Having a tiny adventure

Coffee and a kookaburra

As I sat with my coffee out on the small wooden deck, watching the world slowly wake up and come to life, I was reminded of why I was here.  On this trip. It was for the solitude. For a slice of the simple life. Off the grid. To have a tiny adventure.

In the early morning light, chapters of the book I was reading, The Truants by Kate Weinberg, were interspersed with trying to get the perfect shot of the friendly kookaburra that had come to say hello.  At least, that’s what I thought he was trying to convey through his inimitable laugh. In the distance a cockerel was crowing, announcing to whomever would listen that it was time to get up.

This was the first morning waking up in the tiny house that we were to spend the weekend in.  Owned by a company called In2thewild, there are a number of these tiny houses scattered across New South Wales, and Victoria. We were up in the Lake Macquarie region, in a small village called Wyee.  Our home for the weekend was, called Robinson (Crusoe). This was actually our fall back option as we had originally planned to stay at Isabella, near Kangaroo Valley, but in the time between booking, and visiting, she had been moved to Orange. This would have doubled our planned travelling time.

Refueling after a long drive

Located 100 kms from Sydney, the trip to our tiny house should have only taken 1 and a half hours.  Having lived in Sydney for many years, I now know to add a lot of fat into that. On the way up, cruising up the Pacific Coast highway, we did it in under 2 and a half hours. Coming home was a different story.  Labour Day weekend traffic, and a crash on the Pacific Highway had us parking back up at home some 3 hours later.

We were told we had a strict 3pm check in. How this works in practice, as we already had the code for the key drop-box, I am not completely sure. But with time on our hands we decided to get some lunch in the nearby village of Morriset.  We were not spoiled for choice. It was midday on the Saturday of a long weekend, so where were all the people? Maybe all the in the Lake Macquarie Hotel (pubs tend to be called hotels in Australia), but as we walked past, the doors were so dark we couldn’t even tell if that was open.  Most things in the village appeared to either be shut up, or abandoned. Even the police station had a polite notice on the door telling all those in dire need of assistance that “the station was not manned today”.

Our saviour, which I use lightly, was the Star and Grill, which looked busier than it looked salubrious.  Nevertheless, as the saying goes, beggars are not in a position to be choosers.  Looking for options that are hard to get wrong I went for the homemade (my bold) chicken schnitzel, which left me wondering what other kind there was.  Perhaps they have different chickens up here I thought. Where the schnitzel grows on the bird.  Who knows.

Schnitzel demolished, we had now killed enough time to check ourselves into the tiny house that was to be our home for the next few days.  It was time to start having our tiny adventure. Following our directions, which we had printed out knowing how patchy phone coverage would be, we did the short drive from Morriset to Wyee, then turned off the main road, down a side road, and up into the forest.  Bumping around on the uneven gravel road up the hill, we spotted the gate, set back from the road, with a “In2TheWild” sign telling us we had arrived.

First impressions 

Driving through the open gate, and parking just off to the right, we could immediately see the house, nestled down amongst the trees.  I use the word house, but I have to be honest, it was even tinier than I had imagined, and I had seen all the pictures beforehand. There were no cats being swung this weekend.  With a faint smell of burnt wood in the air, and a constant waft of eucalyptus, we carried our bags, which included all our food and drink for the weekend, down to the house. Thankfully we had brought an esky, and had just bought a bag of ice from the local servo, as the fridge in the house was the size of a small beer fridge.  Enough room for some milk, our wide collection of salami and cheeses, plus a few beers. All the essentials for a weekend away.

Now, hands up those of you that have seen Dr Who.  Good, then you will know what a tardis is. Well, once you get past how small this house looked on the outside, check out the picture above, when I got inside it threw me how much room we seemed to have.  There was a small kitchen, with a two hob stove serviced by the gas bottles outside. There was an oversize sink, that in my opinion could be swapped out for a smaller one creating additional, or some, food preparation space.  The toilet looked like a real toilet, and it wasn’t until you flushed, that you were immediately reminded of pooing on an aeroplane. You weren’t plumbed in, and your waste was only going as far as the septic tank underneath the house.  The bathroom also included a very modern looking shower that we could only ever get to spit out cold water.

