Birthday Roadtrip

This week, Michael and I actually had two whole days off together, and as it is his birthday next week, we decided to go and visit his parents, as he never sees them.
We set off late, owing to the cat's decision to hide outside under the stairs instead of agreeing to be put away safetly from the recent roaming big feral dog. None of Michael's grass waggling or food shaking would tempt her out.
Once on the road, the GPS packed it in at Rosewood, a mere 15km from home. When we finally got the thing going again it lead us into false hope, guiding us all the way into downtown Maroochidor (? I cant spell it) before promptly trying to lead us onto the third exit of a roundabout that no longer existed.
Fianlly, 3 hours after leaving home, we reached the destination and were very happy to be out of the car.
Michael's parents decided to show us around a little, as neither of us had seen much (in my case none at all) of the Sunshine Coast. We headed for The Spirit House, an amazing Thai restaurant, which is pretty famous, having its own book and residing in its extensive rainforest asian style gardens. The pictures are the bamboo and cute little lanterns that light the path. The restaurant is buried deep in the garden and is open every day for lunch, as well as cooking schools and a gift shop. We have been dying to go there since we heard about it months ago, and this trip was not the time.
The next stop was the Ginger Factory, which was a good idea, as the hilly countryside and Michael's dad's driving made me car sick.

The ginger factory is literally covered in ginger plants. So much so that when Michael stood next to this gingerbread man statue, he thought it actually smelt like ginger. There is also a honey room and bee tour where you learn how honey is produced, random, but a nice tourist thing to do.
Today, being a much nicer and less tiring day than yesterday, we drove up the Noosa Heads. We spend a lovely hour walking through the expensive shops before heading to a restaurant called Ricky's which is next to the river (the beach was looking threatening and windy, so we went somewhere more sheltered). The beach was bordered by the these funky looking palms, that Michael's mum called 'pandamous' with roots that continue to grow on the outside.


Ricky's turned out to be a great choice, further away from the crowds of kids on the main drag and the beach, it was quiet, sunny and had an unexpectedly fab menu. We had a tapas of crumbed / fried olives with a yummy creamy dipping sauce, pork belly that was caramelised with some kind of citrus, cajun spiced prawns with rocket, spanner crab spaghettini, a terrine of fois gras, ham hock and duck, potatoes cooked in duck fat and finally a tasting plate of desserts. A bottle of Shaw and Smith sav blanc topped off the 'quick lunch' and two hours later we were lamenting having to drive back this afternoon to go back to work tomorrow.
On the way home from the Sunshine Coast, we got lost, again, and this time we had only got 5km from Michael's parents house (stupid GPS has a death wish).
We finally found the way and took a road that Michael's dad recommended from the usual boring route. We skirted across country via Kilcoy towards Esk, the turned off to Somerset Dam (Lake Somerset), which is apparently pretty cool. Cool is an understatement.
The road skirts the dam along its whole west side, heading up and down hills, with amazing views the whole way, picturesque shimmering water that still has huge dead leafless trees sticking out, way out from the shore. The road was deserted and the afternoon had come out sunny. The 50km detour travelled alongside the dam for about 25 km before hitting the main town of Somerset where the dam wall overshadows the whole town, which is perched just above the high water mark (if the dam burst).
A tiny town, it reminded me of Colo or Jamieson or Eildon, right in the middle of nowhere, with huge rolling hills covered in a bizarre range of trees, at that nice part of the afternoon where everything starts to look cosy and homey.
Once we'd driven past the dam and Somerset we headed into more open sweeping view country, with wild flowers in white and pink lining both sides of the road, everything shining under the late afternoon sun and blowing gently so that the whole roadside looked like it was covered in silver.
At this point, as you may have guessed, my camera and phone batteries both died, leaving me without anything except my memory to record this great drive home. We'd never known that we were so close to such a beautiful drive, accustomed to everything around being fairly flat, except for the area near the hotel. Judging by the campsite at Somerset, alot of people know this place exists but no one had told us before. This is a definate must do on a lazy afternoon with a picnic and we cant wait to go back again, armed with camera.