Womadelaide :: Day 2

It was cool, overcast and a little rainy this morning and I was so cosy in my little bed that I just turned over and went back to sleep!

When I finally awoke for the second time, it was about 9:30.  I flicked on the kettle and decided to make myself a couple of boiled eggs for breakfast.  Then I realised that I didn't actually have any egg cups in the caravan - so made poached eggs instead. (Note to Self:  Get some egg cups).  Then after washing up and showering and a pretty laid-back, relaxed morning I drove into the town centre again and saw some lovely sculptures on the foreshore.

Then I went for another walk along the beach.

After that I did a little grocery shopping and to see if I could find any egg cups.  I finally found them at the local Op Shop.

These cute little egg cups will be just perfect,
because they are wooden and so won't break in the van!

I also found a lovely long skirt and top at the Op Shop.

The whole lot only cost me $10, so I gave them a $10 donation as well.  I do love Op Shops!

Then I went to the Apollo Bay Bakery and had one of their famous scallop pies.  It was particularly yummy!

After lunch, the weather started to clear up and become warm and sunny.  So I drove up to Marriner's Lookout, which is the highest point in the area and right behind the caravan park.

View of Marriner's Lookout from the caravan park

Once I had parked, there was another five minute walk up a steep track to the Lookout, through some lovely little fern gullies.

On the way I stopped to take a picture of the caravan park from the top down.

The walk to the top was really worth it, because the views were spectacular!

On the way back to the car park, I saw a little family of blue wrens hopping about in the grass and managed to get a picture of a male.

Once I had returned back down to sea level, I went to the fish market as Apollo Bay is famous for it's beautiful sea food.

An interesting sculpture on the wall

I didn't end up buying any fish, but enjoyed looking through everything there.  Then I walked along the harbour and saw all the fishing boats and other yatchs.

Back to the caravan to put away the shopping and sit and read in the sunshine for a while.

The weather began to close in and by the time I left to go to La Bimba (another high-rating restaurant) for dinner, it was raining slightly so I took my parka with me.  It's a good thing I did, because the rain got gradually heavier as the evening drew on!  La Bimba is above one of the shops in the main street and I was lucky to get a park just across the road.

This is a rustic, Italian-style restaurant - very different to the one last night.

I was fortunate to get a table right at the front in the window, so I could watch everything that was going on outside.

As I was in a famous seafood town, I decided I would choose some fish meals and (feeling adventurous) I selected a cuttlefish dish for entree.  I've never had cuttlefish before, but figured "When in Spain ...".  I chose another Barossa Valley white wine to go with this dish, but an Italian-sounding one - a 2016 Vigna Cantina Trebbiano.  The cuttlefish was similar to calamari but a little fleshier and it was served with zucchini and finely-sliced radish.  It was actually rather good and the wine went with it perfectly!

The waitress also served some homemade sour dough bread and homemade butter, which was absolutely delicious!

As the evening drew on and it got dark outside, the rain settled in quite heavily and I was glad I had brought my parka for when I left.  It was kind of nice to be sitting at the window of a warm, joyful, rustic restaurant, eating nice food and drinking lovely wine, watching the rain sweep through the ark of the street lights and people huddled into their rain coats and umbrellas, scurrying to their cars.

Then, for main I wanted to order a whole baked snapper, but they had sold out and instead the waitress suggested the grilled whiting.  With this I ordered a 2018 Head Shiraz from the Barossa.

When the plate arrived, I groaned inwardly because (harking back to my vegetarian days), I really hate seeing the head and eyes of a fish on my plate.  It always feels like it is looking at me.  In fact I was pretty sure the semi-fish closest to me was actually laughing at me!  Nevertheless, I tucked in and soon discovered that it had been garnished with coriander, which I really dislike.  I'm one of those people who just cannot stand the taste of it! 

Then, as I tried to eat the fish I discovered that there were dozens of little sharp bones throughout it.  No matter how hard I tried to separate the flesh from them, I ended up picking one or two bones out of my mouth with every forkful.  So, I only ended up eating about three-quarters of the first fish and left the rest, explaining to the concerned waitress that it was cooked perfectly but just wasn't to my taste.  The wine was lovely, although a little peppery.

