Catching up

Hi everyone, I'm long overdue for a big catch up on all that we have been doing since my gorgeous cousin Jane came to stay.  She left us on Thursday to travel home to a rather wet and soggy Shropshire.  I would have to say that we (our family) have had the best time while she was staying with us as not only is Jane the best company, we enjoyed being tourists in our own state of Victoria and appreciated seeing the things we love through fresh eyes.

We've seen other interesting things too.  Jane wanted to make us a lemon drizzle cake with fresh lemons from our tree, something of a novelty for her see fresh lemons on a tree apparently.  I was assured that this is a cake recipe that never fails.  Ooops.  Of course being down under meant the cake sunk in the middle, according to Jane that is.  Whatever it looked like it tasted delicious.  Thank you Jane.

You can't come to Australia without trying Vegemite and I think Jane's face tells the story.

She took a a tube home so her kids could try it.  :)  Should be interesting.

On one of the days when we weren't doing anything too far from home, we decided to have a picnic in the Alfred Nicholas Memorial Gardens on Sherbrooke Road not too far from where we live.  Here are some photos from the afternoon.

At the time these photos were taken it was extremely dry and we had been suffering extreme heat so the gardens are perhaps not at their best.   This cheeky duck below quite fancied joining our picnic.  I did hold my breath while his/her rear end was over Jane's mobile phone case.  It could have ended very badly.

Helping him/herself to cashew nut dregs.

This was a lovely peaceful spot to picnic,

the little island on the lake.

Our next adventure was to Healesville Sanctuary which I will share with you next post.

Anne   xx

More adventures with Jane

Today is cool, pleasantly cool for the first time in days and it's so nice not to feel like we are all wilting.  Cousin Jane cannot believe she is waking up to morning after morning of blue skies and hasn't had goose bumps once since she's been staying with us.  

Saturday we decided to take a drive out to the Yarra Valley to show Jane another lovely area in Victoria.  Of course it is incredibly dry at the moment rather than the lush green it is most of the year.  The temperature reached 43C at one point and because Jane had never experienced such heat before, we suggested she hop out of the air conditioned car for a few minutes just to see what it was like.  She described the hot wind as having a blow dryer directly on your body.

We decided to have lunch at the  Yarra Valley Dairy
and enjoyed some rather delicious cheeses with a selection of olives, breads and crackers. 

This photo makes the dairy look deceptively small, it's not.  It extends further out the back through the dark doorway area.  It was so incredibly hot when I took this photo and the glare of the sun reflecting on the light roof and walls of the dairy make everything in shadow look very dark.

 

I do believe Jane is enjoying herself.

 Some scenes of the Yarra Valley including vineyards for which the area is well known.

We had a lovely afternoon but were glad to come home to a partly air conditioned house and hubby's excellent homemade pizza.

Sunday hubby indulged Jane and took her to the site where they film the house exteriros for the Aussie soap "Neighbours", Ramsay Street.  I've never watched Neighbours but it was fun for Jane to do something so touristy.

 Last night at dusk we went for a walk up in the Sherbrooke forest in the hope we might see some Australia wildlife such as kangaroos, wallabies or a lyrebird or two.  We did hear three different types of owls calling, heard wallabies jumping in the bush, but sadly we didn't see anything.  We did however manage to photograph the rare and beautiful Pommy bird Janeus Louiseus Cooperus.  She obliged me ever so nicely by standing still while I took this photo.  :)

This morning I popped Jane on a plane to Sydney to spend a few days with friends there.  I'm hoping she will enjoy the delights of Sydney, the beautiful harbour etc.  She'll be back on Thursday when more adventures and fun will be had I'm sure.

Anne  xx

Travelling The Great Ocean Road

Today hubby, cousin Jane and I came home from a very enjoyable two day trip along the Great Ocean Road, Victoria.  It surely has to be one of the most beautiful places I've ever been to, the second time I've visited but even more impressive second time round.  We stayed in Port Campbell last night and went back to view the 12 Apostles again this morning to enjoy them in the different light from yesterday afternoon.  Loch Ard Gorge was so beautiful, The Bay of Islands spectacular.  On our first day along the way we stopped off to take a walk through Mait's Rest rainforest walk which was magical and I discovered a tree that grows in Victoria and Tasmania I had never seen or heard of before, the Myrtle Beech.  As we were walking, oohing and ahhing, I couldn't stop thinking about how much Louise and Dave would have enjoyed this walk.  Here are some photos of our time away.

