post 300: the weary traveller returns

This is it – post number 300 on this wee blog.  300 posts in 18 months.  Nowhere near one a day, which is probably good as you’d all get terribly bored with my life’s minutiae, but a pretty consistent rate.  Well, consistent as far as I’m concerned! :)  Thanks to my readers for returning, thanks to you newbies for stopping by.  Muchos gracias people!

Well, I’m back in the UK after my month-long antipodean expedition, and believe me the amount of travelling I have to do on these trips is close to legendary!  I landed at Heathrow at 06:20 on Sat morning, after an exhausting flight where there were in-flight entertainment problems on the 9 hours to Bangkok and someone’s disgusting progeny taking pleasure in kicking the hell out of my seat the whole way to London.  Needless to say I didn’t get much sleep.  Fucking kids!  Shouldn’t be allowed to travel with the rest of us!  Or, at least, parents given explicit sets of rules & regs to abide by, along with the threat of being thrown off the plane at the fuel-stop.  Honestly – if I can be kicked off the plane for rude and aggressive behaviour, why can’t the bloody kid be kicked off for its highly disruptive behaviour?  One of life’s little mysteries.

Anyway, landed fine, waited the obligatory 30mins in the passport queue and then another obligatory 30mins for my bag to appear.  (thank god we didn’t arrive into Terminal 5!)  Heathrow express to Paddington then Tube to Kings Cross, then Cambridge express before 20min wait for my bus for return home.  Got home about 11:20am and presented Mark with his gift (which he loved!) and sorted my duty free and commenced obligatory cat-cuddling.  Mark went off to see his kids and I lasted perhaps another hour before I passed out.  I woke at 10pm when Mark arrived home, and I was in the same position I went to sleep in, except with a hungry cat on my pillow!  The poor little blighter had been trying to wake me up for a few hours.  He got a tin of tuna to make it all better…  And because I’d slept for so long I couldn’t sleep at all Sat night.  I was awake from 10pm Sat to 9pm Sun – then slept straight through til 4am today.  Hopefully by tomorrow my sleep patterns with be somewhere near normal.

So yep – back at work here today.  Met with boss this morning and told him that I’ll be actively looking for another job, and he sort of expected that.  He was really nice actually, told me to let him know if there’s anyone he can call for me – and then told me I couldn’t leave because then things wouldn’t get done! :)  All very nice to hear.  So I’ll be actively looking for other work.  Still don’t really know what industry I feel like getting in to – and I’ve done a hell of a lot of industries already! – but I know that I need a change. 

So there you go – 300 posts and things are still moving along.  I promise to sort my trip photos in the next few days and get them loaded on Flickr asap.  xx

P.S. Happy birthday Evan, ya miserable bugger.

where she drowns some worms (not really) and preps for departure

Tuesday we went to Batemans Bay.  Dad plays lawn bowls, and he had to go do an umpires test at Malua Bay, so Jan & I dropped him off then headed on to Batemans for our errands and some window shopping.  I posted a box of stuff back to myself in Britain so I wouldn’t have to pay excess baggage charges - $96!!  I could have almost got a courier for that!  Dad passed his tests and we’d picked up some lovely prawns and mussels for dinner – so apart from the ridiculous prices for Australia Post, everything was pretty good. 

Yesterday we went fishing.  There were mini-arguments about where we should go.  We both won. :)

Dad likes beach fishing, but me not so much.  Beach fishing isn’t at all interactive – you can’t tell nibbles from surf movements, you just sort of hurl your line out (hopefully) past the breakers and then leave it for 10mins or so before reeling back in to see if you’ve got anything.  I’m not skilled enough at it to cast my own line out, it always goes sideways and I can never get it out past the breakers, so Dad does it for me.  So all I get to do is sit there and watch the surf, occasionally put bait on my hook, smoke cigarettes and wish we were fishing somewhere else. 

We went to the beach near Brou Lake, just north of Dalmeny, and beach fished for perhaps 2 hours before realising that we all had the same bit of bait on the hook as when we started, so gave up & went home for lunch.  Lunch was pies from Bodalla Bakery (YUM!) and a wee lemon tart – also YUM!

