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2021 |
2022
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 Beginning
of
2023.
(by Alison)
Before I can start 2023, I should
finish 2022.
As predicted there was a bit of end of year
madness - break-ups and Christmas
celebrations and tidying things up before
that end of the year deadline we make for
ourselves. We escaped about half of
the breakups by taking the chance to take
the White House away for a whole week before
Christmas.
Being self contained allowed us to meander
up towards Mildura through the Wimmera and
the Mallee and  experience
what the floods have done in this part of
Victoria. The peak water levels had yet to
even reach Mildura when we were there, a
full 8 weeks after Castlemaine floods. All
the water from all the flooded river systems
seems to eventually drain into the Murray
before slowly traversing S.A and entering
the sea at the Coorong. Hattah Kulkyne
national park was under water- This will be
a very good thing for the redgum floodplains
but I think they will need to rebuild their
camping grounds. Mildura itself had built
levees all around the town and most of the
town was high enough to escape flood damage
but the water stretches like an inland sea
for miles and miles. It will be months
before there is river access, before roads  reappear
and can be mended, before pleasure craft are
allowed on the river again. It is a very
different flood here - clear water just
sneaking higher and higher over mown lawns,
neat streets and paths , tennis courts and
marinas.
We looked at many of the art silos that have
become how some of the tiny Mallee towns
attract the tourist dollar. We drove through
miles and miles and miles of wheat fields
being harvested and past mountains of wheat.
Back in our art of Victoria, we went
down to Melbourne five days before Christmas
to drive Alice and Sidharth to the airport.
They went to India to visit his family. We
had a low key Christmas lunch with Louise,
Annette Jack  and
Frankie and my mother. Low key as the kids
were recovering from gastro and the girls
were going down with it. We stayed fine as
did Elsy.
Back in Castlemaine for the quiet week
between Christmas and New year and the
lovely time in January when there is nothing
on - classes on holidays, the op shop shut,
no gym, no orchestra, no pilates , no book
club, too hot to plant along the creek. Now
this is the way time is meant to last when
you are retired. There is something very
satisfying in finally being ably to finish
off lots of little undone jobs and
still feel you have spent much of the day
reading, or walking, or relaxing.
We did nick down to Melbourne on the train
on New Year's Eve to watch the city
fireworks from our roof - probably not worth
the effort but still, it was fun to do
something silly and different.
So now it is " New Year". The window frame
painting is finished, the wind-chimes are
repaired, the bikes have been serviced and
our usual activities are starting to gear
up. We are enrolled in several U3A classes
(and Simon's Spanish conversation class, for
which he is the "tutor", has had 4 people
enrolled - so he has some trepidation
about it); but there is still time in
January to take a little trip to Mt Gambier
and back.
(by Simon)
I must apologise for the long delay in
putting up a new page!
As I write this, we are a little North-West
of Mt. Gambier, in South Australia. Both a
little tired - due partly to a  string
of late nights before we left, and partly
due to yesterday. We thought we'd go back to
Lake Monibeing (where we were picked from, a
couple a years ago, when we were doing the
Great South-West Walk) for the night. I'd
forgotten / not taken note of the drive in -
6½ km of rough corrugated gravel on which we
couldn't exceed 20km/hour, then past a sign
saying that in summer (i.e. now) 4WD may be
needed because of sand on the track. On we
went in our heavy 2WD vehicle. The
campground was quite full, but we nabbed the
last empty (numbered) site.
When we were here before, we'd walked in
after a lovely day of solitary beach walking
along Discovery Bay. We decided to walk to
the beach; it was a long walk, but
we got there. Solitary it was not
though, with  several
groups of campers and day visitors and a
mess of footprints above the high tide
mark. It was quite misty as well.- not
quite like last time.
Back to cook dinner- here our gas
bottle ran out, for the first time. (I'd
been wondering how long it would last.) So I
got out the spare to replace it only to find
that the fittings were different! There was
no way it could be connected. So we cooked
dinner on the portable butane stove outside,
and ran the fridge on 12V (until we went to
bed, and the voltage drop persuaded me to
switch the fridge off for the night). And we
had wood smoke in the air because others
around us had a fire. We really
prefer to smell the unburnt trees rather
than wood smoke.
 This
morning, we got up early, packed up, and
drove out into Nelson, where we had an
unusual breakfast then on into Mt. Gambier.
We had a long walk around town, re-filled
the gas bottle, went to the (very helpful)
Tourist Info, then up to the Blue Lake for
lunch. It really is a glorious deep blue
colour this time of year.Then up to a walk
which Tourist Info had suggested, which we'd
never heard of - the Honan Mint Trails in
the Green Triangle Forests. A lovely walk of
about 2+ hours through gum forest with
masses of grass trees with huge flower
spikes - some up to 4m or so high - with
very new signage and no evidence of many
other people at all having walked it. It has
2 car parks and access points but we have
seen not another soul here. And, as it's a
lovely, quiet, empty, spot we've decided to
stay the night. We are being sprinkled by
rain making the whole forest smell fresh.
There are volcanoes to explore, sinkholes,
cenotes, and some short walks exploring the
different vegetation and finding roos,
echidnas, snakes, wallabies, wedgetailed
eagles , emus and wombats. The wildlife is
certainly one reason we prefer walking here
to the UK.
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