yay a holiday

Well it looks like I will be off to New Zealand in February. It's still months away but will have plenty of time to plan. Will be mainly around Auckland and Rotaura area. Rotaura looks like a lot of fun. Won't have a lot of tome over there so it will have to be pretty well planned which is not me at all. Should be fun sussing everything out though.

housework

You know the problem with housework is you do it and then six months later you have to do it all again.

Not an original quote but it made me laugh.

Where is the time machine

When I set out to write my little blog I decided I would write about the quirky and occasionally the everyday things that happened in my life. My intended audience was my family - if they could ever be bothered to read it. So far I don't think they have been bothered but thats ok. I guess it was more for me anyway. Up until recently I have avoided being philosophical or sentimental but today I'm going to say I feel sick knowing what I have to do. Guess in part it was my own making. Something I handled badly and in hindsight should have and could have done a lot differently. At the moment I am hiding out under the blankets but I also know that this afternoon is unavoidable. PS I finally decided to come out from under the blankets and commit.  I phoned and said I would be there at 1.  I decided to have a shower and maybe even get there early.   But first I have to hang the washing out, put my clothes away, make the bed.   What am I coming to? Well while I was doing this I thought, if I was going to my doom (which I am not but it is going to be hard anyway) would I go meekly making sure that everything was in order for those left behind or would I go kicking and screaming, fighting to the last? I finally decided that if it was inevitable and that was it I would image that I would make my last moments as normal as possible. Like nothing bad was going to happen to me it was just another day and I was going about my life as per normal but if there was a chance that I could perhaps change something and alter the outcome I would be kicking and screaming all the way.

earthquake

Wow I felt the earth move. And I wasn't alone. 5.3. earthquake with the epi center near Moe in Gippsland. Nothing unusual about the fourth in 30 years that I can remember here. Just a tremor with bait of noise but apparently the largest one in 109 years.   Jarrod described it A bit like my old washing machine when it was spinning. lol.

welcome home we missed you

kurranda

Skyrail up and I should have allowed myself more time to  experience Kurranda.  After a tour through the butterfly sanctury and a walk around Kurranda and its verandah markets. lunch in the park and it was time to go again.  The girls had told me there was nothing to do in Kurranda itself but the trip there and back was worth the effort I only allowed myself a few short hours.  The trip up took longer than I expected as there was no set times for my arrival and departure while on the gondolas.  They worked in a continuous loop and it was just a matter of jumping off, lining up and jumping back on again when you wanted to leave.  There was two stations along the way so it made for a relaxing journey.  Kurranda itself is beautiful.  I am just so in love with the whole area.   I think the winter months is the perfect time to visit.   Only problem with June/July is everything that needs to be closed for maintaince is so I missed out on a few of the touristy aspects of my visit.   Still can't complain as there was still plenty to see and do.

skyrail to kurranda

What I can say is the trip to Kurranda was far more spectacular than these photos show.   I got off twice and went for a walk around the rainforest.  But the view from the gondola, exceptional.

this adventure was free

Three doors down from the girls house is a small gague railway line.  I didn't think much about it thought most likely it was no longer in use until one evening a long long long long cane train clanked it was past.   I then decided to explore around the railway line and found a perfect park complete with brook and star fruit tree.   The star fruit was v. yummy.

port douglas

Port Douglas could be renamed Port Picture Postcard.  Took a day trip on a mini bus and the trip was georgeous.   Once there breathtaking.   I saw fields and fields of sugar cane for the first time.   I tried to work out what all the fields of bullrushes were about and then it dawned on me it was sugar cane.   They no longer burn off the sugar cane instead it is harvested by machine.  Going down the mountain there are layaways you can pull over into if you are a slow vechile and let the faster traffic past.   Good idea. 

Green Island

Rodger and I decided to get a last minute ticket to Green Island.   Tried to find where the terminal was on the internet but wasn't confident in locating it.   Decided to buy the tickets at an info kiosk and get directions.   It just happened to be 50 meters from the ferry terminal.   I felt a bit cheated.   Why couldn't they have told us we could purchase our tickets there.  Guess they would have missed out on the commission.  They don't get paid for free information. Didn't cost us anymore but would have preferred to have bought the tickets from the terminal.  It was another perfect day in paradise and a perfect crossing to Green Island.  We did the 'self guided eco tour' that was on the brochure - that is we walked around the island following the walkway and reading the little information stands located along the way..  We booked to go on the glass bottomed boat at 1.30 but unfortunately at that time the tide was out to far for us to go more than 100 meters from the pier.   It was interesting though and the fish equated the boat with food so there were plenty of fish to amuse us.   Even more amusing were all the seagulls that wanted a piece of the fishes action.   They obviously enjoyed a fish pellet or two as well and it was an interesting frenzy of fish and seagulls fighting for food.  Had a  paddle in water and saw a star fish - how cute.   It was my only paddle for all my time in Cairns.  Everything that needs maitaince is closed this time of year.  Even the underwater observatory is closed for maintaince. Had a late lunch of potato wedges and the crazy little birds running around the food area decided if we weren't going to feed the they would help themselves.  Twice I had a dive bombing bird fly in and take a wedge out of my hand.  Glad they had good aim otherwise I may have ended up quite bird pecked.  There are big notices around to say that there are $10,000 fines for feeding the birds.  The wedges were v. hot so there may have been a couple of birds with burnt tongues. Talked to an older woman working in the Green Island food court area who had worked her way up the coast from Gippsland eight years ago.   Had been working at Green Island for the last 4 years and she said it she loves coming to work everyday.  She gets the 8.30 ferry in the morning and catches the 4.30 ferry home.   Hopefully she gets mates rates on the fare.

