Travel | 1000 Fields of Roses

Silver Lining

…without a cloud in the sky!

Sunday just gone was our 25th Wedding Anniversary – I have now spent half my life married ❤ That seems like a dramatic statement! I am very happy that we have come this far – here’s to the next 25 years!
Our boys are old enough to look after themselves, so we decided to have a long weekend in Caloundra. We stayed in a three bedroom unit, but it was still compact enough for us. The balcony looked out onto the beach, and it was only a short walk to the sand.
The main street was close, so we took in the markets on Sunday morning, and went to Kawana Waters Farmers Markets on Saturday morning to pick up good food for the weekend. We also got to say hi to an old friend as well as getting some great hand made (gluten free) sausages… if you’re in the market for quality sausages (and are on the Sunshine Coast) you can’t get better than Saintsational Sausages! 😀
Hearing the sea so close was good for peaceful sleep. The weather was bright and mild.

Our first sunset there…

Caloundra seems quiet and sleepy, especially in term time. We could just meander, and still feel like we got a lot done. There were bits of artwork dotted about the main part of the town as well, like sparkly gems waiting to be discovered…

King’s Beach was lovely, and not too busy even on the weekends, but we also had a walk along Shelley Beach, picking up shells and looking at the wildlife in the rock pools.

The sea was the most beautiful blue, and there were tiny fish and crabs, as well as bigger crabs, sidling along under rocks…

The weekend was meant to be a chance to spend time together, and we did that. It was also a chance to share good, quality food – whether crisp chips or gelato by the sea, or rich picnic food on the balcony.

Sunday’s breakfast – free range eggs, oyster mushrooms fried in butter, avocado on olive, feta and rosemary sourdough bread, and Saintsational sausages (chicken, lime, coriander, mango and coconut). We indulged in proper full cream milk (there was actual cream on top!) and the juice is “Energy” juice from the markets – based on beetroot juice, with additions such as ginger and celery… There were stops at various cafes for good coffee, finishing with Greenhouse Cafe on the Monday morning before coming home.

Lemon Curd gluten free doughnut 🙂

Such a lovely weekend! We were sad to say goodbye, but happy to be headed home…
Sunrise on our last day…

We had a good run home, and blitzed the unpacking/washing when we got back.
What more can I say?

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on September 17, 2019 at 5:51 pm Leave a Comment
Tags: Caloundra, Wedding Anniversary

A Quiet Retreat

It’s Tuesday today… we’re still on holiday, although home now. We went away for the weekend, just to Windsor (near Brisbane) while the boys were away at camp. We rested, went to markets, drank coffee – a refreshing and peaceful stay!
It was touch and go if we would get there at all – Little Bean had been feeling “icky” during the week, then stressed up to Friday about ruining everyone’s weekend… right up to the bus left, he still wasn’t 100% sure. We would have been fine staying home with him, but he decided in the end to go…

Our first view… we stayed at PJ’s on Fifth, which we found through Stayz. It’s a site for holiday accommodation of varying types and prices. This one was someone’s house – the downstairs was modified as a self-contained flat. The owners weren’t there while we were, although they apparently are most times.

The bedroom 🙂
The place was pretty much two rooms (bedroom, combined kitchen/dining/lounge room) connected by a hallway with bathroom/toilet off the hallway.

Bathroom

View from the loo!

kitchen/dining/lounge

Looking through to the back yard – this was our view over breakfast…

We got there Friday afternoon and got food in for the weekend (chocolate! 🙂 ) Had a Thai takeaway, then off to Glory City Church for Friday night service. Lots of worship, lots of prayer – just right to start a great weekend!
Went to the Fortitude Valley Markets on Saturday morning (a bit of a disappointment) but enjoyed a brownie and coffee in Bakery Lane, which made up for it 🙂

We were hoping to see Riverfire from the house, but the houses opposite got in the way. Watched it on TV while eating another takeaway. (posh miniburgers and chips, which means they had lots of herbs, sea salt and a bit of aioli…) 🙂
Took in Northey Street Farm Markets on the way home Sunday morning, after another morning lingering over breakfast on the back patio. Home, kept the holiday vibe going until we got the boys home later that afternoon. Still feeling in holiday mood, even though I’m back to studying 🙂

I’ll finish with a photo of the flowers outside our holiday place.
Sweet and fragrant, just like our weekend!