After lunch we went to my preferred spot – off the boardwalk on Narooma inlet, where the water is almost crystal clear, a lovely blue, and I can do almost everything myself.  Literally 30 seconds after I cast my line in, out came my first of 3 leatherjackets!  30 seconds!!  Love it! :)  My 3 leatherjackets were perfect size for toast (Jan’s preferred breakfast) and I also caught a wee bream that we threw back in with instructions to notify its parents of our yummy bait.  (It didn’t, but we didn’t mind too much.)  Jan also caught a leatherjacket for the pot and another wee bream, which we think could have possibly been the same one – what’s the learning curve on a fish?  Anyone?  Dad didn’t catch anything – which also happened last time I was here and we went out in the tinny (for those non-Australians – a tinny is a 12foot aluminium boat, a couple of metal seats and an outboard motor.  Luxury!  Just beware of touching the sides or changing seats on very hot days.  But it does mean you can find fishing spots that those without boats can’t access).

We were on the boardwalk for perhaps 2 hours, and Jan & I caught all the fish, in between spotting the stingrays that inhabit the inlet (they just cruise up & down, eating fish bits from incoming boats, getting their photo taken – quite a good life really) and watching the enormous bloody pelicans skim over the water.  Lovely way to spend an afternoon, especially since the fishes were throwing themselves on my line!

Today, Thursday 10 April and my last full day here, we went into Narooma and wandered about for a wee bit before heading off to Dalmeny Point for a picnic lunch.  After lunch a few hours sitting in the sun were followed by a trip to Naroom a to pickup the fresh lobster we ordered yesterday – lobster thermidore for dinner tonight!  :) 

I’ve been so spoiled on the food front this trip.  Thurs 27 = fresh fish & chips in Ulladulla on the way home form the train station.  Fri = fish & chips for lunch, spag bol for dinner that I cooked.  Sat = pies for lunch, steakfor dinner, I cooked.  Sun = roast chicken, roast pumpkin & lost of roasted veges, I cooked.  Mon = fresh flathead.  Tues = fish & chips in Batemans Bay for lunch, prawns, then fresh mussels in white wine & cream for dinner.  Wed = whole snapper (which I didn’t manage to finish on account of the size of my plate compared to everyone elses).  Thurs = lobster thermidore!!  WhooHoo! I’ve been properly seafooded, which is what I wanted.  The memories of this fabulous aussie seafood has to last me until my next trip, after all, so there’s no point mucking about! :)

I’ve had a great time here, I really do like coming to Dad & Jan’s.  And not just for the seafood!  Really! :)  Swimming in the sea, fantastic countryside, lovely wildlife (rosellas visit the balcony every morning, bellbirds everywhere, magpie and kookaburra song in the mornings, galahs eating grass-seeds in the lawns, fishies, dolphins in the sea that you can see from the balcony, seals, penguins…).  If you’re visiting Australia, I heartily recommend the Sapphire Coast – the NSW South Coast.  Bateman’s Bay to Bega.  You won’t be disappointed.

I’ve had a bit of a fab time all round this trip.  Nell & Gavin’s was lovely – it’s wonderful to be with my sister again.  I miss laughing with her so much!  Mum & John’s was good – brilliant to see all the family (tho exhausting!) and I’m glad I got to set Mum up on the internet.  It should make our conversations much easier! ;) 

But I think, after all this, I’m ready to go home.  I want my own bed and to cuddle my cat.  I’ll even suffer the bloody snow (now I’ve got a reasonable tan ;). 

Oh – and as a final note – thanks to every one of my readers.  I average 45 readers a day, and have passed the 11,000 total mark.  This post makes 299, I should do something special for number 300 I think.  Thanks for your support, thanks for your comments, and thanks for making me believe that someone, somewhere is vaguely interested in what I have to say.  Bless your cotton socks. :)  

See you in Britain. xx 

where she dips rods and toes in the Pacific

‘there’s this stuff in the chemist called Quell’

Up at 05:30 this morning for a quick breakfast before heading out on Dad’s mate, Gary’s boat for a bit of deep sea fishing.  And luckily I’ve got my body clock so well trained that I tell it I have to wake up and it does the job for me – I woke on my own at 05:22.  Nice when things work how they’re supposed to.  Tried to stay up late and watch the Bahrain F1 Grand Prix, but it started at 22:30 here and I was fading by then.  Jan & I sat up for perhaps the first half hour, then both gave up & went to bed. 