Jane and I dunking our feet in the very balmy water of a rock pool.

 

Mait's Rest rainforest walk.

The trunk of a Myrtle Beech

Late afternoon at the 12 Apostles beach area.

Morning photos of the 12 Apostles.

Loch Ard Gorge

This beach was lovely and we did a little foot dunking.

I absolutely adore this photo from the stunning rocky pillar to the colours.

After we finished viewing the spectacular Great Ocean Road scenery, we headed to Warrnambool for lunch and spent some time in the cemetery after to look for the graves of my great, great grandfather,  great grandfather and families which we found.  It was a lovely moment.  My great, great grandfather arrived in Victoria from England in 1852 with his wife and four children at the time (more were born in Australia), settling in Warrnambool.  He was 32 years old and died 10 years later from an unfortunate accident where he suffered a compound wrist fracture.  He contracted tetanus 7 days later and died 3 days after that.  A tragic story.  My great grandfather and his younger brother left school (they were in their mid-teens) and went out to work.

Our journey from Warranambool back to Melbourne took us through lovely farming country and we stopped so Jane could take some photos of the vast open spaces of our country.

Anne  xx

New species discovered

This is Jane my 3rd cousin from Shrewsbury, Shropshire   Jane is visiting us for 3 weeks and today we took her for a drive down to the Mornington Peninsula including a stop at Tooradin to see southern growing mangroves and have a bite to eat. We were walking to sit at some table and chairs and Jane gave the most awful screech thinking she had just missed stepping on a snake. Her snake turned out to be a Norfolk Island Pine long leafy thing that had fallen on the path. Here she is handling what is now known as the highly vicious and venomous Norfolk Island Pine snake or NIPS or Norfolkus Islandus Pinus snakus. It's always exciting when British explorers come out to Australia and discover a new species. I wonder what tomorrow will bring. Will keep you posted, we're going bush walking up in the forest tomorrow.

Today we drove passed some beautiful flowering gums.

These pelicans were waiting for fish scraps at Tooradin.

A view of one of the back beaches at Sorrento.

The air was so fresh and invigorating and as the cool change had come through it was very pleasant after the hot weather we've been having.  

Anne

P.S.  We'll be looking out for drop bears in the forest tomorrow.  :)

A visitor from the U.K.

I've been neglecting my blog, not on purpose but the days have been busy and I've not taken the time to sit down and put words together for a post.  The most exciting thing happened yesterday, hubby and I went out to the airport to meet my 3rd cousin from Shrewsbury who is staying with us for a three week visit.  I've known Jane for such a long time and it's so nice for her dream of visiting Australia to have finally come true.  So the next few weeks will be busy showing her a small part of our country within Victoria.  We are having a period of prolonged hot weather, something of a difference when you've come from a maximum temperature of about 7 to 8C as Jane has.  We were sitting outside last night with a glass of wine and delicious hamburgers Charlotte had made and at 8.30pm it was still very warm.  Jane commented that in the U.K. you would be putting a cardigan on after the sun went down no matter how warm the day had been.

I've been busy doing a few things in the studio.  I finished making the curtains and they are now hanging.

I'm not as fond of these curtains.  The other curtain appeals to me more.

A few nick knacks have found their way in purely for visual pleasure.

I found these little vases (or whatever they are) while op shopping with my sister.  The painting I did years ago when I first started lessons.  Looking at it now I can see it was very early work.  I believe the photo I copied from was somewhere in Cornwall.

The pin board holds a few hand sketched illustrations I did years ago and a wintry painting on a postcard which I love.  The chrome mug holder is home for scissors and tapes of different kinds.

These two plant holders received a makeover.  They were bought years ago, were painted black and rusting.  The rust was removed and hubby very kindly spray painted them for me.  That colour is called stormy blue, love it.  With new coconut fibre baskets, I'm hoping the succulents will find a new lease of life.

Hoping to be back soon with tales of adventures with Jane.

Anne  xx