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on September 27, 2016 at 8:04 pm Leave a Comment
Tags: Glory City Church, I Heart Brownies, PJs on Fifth

In Search Of England

So, I watched an episode of Midsomer Murders last night, after getting nostalgic… it seems the programme could be seen as one of Britain’s best exports, in part because of its evocation of “rural England”. The body count may not be strictly authentic to the real U.K….

Anyone have those books that you buy but never get around to reading? I tend to get stacks at charity shops, then often can’t find the time to actually read them. This was especially bad with some shops in England – I would regularly go looking, and find books for 10 or 20p … cheap enough to buy, and then keep, or donate back to the shop on the next clearout..

One of the books I’ve had for a while is “In Search of England” by H.V.Morton. I’ve been stuck in bed most of the day, so it seemed an ideal time to have a look…
A basic Google search reveals that the author may not have been the cheerful chappy he portrays himself to be in the text; nevertheless, I’ve been enjoying my reading. The book was published in 1927, and reflects the time after the Great War, the One to end all wars, when the world changed… there seems to be sense of hopefulness, a collective sigh that the worst was over, and things could get better. There is no hint of the coming of that next war, when the world changed again…

The book starts from London, then moves through to Hampshire, to places that I know. I could walk through Winchester to the cathedral with him, and stand at the Bargate in Southampton… there are stories that I remember about these places, and some that I had forgotten – that Richard the Lionheart sailed to the Crusades from Southampton, or the story of the townspeople of Romsey buying the Abbey from Henry VIII, to save it from being demolished in the dissolution of the monasteries. In some ways, the narrative is almost alien – there were no backpackers and hostels then, and cars were still a rarity in places. A good evening’s entertainment could be listening to the wireless, in the front room of the one man in the village to have one… there are echoes of history that seem contemporary as well – places like Stonehenge, or traces of long-dead villages, just as ancient in the beginning of the last century as they are now.

Perhaps the book is not a strictly truthful retelling of the journey. Perhaps it just reflects the England that we want to remember. I don’t know…. There is a sense of wonder and discovery to the writing – beautiful word paintings of a time long gone, but could still, maybe, be seen out of the corner of an eye, when the light is right…

Here’s a bit of a picture –
“…the next thing (I saw) was a village that was trying to climb a hill. One whitewashed cottage had reached the top, but all the others had stuck half-way, with their gardens gazing in a rather surprised manner over their chimney pots.”

…or this quote capturing the “stiff upper lip” of a young woman who lived alone in the ruins of Beaulieu Abbey, a place widely believed to be haunted, especially during the night –
“Things do happen, of course,” said Miss Cheshire in a matter-of-fact voice, “but I won’t have anything to do with them. I just turn over and go to sleep.”
The “things” she’s talking about are footsteps, keys in locks, choirs and voices in a place where there are no other inhabitants…

I haven’t finished reading the book. Perhaps it is mostly a fabricated documentary…. but it feels like I’m seeing the scenes before me as I read. I like that.

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Travel

on August 13, 2013 at 11:28 pm Comments (2)
Tags: England, H.V.Morton, nostalgia

At The Next Beach And Up The Mountain..

One more visit to Dicky Beach on Friday morning..

..where littlest bean honed his stone skimming skills..

Then we were off to Kings Beach in Caloundra.

The boys had a swim for a bit, then were asked to get out of the water to allow a group of fishermen to bring in a school of mullet.