So, I decided to finish off the evening with a tarte tartin and a peppermint tea.  There's nothing more yummy than apple, caramel sauce and cinnamon with a homemade vanilla ice cream and the peppermint tea helped settle my stomach after all those strange and unfamiliar flavours.

Home and into bed by 10 o'clock.  The rain was pelting down on the caravan roof and the wind was really buffeting the van about, but I was warm and dry inside and was soon rocked off to sleep.

Womadelaide :: Day 1

So here's the start of my latest caravan holiday - this one to Adelaide in South Australia to attend the Womadelaide World Music Festival. 

It was cool, overcast and a bit showery when I headed off from home at about 10:30am and drove four hours via Geelong and the Great Ocean Road.  The weather gradually lifted as I drove.

My car and van at the beginning of the Great Ocean Road
- a place called the "Devil's Elbow"

The view of Cape Patton, not far from Apollo Bay

I arrived at my first scheduled stop in Apollo Bay at the Big 4 Pisces Caravan Park, unhitched and set up in warm sunshine with a stiff breeze.

The van set up with the pop-top up, overlooking the ocean

After setting up, I drove into the town centre and walked around the shops and then headed down to the beach for a walk along the sand.  At 6 o'clock I went for dinner to a lovely Greek restaurant called Chris's Beacon Point Restaurant, about 10 minutes back along the road from Apollo Bay.

The entrance to Chris's Beacon Point Restaurant

This restaurant was highly recommended on the foodie websites and I could understand why.  It is a fine dining restaurant, situated at the top of a hill, amongst soaring gum trees, overlooking Skenes Creek and Apollo Bay.

The view of the ocean at Skenes Creek from amongst the gum trees

Another view from my table of Apollo Bay

A lovely young waitress with a French accent handed me the menu and suggested some of the day's specials.  I asked for her recommendation and she said the sardines with lemon and tzatziki - an excellent suggestion, which I teamed with a 2019 Rusden 'Christian' Chenin Blanc from the Barossa Valley.  The sardines were absolutely exquisite!

Sardines with lemon and tzatziki - I only
remembered to take the photo after I was half-way through!

Then for main, I chose a rib eye of beef with a creamy mushroom sauce and potato mash, with a Greek salad.  The meat was very tender and delicious and the salad was beautifully fresh with just a light dressing, which is how I prefer it.  I chose a 2014 Ottelia Cabernet Sauvignon from the Coonawarra to go with this meal.  I'm deliberately choosing South Australian wines on this trip, as I'm intending to do a bit of winery touring while I'm there and to bring some delicious wines home with me.

Beef with creamy mushroom sauce and a Greek salad

Home by 9 o'clock for a cup of tea and to do a little reading - "The Drover's Wife" by Leah Purcell and then off to a very sound sleep, listening to the waves sweeping onto the sand just below the caravan park.  An absolutely beautiful start to my holiday!

Pesto

This afternoon I met up with Richie for a coffee and chat.  The basil in my veggie patch has also been going berserk, so I harvested quite a bit and decided to make some basil pesto for my own dinners and lunches, and to also give some to Richie.

Using the mortar and pestle to crush pine nuts with the basil leaves.

Then mixing in crushed garlic, grated parmesan cheese and extra virgin olive oil.

Richie was very pleased with the fragrant, fresh pesto and I also gave him some basil leaves to put on his home made pizzas.

We had a lovely time together at a wonderful local coffee shop I have just discovered in Kilsyth.  It's called Essenza and came very highly recommended.

Richie said the coffee was really great.  I don't drink coffee, but I had a peppermint tea and we shared a savoury muffin.  It was presented so beautifully - it looked like a pot plant - and tasted delicious with basil pesto, slightly warmed cherry tomatoes and parsley on top and butter and tomato relish on the side.

Veggie Patch Update

It has only been four weeks, but my veggies have been growing amazingly!