Anyway, up before the sun today, and at Gary’s house for 06:30.  He’s got an 18ft fishing boat that he takes out as often as possible and offered Dad & me a mornings fishing which, of course, we jumped at.  Gary had all the tackle and equipment, so we rocked up to his place and then with his other mate, John, headed down to the boatramp.  On the way to the boatramp saw a pod of 4-5 dolphins frolicking off the beach near Dad’s. :)  Quiet morning on the sea, very still and calm in the inlet, I was feeling quiet good about the whole thing.  When we got out of the inlet and headed into the actual sea things got a bit rougher.  The boat was being tossed a bit, partly because of speed, partly wind, but I could see a slight swell picking up – nothing to worry about though, and I was with guys experienced in these waters and the boat had plenty of lifejackets.  I felt fine, looking forward to a good day’s fishing in the deep blue.

We headed out to the north end of Montague Island, about 5 miles off the coast, and paid a brief visit to the Australian fur seal colony there.  The sun was just coming out from behind the clouds and I got a couple of lovely photos, as well as just marvelling at the lovely furry beastie’s amazing abilities in the water.  And the fact that they really did like to show off! :)  We headed around the eastern side of the island and then down to the reef on its southern tip, where the water shallowed to about 50-60ft to wet our first lines.  Didn’t have much luck, seemed to feed lots of fish but none came on the hook!  John caught himself a lovely big leatherjacket, but that was about it so we moved on to spot 2. 

I was starting to feel a bit green around the gills at this point.  See, a small boat tends to move to every single little wavelet in the bloody ocean.  I was having trouble finding my sealegs, I seemed to have left them bloody far from where I really needed them.  Despite the bit of toast and cup of tea that constituted breakfast, my stomach started to feel that there was a hell of a lot more in there than that.  I held myself together with a stalwart determination.

Spot 2 fared better.  We each caught a Maori Rasse, which are really pretty fish but not very good eating so they all went back in the sea.  A few little rock cod also jumped on John’s hook (‘See it takes talent to catch one this big!’), and I got myself a small grouper, which was very pretty as well, but all also went back to the sea.  Gary started asking if anyone had a banana on board, which apparently is the cause of most of the fishermen’s woes.  We didn’t, but we were beginning to wonder where the fish were – we’d been out there about 2 & a half hours and only had one leatherjacket to show for it (good eating, but not my favourite – I was after a nice snapper).  I was feeling greener and greener.  My hands and feet were cold and my feet were tingling.  I couldn’t stop yawning or burping, but the nausea seemed stuck in my chest – it wouldn’t come up or go down, it just sat there.  Tried to concentrate on fishing, but looking down at the water made my head spin.

Moved on to spot 3 for a final go before giving up.  Gary found the spot by GPS and said that he’d never come away from there without a few flathead (lovely eating fish!).  I think by this point he was feeling a bit guilty that we hadn’t caught dinner and I was feeling poorly.  I halfheartedly threw my line in again, lost some more bait, then gave up & just tried to control my stomach.  The men kept it up for another 30mins or so and Dad also caught a lovely leatherjacket to add to the lonely one of John’s in the bucket.  The guys were all giving me advice and apparently ‘there’s this stuff in the chemist called Quell’ which is brilliant for seasickness.  Pity the bloody chemist was 6 miles away, onshore!!  Anyway, shortly after they took sympathy on me and  called it quits.  The fish weren’t biting, only nibbling our bait away, and I definitely wasn’t up for an extended session.  We packed up the gear and pointed the boat toward home.  As soon as the boat started moving again my stomach felt better – it was purely the movement of the open sea in the drifting boat that made me queasy.  Took a slightly circuitous route home so I could take some photos, and I was feeling loads better, before getting back to the boatramp about 11am. 

John gave us his leatherjacket to go with our own, and Gary felt bad enough that we didn’t catch anything that he gave me half a dozen fresh flathead fillets from his previous trip out the day before!  Bless him!  Gary, we had them for dinner tonight – absolutely lip-smackingly beautiful!  I do love a good bit of fishy. :)

Got back and went for a swim with Jan.  It’s the middle of autumn here but the water temp is still 20deg and it was lovely!  Spent an hour in the back garden with a book, trying to make the colour on the back of my legs sort of match the residual colour on the front of my legs. My sumburnt legs have healed really well, and they just look brown now – but only on the front.  The back is still pommie white.  Anyway, the hour yesterday and the hour in the sun today helped, there’s a bit of colour there now, definitely enough to prove I’ve been on holidays. 

