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Gold Coast - Surfers Paradise
Friday 22nd January
We woke up really early Friday again from the heat of the van. I wasn't feeling great and still felt down missing home, so Lisa left me on the phone while she went into town to get an Australian SIM card for her phone which was now unlocked meaning she could finally help me organise things on her phone. When she got back we had another pool day and I chilled out reading Bridget.
Much later on that night we went to drive into town to do a food shop and I happened to be driving when the incident happened. Lisa and I were bickering and not really paying attention to the road, we verged off road down into a multi-story car park in order to go to woolworths - neither of us realising what was about to happen. I drove straight under a height restriction barrier and even though that hit the roof none of us realised and then the next thing I knew I'm hearing loud bangs and what sounded like a pipe burst and wasn't able to continue driving forward. We both panicked and got out the van to see I'd driven into a height restriction that the van didn't fit into and therefore it was now wedged against the concrete ceiling. Cars were lining up behind us as well as pedestrians staring - then thankfully a bloke and his son offered to help us as they realised when I was trying to reverse the van wasn't budging. They asked Lisa to stand on the back with them as I slowly tried to reverse it out, which seemed to shift the weight and work...followed by the light in the car park ceiling dropping down and a tile. We thanked them both and were both really rattled, looked around to see if there was a security guard or anyone to tell but the bloke said accidents like this happen all the time with travellers and campervans so told us not to worry and move on.
We parked up around the corner and continued our food shop, then once we'd returned to the camp site realised the two vents on the roof had smashed now leaving two circular holes in the roof. The van was too tall for us to get on top to put anything to cover it and a storm was due to come the next day so we phoned Dad to see what we should do. A plan was made to try and get it fixed in the morning at a local campervan fixing place and then to take it back the following week hoping they wouldn't notice as we realised we we'd paid full whack for the insurance cover but of course it didn't cover roof damage! It was another inbetweeners moment for us and although my Dad tried to make light of the situation I was very teary and felt awful. We tried to sleep and thankfully didn't get rained on...
And we will eventually get to see the real surfers paradise soon.
xxx
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