Weekend in Australia

Friday night started with Col. Leon returning from Pukapunyal.  I hope I finally got the spelling right.  One of the girls from school gave me a ride home.  Poor girl, she slept in that morning and forgot to pick me up for school.  She did double back and scoop me up in time for school to start.  Good morning, so far.  Anyway, she invited me to her place for a cuppa after work, but I figured it was just as easy for her to have a glass of wine here, which we did.  Dinner was a really tasty veggie pizza from Nelson’s – apparently a place Donna likes too.  A bit of wine (the new house favourite is Bowler’s Run at $2.99) and a lot of tv on a rather chilly night.  Lots of blankets and a snoozing husband on the couch, ahhhh!!!!  Just our speed at times.

Saturday – well, I had some big plans for banking and shopping.  Morning got off to a late start and I forgot all about the bank.  But I did do a load of shopping in Kangaroo Flats, at the Kmart mall.  I got some canvas runners ($5), a t-shirt nightie ($6), slippers ($15), loads of socks and a nice rain jacket with a hood that fits in a pouch (from Rivers).  We ended up shopping at the butcher, the discount grocery and the veggy store too.  Hence, we had snags for dinner (along with steak).  Snags seem to be the meal of choice around here for a bbq.  These were capsicum (red pepper) and sage.  Quite nice, although I only had one.  I don’t mind sausage, but I don’t want a whole meal of them.

Sunday – we decided to volunteer a little time and went to Long Gully to help clean up Australia.  After an hour and a half, we were rewarded with a muffin and a group photo (maybe I’ll make the local news?).  The organizer asked where we were from in America (Canada, as Leon had written on his tshirt, doh!!).  We did our part and even saw a nice cockatoo of some kind.

It was such a nice day (finally warm and sunny as we expected in Australia) that we decided to take a long drive in the country up to Kerang.  There isn’t much up there but it is known for its lakes and birds.  So I drove the 122km up and Leon drove back.  We stopped and walked along a swampy park area and saw a few birds.  Unfortunately, the egrets were too far away to get a good pic of, even with the new camera.  As usual, I really had to pee, so we stopped at the first public washroom when we arrived.  It is common here to have public washrooms in areas in most towns.  The first place we stopped at looked rather abandoned but I was kind of desperate.  I walked through this huge web and then saw the spider and the condition of the toilet.  Forget it, I am not that desperate!!  But I did draw Leon’s attention to the spider.  As we walked along the swampy park there were a whole lot of other spiders of the same kinds.  Here’s a pic.  The spider was about that size, so it’s not a blowup.  Yuck!!!!! Leon will surely have nightmares tonight.

We are currently back at the house where I am bbquing a nice pork roast.  I’ve made apple sauce from the apples I picked the other day in the yard.  Dinner should be good.  Next weekend, we will be in Port Fairy for the Music Fest.  Leon is renting a hippy van for the occasion.  More pics to come…