Saw on the news tonight that it’s still snowing in the UK!  Hehehheeeeee! :)  Got picture message from Begonia showing me the snow in her garden.  I sort of half hope it’s still there when I get back.  Only half though, because I want the warm weather to come now!

Have also made a decision about my job.  My mind rests better.  Tell you later.

hope all are well & happy & not suffering cold feets.. :)  xx

where she travels forever (!) and meets again her family, 2

At Dad’s now.  Got here about 7:30pm Thursday, after rising at 6 so I could farewell John before he went out on his school bus run.  Mum & me got to Tamworth airport about 8:30am, and waited around for 30mins or so before check in.  At check in I was told that due to the ridiculously high winds in Sydney the 09:45 flight was delayed until 10:30.  OK, I can understand that.  They’d had an almost hurricane in Melbourne the night before, trees down, buildings damaged, people killed.  So I called Dad, so he wouldn’t be waiting at the train station for 3 hours.  No problem there.  And yes, the plane took off at 10:30, or as close to it as nevermind.  But it didn’t quite sink in that we didn’t see a refueling truck on the tarmac, though I realised that with the wind it was going to be a really pleasant flight and touchdown in Sydney could get a little hairy.

About 45mins into the hour flight, the Capt got on the blower to say that we were diverting to Newcastle – because we didn’t have enough fuel to stay in a holding pattern over Sydney for the hour it would take the controllers there to clear the queue.  Only one of the runways in Sydney was working, and there was starting to be a bit of a parking lot overhead.  So we went to Newcastle, had a lot of fun landing, and sat on the tarmac there (weren’t allowed out of the plane) for 45-50mins whilst we refueled and got a new landing window in Sydney.

Finally landed at 12:40, almost two hours behind schedule.  Can’t blame anyone but the weather, so no point getting in a fuss about it, but was worried about Dad sitting at a train station (with no mobile phone) waiting for me and getting worried when I didn’t show!

Got on the train to Bombaderry 2 hours later than planned, and had to rush my way through baggage claim etc.  Had no lunch because no time, and only a museli bar and a banana to sustain me til I reached Bombaderry (about 3.5 hrs later).  Dad was waiting, and it was damn good to see him!  But I was hungry, so we stopped at Ulladulla for some lovely fish before going on to Narooma.  Got here about 7:15ish and I lasted maybe another hour before falling into bed.

Next morning I was up with the sun, which was good, because Dad and dog were heading out for their morning beach-walk.  First thing in the morning is a lovely time of the day to be on the beach, and after a good hour walking we got home, had breakfast and headed out on mission 1: find a pair of Ugg boots for Christine.  Headed to Tilba Tilba, a lovely little tourist town about 20kms from Narooma, and scored!  Got in the car & headed to Bermagui for lunch.  Were going to go to Bermi Pub, where we went last time, which does good honest food for cheap prices, but it seems to have gone a bit upmarket, and we weren’t up for paying $25 each, so ended up with fish & chips in the picnic spot on the point overlooking Horseshoe Bay.  (I know, fish twice in as many days, but honestly, I so miss Aussie seafood that I could eat it every day!)  Headed back to the house in time for afternoon dog walking and a wee rest in the shade before I cooked dinner for Dad.  He’s 66 and never cooked for himself, and (possibly) thinks it’s a bit pointless to start now!  Anyway, my spag bol got the nod of approval. :)

Haven’t done much at all today.  Morning dog walking, and afternoon walking as well, before bbq dinner of prawns, steak and salad.  YUM!  Jan’s back from her bushwalking adventures tomorrow (she’s been bushwalking all week in Kosiosco Nat Pk, nasty weather and all!) and I’m doing a roast chicken to welcome her.  My chicken’s somewhat legendary (in my own mind, anyway :) so I hope she likes it.

