A few years ago, during the childless period, which came just after the Jurassic Age, I was young and carefree and had just commenced my Christmas break. A co-worker friend mentioned that they were taking a quick trip to Victoria and driving down the East Coast (from Noosa) with surf stops all the way. Always in there for a surf trip I quickly threw up my hand for the position of co-driver.

We left first thing in the early hours of the next morning. I quickly encountered the first of a few hiccups that were to ensue. My friend had neglected to tell me about his pet cockatoo 'Hurricane' a bird that was aptly named I quickly discovered. Hurricane introduced himself to me by burying his claws in the back of my head and beating me around the ears with his wings. After going two to three rounds with my feathered combatant in the small cab of the moving vehicle we retreated to neutral corners where we both stayed for the rest of our trip, with both of us keeping a watchful eye on the other.

After one of the most surfless and stressful (three days of vigilante cockatoo cross rottweiler watching) surf trips I have ever been on we arrived in Victoria. Not long after arriving at my friends parents' house on the Mornington Peninsula he took off to take care of some business and left me in the care of his eccentric father.

Dear old dad had not long recovered from surgery for testicular cancer which he proceeded to describe for me in detail including all the nitty-gritty post-operative effects. Riveting stuff. I was soon to discover that my friend had decided to remain in Victoria for a few weeks and would not be making the return trip to Noosa as planned. To cap things off my girlfriend (now my beautiful wife) was arriving that day and had planned to return with us (and help protect me from Hurricane). After trying to secure flights from Melbourne to Noosa the week before Christmas and being greeted with hysterical laughter by every travel agent and booking officer we spoke to, we decided to look for other options.

My friend (I was starting to use the term rather loosely by this stage) who was feeling rather guilty mentioned that his brother had a cheap little car to sell. We went and viewed the fifteen year old Valiant Gallant. It was the size of a shoe box, however it ran and amazingly the aircon worked, we bought it. I ran into another old friend, Les, that night who also wanted to return to Noosa and decided to join us in the shoe box. So the next day we set off for what we hoped would be a less eventful return journey.

That night we had made it to the Wodonga/Albury border. We decided to take a short stop. We noticed that there was a horror movie showing at the Wodonga drive-in. With all of us being scary movie buffs we decided to investigate. No-one was on duty at the entrance, in fact it was shut with the only gate open being the exit.

We thought ‘what the hey’ we'll drive in that way and when someone comes to investigate we'll pay for our tickets. The movie played out and finished with no-one asking us to pay so we left and continued on our journey.

A little way down the road I crossed the bridge and the border into Albury and did not expect what I was greeted with. As I rounded a bend in the road at first I was blinded by the bank of floodlights that were aimed at our car. Through the tears I could make out at least thirty uniform police, an array of police cars, motorbikes and buses. Rather elaborate for avoiding movie tickets was the first thought that came to mind. A rather senior policeman (I could tell this by the amount of silverware on his shoulders) approached the car which I had wisely pulled to the curb. He did that police thing of motioning me to wind down the window.

“Evening officer, what seems to be the problem?” I said trying to sound nonchalant, whilst shitting myself. He just stared at me and then Michelle and asked what was wrong with my friend in the back. I looked over at Les who was fast asleep with his beanie pulled down over his face. Les was a notorious deep sleeper and could sleep through anything. “Les”, I yelled. “Les”, Michelle yelled.  “Les”, Michelle, I and the police inspector all yelled together. Just as the inspector was motioning for back up Les stirred and sat up. “What's the problem?” he asked blearily. The inspector asked him to remove his beanie, which he did and after a few minutes of staring at a blinking bewildered Les he looked at our plates and asked us if we were going home. Straight home I replied, neglecting to tell him that home was a few hundred kilometers up the road. He told us, “Off you go then. We're looking for a couple of bad men so be careful and have a good Christmas.” We hoped it was going to end up that way.

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