Large windows all around the house created a further sense of space.  What the windows upstairs didn’t have were blinds. The eye mask that is provided was going to come in useful if we wanted to sleep beyond the rising of the sun. We were going to be embracing our circadian rhythm this weekend.  To get up to bed we had to negotiate 6 very steep, smooth wooden steps. If this looked challenging now you should have seen me attempting it after a bottle of cabernet.  

Not that you would need storage space for this kind of minimalist weekend trip, but there were a few cupboards. Enough to store some food, and the board games, and a deck of cards that were provided to give you options for keeping entertained once night set in.  The stairs were constructed in such a way that the bottom few doubled up as storage space, with a tiny bookshelf under one of them. Inside we had everything we would need for the next few days, and outside on the deck there was the all important BBQ.

When off grid literally means just that

Being off grid, and powered by solar panels, the house does not have any electrical power sockets. This meant that this was the most redundant I had ever seen Victoria’s hairdryer and straighteners.  It also meant we were in the (un)enviable, you decide, position of not being able to charge our phones. How often are any of us in this position in this day and age, tethered as we are to our mobile devices.  Believe me, it is very liberating. Just knowing that not only have you not got a full mobile signal, but you can’t charge your phone up any way.

Now, let me say something here.  As much as I love being out in the wilderness, having a tiny adventure, and the Instagram photos of tables, heavily laden with a feast of food, look very appealing, nobody ever tells you about the large flying creatures, and the mosquitoes that appear to have been on steroids.  I love the idea of channelling my inner Thoreau, imagining I am sat on the edge of my own pond, quietly reading my book, with a glass of wine. But damn, if only those flies had read the script. Later in the evening, it wasn’t the flies that scared the bejeesus out of us.  It was the huntsman spider, the size of a small cat, (that could be a slight exaggeration, based on the amount of wine we had drunk) than ran across the outside of the window, right by our heads. At this point, I started frantically looking around the house to see if he could sneak in anywhere, and eat me in the night.

Maybe if I lit the campfire, that would discourage both the flies and mosquitoes.  Ah, the campfire. I wasted a whole New Yorker, and the best part of a box of matches trying to get the fire going without firelighters.  There was a “survival kit” provided but I wish the sachet of porridge had been swapped for some much more practical firelighters. It had gotten dark, literally, by the time I admitted defeat on the first night.  We had no kindling. We had no fire. I was proving to be no Bear Grylls. I had to have a second whisky nightcap to drown my disappointment.

A new dawn and final impressions

The morning dawned bright, with an hour lost to the clocks going forward.  This was inconsequential to us as we were not on any kind of timetable this weekend.  Clambering, which is the only way I can describe it, precariously down the stairs, I brewed up coffee with my beloved Aeropress, and made a Yorkshire tea, nice and strong for Victoria.  Experience has taught me to always pack some fresh coffee, and my Aeropress when going on trips. There was a cafetiere in the house, but the only coffee provided was that instant kind that comes in glass jars. I didn’t even think people still drank this.

Back on the deck, the snap and sizzle of a frying pan told me that breakfast was on the way.  Bacon, egg, and black pudding breakfast. This has become a travel classic, always cooked up on our trips away.  Sat back in my Adirondack chair, hypnotised by the trees, blankets of green laid on top of the lines and lines of wooden sentries, I was rested, and very relaxed.  Pockets of sunshine crept through the canopy as I marvelled at how easy it could be to slow our lives down when we are mindful of it. This weekend was about having a tiny adventure. Our intention was to unplug, unwind, read, and relax this weekend.  Sipping my coffee, looking out into the forest, I had concluded that we had made a great success of it.