Well we had planned to go to Byron Bay, then we cancelled, then after teary phone calls, we decided to surprise That Other Eldest Daughter by going down. This would be the last time we would see her until we know not when, plus never having been to Byron Bay it was a good excuse to go.
It took about 3 hours to do the drive at some times slowing down to 11km/h on a freeway. Australian drivers just have no idea how to merge and off course then every other lane of drivers panics and slows down as well for no reason.
We finally caught up with That Other Eldest Daughter at "The Farm", just outside Byron Bay. Then we headed to their accommodation about 500m from the beach. After getting changed we all headed to the beach, me driving with the other elderly visitors, the rest walking.
On entering the water and getting about 50ms out I realised the electronic car key was still in my pocket. Bugger, I quickly left the water, pulled the key apart and left it to dry in the sun with That Other Girl.
Over the course of the afternoon, there were some drunken possibly "ice'd" up idiots causing a ruckus nearby. In the group e agreed whoever took care of the antagonist would in all likelihood receive a standing ovation from the beach goers. Well possibly about 30 minutes later the antagonist decided to leave. I decided to keep my back to him in order not to be drawn into anything. Bending down to change lens on the camera, he decided to slap my arse as he walked past. That was it, I basically said to him did he want to try again while I was looking? Trouble is I looked absolutely livid and was waving my walking stick like a weapon at him. He sobered real quick, apologising. I basically verbally abused him and told him to stop apologising and just leave the beach as we were all sick and tired of his crap. He skulked away never to be seen again that day. Shortly we left to go back for some rest at the accommodation.
as luck would have it my key worked to get home. It continued working until about 30 minutes before we wanted to leave, then it stopped. I tried the assist number, but being keyless (they do have an emergency door key hidden from view) I could only enter the car (setting off the car alarm), but not start it. A hair dryer to the key got it working enough to get the car started, but then the car claimed it could not find the key. So with Auto Sop/Start disabled and barely enough fuel to get home we left. A clear run at night saw us home in just over 2 hours with about 50kms of fuel left in the tank.
Postscript: After being bagged with desiccant for a few days, the key has recovered thankfully, saving a $470 bill for a replacement key.
Photos:
2018-01-06 - Byron Bay
