, the real estate agents who were managing the holiday accommodation (they didn't realise the owners were over-staying!) came through wonderfully well for us and immediately offered us an alternative, and clearly better, house – at no extra cost to us!


I was really looking forward to the sun, surf and sand, but there wasn't much sun because we got a lot of overcast weather the first half of the week, and the waves at the beaches at Cowes are quite gentle. Perfect for young kids to play at the beach, but not much surf. My second son, Jamie, treated the beach like a giant sandpit - with water views.

We did make it to Smiths Beach for one afternoon, which was great for catching a few waves on the boogie board. I'm so glad I learned how to do that two summers ago at Wilsons Prom.

I really enjoyed the chance to fly my kite on the beach. It's one of the most satisfying things to do – if you manage to get the kite to fly in the first place! The first day I tried, there wasn't enough of a breeze to fly it.

The second day I tried, I managed to get it high into the air. The wind on the beach was strong enough to carry the kite to the full extent of the string, and to let me relax on the beach!

Shelley's mum and her partner Chris joined us for a couple of days on our first weekend. Chris took my eldest son Jacob on his first fishing trip – off Cowes pier. They caught two flathead! I had dirty job of cleaning and filleting them, but they tasted good.

It was great that Jacob got a chance to handle the rod and reel in the fish - he was so excited at catching his first fish that he had to call Nana back at the holiday house to tell her about it! I was on dad duty looking after Jamie, but after his nap I took him for a walk to the pier to visit the fisherman.


We also headed out to The Nobbies, and walked along the boardwalk. That part of Phillip Island is wild and windy, but the walk is worth it to get a good view of the Nobbies (above right) and Seal Rock in the distance. We also caught a glimpse of a couple of the little fairy penguins in their burrows, which was surprising considering it was daytime.


In all, it was a lot of fun and really great to get away from work and the usual routine, and relax. You can see the whole Phillip Island holiday set on my flickr site. I've included more detail in the descriptions for the photos, so you can get a better idea of what we did. Enjoy. I know we did.