The net was attached to a truck at one end of the beach, and the other end was taken out by boat to attach to another truck.. they were drawn together and then pulled in by hand..

It was only a small school – the first of the season.
It was quite exciting to watch, but also confronting to see the fish trying to escape. We don’t eat fish much, but we do have some in the freezer.. I do think that if we are going to eat meat/fish, we should be willing to look at how it gets to our plate..

The seagulls flocked, but were ultimately disappointed, even though they were thrown a few fish.

The fish were separated into male/female containers – the females would still have the roe inside, so could be sold for more.

A bit more swimming before we went up the mountain… a typical crowded Queensland beach in May 🙂

Little bean spent the next night in a tent out past Maleny with his friend and another four boys. It was freezing, and I’m not sure how much sleep was had.. there was some tension and “overwhelm” happening over the 24 hours of the party, but they had fun overall!
The adults at least got to sleep inside – still cold. It was a house full of Whovians – this was behind one of the chairs in the lounge.

I didn’t sit there.

It was a school project, made by the eldest daughter of the family… there was a lot of random art dotted throughout the house.

We sat out next to a small barbeque fire that evening, toasting marshmallows and chatting. You know when you meet people and it’s like you’ve just known each other for ages? It was like that… It was the first time we’ve met half the family, and we’ve only caught up with the other half a couple of times… we felt comfortable there, though.

They run a flower farm, native trees and flowers, by the look of it, grown by biological farming. It’s the off season, so there’s not much by way of crops at the moment.

This was our view over morning tea (with extra marshmallows)

Obviously, there’s much more to a farm than toasting marshmallows over a fire… I could get used to this as down time, though 🙂

The other fields..

… and the view from the back verandah.

We had a busy time, but fun..
We’ll be back! 😀

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on May 26, 2013 at 7:02 pm Leave a Comment
Tags: Beach, fishing, Maleny, mullet

At The Beach

We spent the part of the weekend away.. left here Thursday morning, came back Saturday night (yesterday)
Littlest bean was invited to a birthday party sleepover just past Maleny, and we wanted to visit another friend in Maleny, as well as spending some time at the beach..

We went to have a look at Montville first.. it was a tad disappointing..

Still beautiful – gorgeous views.. the quirky little shops I remember from past years seem to be upmarket brand name shops now..

Still – gorgeous views.

Littlest bean was fascinated by the big water wheel. It’s not functional now, but we discussed what it would have been in its previous life..

The footpath is lower than the entrance to the shops, in most places, and they’re bordered by various flower gardens.

Littlest bean wanted to be in the shot..

There he is again! 😀

😀

Great views… you could see right down to the coast, which is where we were headed after a stop in Maleny to see our friend. He makes (amazing!) sausages, and we got to watch the process from getting the sausage meat into the casing, to the final packaging. We had sausages down at the local park… we discovered that we’d forgotten to bring any barbeque utensils, so had to make do with a plastic fork to turn the sausages, and some water, tissues and the remains of the fork to clean the barbeque after – I think we did quite well!

We spent Thursday night at Dicky Beach, where the remains of the wreck of the S.S.Dicky still lie on the beach. Our unit was about the size of a shoebox, but it was just a short stroll to the beach, and comfortable enough for a night. We got there before dark and went down the beach.

The S.S.Dicky.

An evening stroll/run…

The boys were trying to touch the pole in the water just in front of them, while still dodging the waves. They didn’t succeed… there were wet, sandy pant legs to be dried before morning..

There was a woman filming in and under the water.. I’m not sure why..

…and so to bed..

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on May 26, 2013 at 6:00 pm Leave a Comment
Tags: Beach, Montville, S.S.Dicky

Time For Tea?

On our way back from New South Wales last weekend, we stopped off at Maclean, and had a cuppa at the teashop there, Ripples on the Clarence… I’d had a look through the window when I was there with my friend a while back, so it was nice to go in. I chose a hot chocolate, and was offered a choice of dark, milk or white, using real chocolate… that’s my kind of teashop!