That’s it for now.  Sunday tomorrow.  Swimming and lounging, before going deep sea fishing on a mate’s boat on Monday.  Never been before, quite excited! xx

where she meets again her family

I’ve been at Mum’s for 5 days now. The train ride up was fairly pleasant, as pleasant as long train journeys can get, I guess. 6 hours on a train is never exceptionally fun, but it was bearable. It was hard saying goodbye to Nell, though. Love her dearly and miss her loads.

Arrived in Tamworth on time to be met by 6 men of the family, my stepdad, John, brothers B and G and their 3 sons. Much hugging and giggling later, and after young K had seen the train engine close up, we stopped off to get dinner on the way to G’s place to meet the wives ( as well as mum, B is with K, and G is with J) and other child.

Mum v happy to see me, as you’d expect after not seeing me for 18months. Much hugging and kissing and chatting and giggling.  Headed out for the hour drive to Barraba a few hours later.  Quiet roads, nice countryside, assorted witticisms from John made it go fairly quickly. B & K and their son J were staying at Mum’s too, but were going to follow later.

Got to Mum’s and settled into my room for the week – they’ve got a 4 bed house, which is really too big for them now, but Mum likes to have it so we 4 kids can all come visit at the same time without pitching tents in the yard. The house is a typical big old country property, tin roof, big verandah and lots of assorted bugs, grass seeds, bindies and birds. They use bore water from the artisian well for laundry and toilet, and sometimes the shower when it hasn’t rained for a bit. But they’ve had a bit of rain recently, so the tanks are fairly full and can shower in normal water, not the strange smelling yellowy stuff that gets pumped up from underground. Ah, the joys of middle-of-nowhere living! Don’t get me started on the spiders and bugs, especially not the grass seeds that get into absolutely everything…

Anyway, Friday was a bit of a rest & recovery day before we had the extended family over en masse on Saturday for Nana’s 85’s birthday party (subtitled the welcome home Jane party). Sat morning was a lesson in how to get my mum flustered and panicked, as she panics at the drop of a hat but especially when the house will be full of people. So all morning Sat was cooking before the fambly arrived for lunch. Nana, Aunty L and Uncle T, brothers B & G and their families, and B’s school friend/best man, J and his family of 4. 18 in all made for a quite busy house, and made John v busy on the bbq! But the food was delish, Nana got some nice presents and it was really nice to see everyone. Got a little tipsy only, not raging drunk, but everyone had a good time.

Sunday was recovery day again, and B & K left mid-morning for the drive back to Qld, and G & J and assorted kids left not long after for their drive back to Tamworth. Was really good to see B again – I’ve not seen him for a good few years and he seems to be doing very well for himself. Rather proud of him actually, in that proprietary sisterly way. ;)

After the departures I spent the day reading my big David Eddings omnibus between chores for Mum and John.

Monday mum & me went to Tamworth for the day. Got another 2 pairs of shoes (that makes 4 in total this trip! I’m such a girl!:) a couple of skirts and a couple of shirts. Also bought present for flatmate to say thanks for cat-sitting my wee hairy beastie. And no hints, Mark – you’ll have to wait til I get home! No luck on Christine’s Ugg boots tho. Bummer. Oh well, I’ll look at Dad’s next week. Stopped in at G & J’s on the way back for a quick coffee and farewell – I won’t see them now before I go to Dad’s on Thursday morning. It’s lovely to see G again – he and I get along v well, we’re similar people and understand each other.

Today I’ve setup Mum & John on the internet. She’s a bit old-school and scared of computers, so I’ve taken care of all the installation stuff and shown her how to send me emails and how to get to my blog so she doesn’t have to go in to the library anymore.  Going to spend the rest of today going through the boxes of stuff I’ve got stored here.  I sold almost everything I owned when I went to the UK, but there’s some stuff that you just want to keep, and Mum’s getting worried that the bugs and rats are getting into the outbuilding it’s all stored in, so I’ve got to go through it again and perhaps do another cull. Then I leave early Thurs morning for the plane to Sydney, before another 4 hour train trip to Nowra where the train stops. Dad will meet me there before heading out for a 3 hour drive to get to his on the south coast of NSW. Thus begins the next chapter of my holiday. Next post will probably be from his house. (EDIT: And this post too, cause WordPress were having an upgrading party and the system was giving me lip!)

Hope all are well and as happy as me.xx