About seven minutes from our house by the lake, my phone goes into 'SOS' mode... therefore no phone or internet for about 10 kilometres. This weekend, we arrived there on Friday night 8pm and we left there this morning, Monday at 5am... 57 hours of phone and internet free bliss. If I belonged to a different network, my phone would work fine. If my house had a booster antenna, I would be able to pick up the signal from the other network (and we are looking into it, but there is quite a large expense associated with it). But, even though I was a little edgy about not having phone or internet access when we first settled the house 3 weekends ago, it's actually been wonderful without it...
The boys and I ventured around our little town and found some more discoveries... we discovered the cafe, fish n chip & pizza shop in the caravan park store, we found the picnic point with a playground, electric barbecues and a magical view, and we discovered a fire track that leads up to a lookout. We chatted with a few locals (or, as my boys would say, I chatted with a few locals) who told me to check out the local boat club this weekend for a few social 'getting to know the community' drinks, and the boys got into their board shorts for the first time and took a dip in the lake.
At the house, the boys got into throwing their weight around with an axe chopping up some firewood, we pruned some trees to make them fire-safe for the up-coming fire season and we had a campfire scraping away all the pine needles off the ground for instant kindling, assisting our 'fire safe' strategy. We played board games on the deck, watching the pelicans and eagles flying about, and the water-skiers and kayakers enjoying the beautiful waters. It was amazingly relaxing, and it was so good seeing my boys enjoying the outdoors and appreciating the nicer things in life.
It was only when we walked up to the lookout and I started taking some photos that I noticed I actually got reception on my phone from this 'middle of no where track' in the Delatite Forest and I had 8 emails come in... but I just scanned through them, realised there was nothing that couldn't wait, and enjoyed the rest of the weekend with my precious little men.
On the drive home, in the previous weeks, as soon as we got to the end of the road where I know the service comes back in, I'm busy checking if anyone loves me... but I didn't even look today until I actually made it home, a little over 2 and half hours after I could get service.
It is nice having a break from technology and just enjoying the people you love. It does help when you can admire the beauty that's around you, and it does make you appreciate all the little things that make you whole, and really the phone and internet don't even come close to bringing out the beauty in who you are.
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