I have been harvesting lettuce leaves for my lunch and dinner every morning for the past three weeks.  So beautifully fresh, crisp and delicious!

The tomatoes have literally gone bananas!!  They are almost a metre tall, with flower buds all over them.

So, this morning I trimmed all the lower leaves and re-staked each plant.

The zucchinis have not only all survived, but are now crowding each other out.

So it was time to re-home some of them to the other side of the peach tree.  It was such a warm and dry day today (about 25 degrees), so they immediately flopped and showed me how unhappy they were with the move.

But I gave them a treat, along with all the other veggies - a delicious dose of veggie feeder!  Then I gave them a lovely long drink of water.

I had noticed that there were also some unexpected pumpkins coming up through the lettuces and tomatoes.  There must have been some pumpkin seeds amongst the compost I had dug into the patch.  So, I re-homed them with the zucchinis.

Then I threaded a soaker hose through the patch, to make it easier to water all these thirsty plants as the weather gradually warms up towards Summer.

It seems my long-held black thumb has turned green at last!

Crop Swap

With my garden beginning to burst with so much wonderful produce, I am now in the fabulous position of having more of some things than I need.  So, this morning I took some of my excess fruit and veggies along to the local Permaculture Crop Swap.

I took seven lettuces, about twenty mandarins, a dozen lemons and I also bagged up some kaffir lime leaves (fantastic in curries!).

The idea with the crop swap is that you take your stuff and lay it out on the benches with everyone else's.

Then you stand around admiring everyone else's produce and talking about their gardens and yours.

There's morning tea.

Then everyone takes some of the other people's produce that they don't already have at home.  I took some spinach, rhubarb, broad beans and some seedlings of cucumber, rosemary and sage for the garden.

Even though there isn't any direct swapping involved, everyone just took a little of what they needed.  There was no "bun fight" and everyone was very respectful.

After that, there was a demonstration on how to make your own beeswax wraps.

I have seen these in some craft and wholefoods shops, but had never really understood what they were used for and how great they are!  Also, they are very expensive in those shops - $50 for a set of five!

And yet this lady showed us how easy it was to make them and they can be used to wrap any food items from watermelons, to cucumbers, apples, celery, capsicum, salad bowls, left overs, etc.

Even make your own popcorn bags to take to the movies!  They are completely reusable.

I was very impressed with these wraps and once you have a set, you can basically throw away the cling wrap (which will save some birds' lives, because they tend to eat the stuff)!

I think my family know what they are all going to be getting for Christmas this year!

Wisteria

I can't believe how truly magnificent my Wisteria is!  

After so many years of wishing I had a flowering one, I now have one of the best I've ever seen!

Sadly, this magnificent display only lasted about three weeks and now it is all leaves and runners looking to climb underneath my carport roof.  Time to get out the secateurs!

Nevertheless, I have had the joy of sitting underneath it and just marveling at its wonder for most of the month and it has given me great happiness.

Perth & Broome Holiday :: Day 1

Pier 21 Apartments & Pool

Richie dropped us to the airport at 9:00 am and we hopped on the flight to Perth just after 11 o'clock.  

View from the Pool to the Marina on the Swan River

We landed in Perth at about 2:00 pm, picked up a hire car and headed down to Fremantle, where we were staying in some nice apartments called Pier 21, looking over a marina on the Swan River.

Pier 21 Apartment Living Room

We checked in, unpacked and then put our feet up and relaxed with a cuppa for a few minutes, checking out the view from the balcony.

Pier 21 Balcony & View of Marina

The weather was lovely - sunny & warm.  So, we decided to take a drive along the marina and see what we could find.

The Left Bank

Just over the bridge we came across a likely looking pub - The Left Bank - sitting bathed in the afternoon sun and full of people enjoying themselves.








So, we decided to join them!

The Left Bank Courtyard

Wayne ordered a fisherman's platter and a Peroni for tea and I had a cheese board and a nice cold sav blanc.

Wayne on the balcony of The Left Bank

We wiled away the next few hours on the balcony, watching the boats sail passed and the sun set.  A very nice start to the holiday!