beautiful cairns

How convienant the bus stops anywhere safe on the road outside the girls house. Took the bus into Cairns and spent the day walking the esplanade and around town.  Checked out the library the casino, v small. Planetarium was closed.  The day was perfect.  Not much traffic around.  People seem too think that the red and green men are there for decoration.. Didn't take me long to go with the flow.

Finally leaving the cold behind

Early to rise 5 and to the airport.  Flew tiger and good thing we looked up where the terminal was.   It is like an add on away from the main terminal.  We checked in, no ID necessary because we had our itineries.  We waited for our flight to be called.  We noticed that instead of the gate 2 printed on our dockets the main board now was showing that our flight would be leaving from gate 3.  We checked and were told yes it had been changed so we trooped around the corner to gate 3.   That was about the only bit of trouble we had on our outbound trip.   The leg room was minimal but it was a budget airline.  You get what you pay for.   It wasn't long before we were flying well and truely above cloud covered land.  Eventually the cloud cover disappeared and we were flying over hundreds of k's of bare empty land, criss crossed only but roads and amazingly rivers.   Occasionally there were glimpses of small settlements of three or four buildings then nothing but vast expanses of land.  It is fascinating to see the land from above.  In less than 3 hours from take off we were landing in Cairns. Off with the jackets and on with the sunnies.

addicted to trove

Have been finding out awesome things about my ancestors from searching the digitized newspapers in trove. I have found (most exciting of all) a photo of my G.G.G. grandmother. No mean feat considering she was born in 1791. Have also found a lost relative that really did get lost, miners that struck a rich load, a bigamist. Read about losing homes to bush fires and floods, motorbike accidents, falls from horses, treks across to the Bendigo digging and being there at the time of the Eureka stockade, and just so much more. Truly amazing. And it's all in the newspapers.

kimmii

sometimes

I was reading a blog I came across the other day called 100 things.   A young guy deciding he is going to live life to the fullest decides to do 100 things from his list of things to do before I die kind of thing.  You know the live life to the fullest you only have one life, make the most of it..   Great in theory but we all don't think we have a wasted life by just enjoying every day in what we do.  I think that is more to the point of existance.   But on the other hand it is nice to have dreams and have that list tucked away.  My to do list has filled one toilet roll and I am well and truely into the next.  A lot of the things are in the mode of to travel, to go here, to see that and somethings are more practical like to de junk my house.  I looked at the blog of the 100 things and realised he didn't set out with a predetermined list of things to do but  in some cases he made them up as he went along.
Anyway I have started to cross a few things off my list.  Things like
1. learn to dance  2. take the fast train to Ballarat,  just general things but they don't have to be huge things like meeting the Pope to be of value. I think some of the smaller things for a mere non world travelling mortal are just as if not more important than for eg. marrying a stranger in Vegas. ( one of the thing he did in his 100 things blog)
Another thing I can now cross off my list and it wasn't something I set out to do is to stand up to a workplace bully. 
I became indignant at the way she (the bully) was running down a person that we worked in conjunction with and that she had never met.  If she had shut up after the first or second time I may not have said anything.  I would have just let it ride, but she had an audience and she was in making the most of it.  The guy she was running down is a genuine nice guy who works hard to provide a service that he has been thrown into and she was making him out to be some kind of workplace pariah because he was providing this service and working hard to make it work.  I stood up to her on his behalf in a quiet way and then went back to my work. 
That was by far a greater achievement than meeting the Pope.  (no offence to the Pope)

the lake

What a shame.  There was no eerie fog over the lake this morning as I waslked to work.   I had my camera with me looking forward to a nice foggy start to winter but it was nothing like yesterday.  Guess I will just have to keep taking the camera and waiting for another morning like yesterday.  Guess over the next few months there will be plenty of them and I will be over them.  Here are a couple of photos of the nearly empty lake minus the fog.  Still looks a bit eerie.  The lake has been emptied for the winter for a weed erradication program.