THERE must be something special about holidaying at the Narrawong Island Holiday Park, because many of the campers there have been returning to the same spot for decades.

A walk around the grounds shows elaborate camping set ups, with barbecues blazing and TV screens set up on trestle tables, surrounded by dads and exclusively tuned to the Boxing Day Test cricket.

Groups are on the move picking their way through guy ropes, either to or from the beach, and the place swarms with kids of all ages – riding bikes, kicking the footy, and begging their parents for change to get ice creams, lollies or chips from the shop.

“It’s just a really nice and safe family environment,” says Markeeta Rietman.

Ms Rietman is from Heywood, and barely missed a summer at Narrawong for three decades while she was growing up.

She now lives in Perth, and due to difficulties with travel is back at the park for the first time in three years.

“It was too difficult with COVID and the borders and everything so I wasn’t able to get here, it’s definitely nice to be in Narrawong again.

“It’s a good place, generations just seem to keep coming back.”

Their campsite is full of kids – among them is nine-year-old Khya Isailovic who ran The Observer through her bracelet shop business plan in great detail, along with her summer highlights.

“It’s a really fun place I think, I enjoy swimming in the river and at the beach and playing with my friends,” she said.

“They don’t come until a bit after Christmas, so I’ve been making bracelets and rings with my loom band that I got for Kris Kringle, and I’m going to open the shop tomorrow because I have made enough of them to sell them.”

The middle lane of the powered site area is “Heywood Street” informs Rita Handreck, who is camped with her family about 100m down the road.

“We started coming here more than 30 years ago, and now our daughter comes with her baby, so there’s three generations of us here.”

Her daughters still make the annual pilgrimage to Narrawong from their respective homes in Queensland and Geelong, to take part in  Handreck holiday traditions including board games, cricket, and lots of trips to the beach.

“It’s great, the beach is beautiful, we meet here with some friends from Warrnambool, and when work starts you can stay here and not have to take annual leave,” Ms Handreck said.

The next road across, Portlanders Danielle and Jamie Walsh are joined by their caravan park neighbours of at least a decade, under the gazebo in front of their van watching day three of the Test match.

They arrived on Boxing Day and will stay into the New Year, with a “dangerous” cards night, footy tipping competition, Brownlow night, and plenty of cricket to come between now and then, they say.

Eight of the sites behind them are taken up by a group from Ballarat who have returned each year since 2000 and refer to themselves as ‘the Narrawong crew’.

“There’s 34 of us now, and it gets bigger each year,” says Sue Gallagher.

They love it at Narrawong, Ms Gallagher says,  they have had commemorative t-shirts made up, and a dozen of them even went in for matching Narrawong tattoos that one of the group designed.

Activities are jam-packed for the group, with big spit roast meals, an elaborate beer pong tournament, dress up nights and a game show night.

“We even have whiteboards to organise us all, one tells us what the menu is, and another one for the activities,” Ms Gallagher said.