Some of the lovely and unusual teapots on the wall..

Close up 😀

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on August 10, 2012 at 2:24 pm Leave a Comment
Tags: hot chocolate, Maclean, Ripples, teapot, teashop

Rainbow Chips and Liquorice Allsorts..

Got back yesterday from the road trip – we had a great time! We didn’t end up camping – way too wet – but we explored the back roads, and had fun 😀

The main purpose of the trip was to pick up a trailer my friend had bought online, so we headed for Grafton to do that… I don’t know New South Wales particularly well, so I left the sightseeing itinerary to my friend. She’d been wanting to check out the Lions Road over the mountains, so we went that way.. Up the top there’s a lookout called the Border Loop Lookout, where you can see the railway line as it spirals round the mountain (and, presumably, trains, if you’re there at the right time..) We stopped there for a cup of tea and a look… we’d been hearing the bellbirds from the car as we drove, but they were louder when we got out.

The other sound you hear would be rain…

We travelled the rest of the way to Grafton… the Lions Road is winding and climbing and bumpy. Normally I would be quite travel-sick… this time, my boys prayed specifically for me to be OK, and we had a box of liquorice allsorts in the car there and back – I didn’t even have a twinge of nausea, so I figure the combination of prayer, liquorice and sugar must have done the trick 😀

Picked up the trailer about half an hour out of Grafton.. the sellers also bred puppies, so we squeed over gorgeous puppies (how do their tails wag so fast!?) and were also gifted with some fruit from their trees (grapefruit, guava, passionfruit,oranges and a grapefruit/orange cross)
Back to Grafton for some lunch by the river..

From there we went straight to Maclean, where we were booked in to the Maclean Hotel for the night..

We were by the river but couldn’t really see it too well from the balcony, so we braved the drizzle to have a walk by the river and up the street lined with old brick buildings..

Maclean is a fishing town on the Clarence River… it also calls itself “The Scottish Town in Australia”

The telephone poles are painted with different clan names and tartans, and there’s a map at the Information Centre/Scottish Shop where you can look up your ancestral clan… here’s mine..

We wandered up and down the main street… there were some interesting shops and a lovely little teashop, but they were closed, and we left in the morning before they would have opened… we got hot chips for tea and settled back in the hotel for the evening. The Maclean Hotel is a nice pub/accommodation place, with a fire downstairs in the winter… the room had a lovely high ceiling, and doors leading on to the balcony – it would be nice in the summer… a little too cold for the winter… nothing a big woolly blanket couldn’t fix 😀
It rained heavily throughout the night, but let up enough in the morning for us to pack the car… the downpour resumed as we left Maclean…

We had planned to take the coast road back, but we both agreed that we’d always wanted to visit Nimbin, so it was back up the mountains again… still raining, and lots of potholes..
Nimbin is known as the “Alternative Capital of Australia”… it reminded me of the Montville/Maleny area, but with more hemp (of all kinds..) I’d love to go back and visit when it’s not raining.. I liked the vibe..
We passed the Nimbin Rocks on the way in..

… and encountered rainbows on the outskirts…

This is the school at the other end of town..

We walked up and down the main street..

… checked out various clothes shops, as well as Happy High Herbs, and the Hemp Embassy, and then stopped at the Rainbow Cafe for lattes and rainbow chips (various coloured root veges, thick cut, fried and salted – perfect for a cold, wet, windy day!)
There’s a fair bit of drugs/paraphenalia at Nimbin (we inadvertently gatecrashed a couple of deals while visiting the public loos on our way out, and it’s the place to go if you want to learn more about legalising cannabis) but there’s also alternative lifestyle, as in sustainability and creativity. I’m not interested in smoking pot, but I’d be interested in checking that out a bit more..

We finally wended our way home, back over the range… the creek was noticeably higher and wilder after the previous night’s rain, nearly reaching the bridges at some points…