My sister, Elizabeth (aka Liz or Bij by me) had a few days in Queensland with an ex-neighbour of hers from her early days in Australia at Mornington. They had booked a place on Bribie Island so we took the opportunity of meeting her there. Much easier than battling our way to Bermagui in South Australia! (80 km instead of 1400 km!)
We walked on the beach to Buckley’s Hole – almost the very southerly tip of the island.
Back at Kiels Mountain there was a bit of grandchildren delivery and collection. Plus some general clearing of the pool and surrounds. This area was affected by the house building operation and still awaits full restoration.
Gardening is hard work between 10 am and 4 pm. It’s just too hot. The school runs end about 8.30 am and, even if there’s no after-school chess, swimming, tennis or frisby, it’s dark soon after 6 pm. So there isn’t much time available for work! However, the bonfire heap is slowly getting bigger and the paving round the pool now has far fewer weeds. The concrete plinth outside their huge shed had a number of flat planks of wood scattered around. These were lifted gingerly one by one with a stick. Just as well as a couple of cane toads hopped out from one pile and a snake was sheltering under another.
“Benji, this is what I mean. You have to be very careful!” He took one look and said “It’s a keelback, Grandpa! Non-venomous!” “Well, I’m sure you might be right, but just in case, we are leaving.” “Now!” “Immediately!” To be fair, Phroggy’s identification was confirmed once this photo had been sent to expert snakeologists.
To celebrate our miraculous escape, Linda (with a little help from Glenda) constructed a spectacular dish for supper. An un-named Lebanese concoction involving greek yoghurt and garlic sauce, chickpeas, tahini and mint with grilled cauliflower and asparagus on top and harissa-marinated lamb and chicken in the middle …
Actually, i think this was made for dinner the previous evening, but why let the truth spoil a good story?! It was really to celebrate Jack’s successful band performance. Their rendition of the Star Wars theme tune was truly brilliant!
The next stage of this trip is a week in Melbourne with Jeff and Laurel, friends we met on our Kimberley trip in 2016. This time we are staying in their lovely new house. Last time we were in Melbourne it was almost ready for Jeff and Laurel to move in – just being finished off.
Linda delivered us to Maroochydore Airport in plenty of time for the 8.05 pm flight – which was already showing a delayed departure. The bad news is that the flight is about two and a half hours long plus there’s an hour time difference, so our 11.30 pm arrival could slide into tomorrow! Sorry Jeff and Laurel! In the event we collected our luggage at 11.59 pm!
We picked up our old Myki cards and all hopped on the bus to the city. We thought we could top the cards up on the bus, but we couldn’t. So swiping the cards put us into debt. We’ll worry about that later! We are on the way to the “Monet and Friends” sound and light display at the Melbourne Convention Centre.
The show is in an enormous, cavernous space with dozens and dozens of individual screens onto which are projected images of impressionist artists works of art. Over 800 of them are combined in a magical extravaganza.
They are woven together with sets of images of clouds, trees and “bioluminescence”, all overlaid with dramatic music. Stunning!
Some of the famous artworks have been animated with dragon flies scooting about and boats rocking and rolling on imaginary swell. What Monet, Manet, Cézanne, Degas and their mates make of this show, I shudder to think! Luckily there are no lasting copyright issues! … Or are there? Matisse lived until the end of 1954. Artistic copyright runs for 70 years from an artist’s death. I think his stuff is covered till November 2024. Who should I tell?
Anyway – the show was fabulous. If it pitches up near you, you really NEED to go and see it. (BTW, I get 10% on all new business!)
We visited Bob and Mary (met recently on our Norwegian adventure in fjordland) in their superb house in Glen Iris.
Lovely BBQ, excellent desserts and silky wines! Thank you again guys!
Our stay in Melbourne continued, but I’m so far behind, I’m going to leave tales of our further adventures for later!
Just letting you know that Bob and Mary live in Glen Iris not Glen Innes.
Would have been a long trip to Glen Innes.