29th February. The day that dosn't normally exisit.

I renamed this blog entry to celebrate the 29th February, a rare day! It's a bonus day, so something grand should be done with it, so I was off to Ballarat to find some gold.
Sovereign Hill has been one of the best attractions I've visited so far. It's an open museum - an entire town plus 2 mines and homes representative of the 1850's gold mining era. I heard about it on the Overlander train, the lady next to me was going to Ballarat and told me it was a must see.

I left the bnb at 9am was there by 10.30am, I didn't leave until 4.30pm there was so much to see. As well as the mine tours and shops and people dressed in proper attire for that period there was also a list of events and activities throughout the day. For example musket firing, black smith demo, gold pouring, candle making, metal spinning, sweet making. There also stuff to take part in like coach rides with lovely big horses, bowling, gold panning and a funny game at the hotel which you could actually stay at which looked like a thin snooker table, the aim was to get you balls into little cups at the far end of the table for which you scored points. I scored 6 points but my opponent scored 7 points, so she won!

On one side of the shops were the houses with vegetable gardens and chickens, and on the other side were the mines. It was the best day, have a look...



Apothecaries Hall - Doctors and Chemist.

The blue and red jars in the Chemist are to show its a Doctors/ Chemist as these were the colours on the ambulance, this was to help those who couldn't read. The doctor had an 8% survival rate.



Candle Makers

The candles are hung on a rotating wheel in batches, they start at just the string, they are dipped in the tallow bath and hung back again to dry, once dried they are dipped again until enough layers have built up to form the candle.

Those horses are vey sort after.

Tin Smiths



Gold Pouring into an ingot, a 4kg bar here is worth $150'000

Musket firing

 This guy was great, the police at the time made sure people had a licence to mine, if they didn't it was a $5 fine, the police were corrupt however and a man on handing over their licence would have it ripped up and asked again for his licence. So instead of making $20 a year policeman's salary, they made an awful lot more. He also explained the unrifled musket, the unrifled bit meaning it did not have a rifle which was a twisty bit that made the bullet spin and therefore travel faster, further and truer. The musket didn't have this so it was unrifled and was less accurate and would spit out a more wobbly bullet.


Sweet Shop

 

What was really cool was all the things made in the various shops were used throughout the town, for example the Blacksmiths made tools and metal work used in the mines as well as house hold items for sale to the public. The candle maker provides all the candles of course, you can buy them too. The Saddlery makes and fixes the things used on the coaches horses, there's the  wheelwright and coach builder, the tinsmith who all things brass, candle holders and house hold fixings, kitchen wares, stuff like that. The people in the businesses were real skilled tradespeople who just got on with their jobs and every now and they might have a scheduled demo where they would talk about their craft and what it meant for the mine and the town. I think that's what makes this place so authentic is the real crafts people who work there, and even though its a theme town, everyone working there has a real job to do. I saw gardeners, men refilling wheel barrows with wood for the boilers, shop keepers and other peoples in dress going about their business.

There is almost too much to see at Sovereign Hill.

On the road again, the Great Ocean Road

After a bit of a debacle with the hire car I headed out of Melbourne to Geelong, it was 3pm when I was passing through the unavoidable city bit and being a Friday afternoon, the traffic was super slow. I was glad to arrive at my airbnb in a quiet suburb of Geelong.



Fly

Molly

My host Linda and John were friendly and entertaining, although some of John's jokes you have to be in the mood for! Nevertheless, the wine came out and I was introduced to their 2 old dogs, Molly - a Scottish Terrier who is extremely fat like a balloon age 14 and Fly age 16, I forget the breed but he's blind and a bit deaf but very endearing, he walks in continuous loops of the place gently bumping into things. The dogs have a favourite place to sleep, of course they both want to sleep in the same spot despite having the run of a large deck and garden, but really it's Fly's bed, when Fly finds Molly in his bed he barks and Molly can be brought out from the bed by the slightest call as she's always thinking of food! Fly often doesn't know his bed has been vacated and will continue to bark at the empty bed, poor old chap!

Molly is very affectionate and will come up and sit in front of me and then roll over and wag her tail, for a fat dog she sure does move around a lot, neither dogs keep still for more than a few minutes.

 

The day after I arrived it was the Pako Parade, held in Pakington street every street, the road is closed off and fills with markets and food stalls with food from around the world. Most of the food is yellow; something deep fried or something in bread deep fried or maybe just something in bread, but overall impression is yellow. The parade consists of whatever different community's they have in Geelong and a brass band, the band were great, they played the Star Wars theme tune and wore storm trooper outfits, there was also a magnificent trio in lederhosen with accordions and oboe, they rocked.
After that I went to the Art Gallery, the sea front and then back to base.

Today I visited Queenscliff, the other side of Mornington Peninsular I visited where the Echidna was sighted, and then onto Torquay to have a wander along the beaches.
Tomorrow, I'll finds me some gold!

Fun converted attic room for guests at the airbnb. Like a little chalet.

Its difficult to write with a mouse, Melbourne NE, Ballarat NW, Great Ocean Road SW

Sherbrooke Forest and a Lyre bird sighting

Yesterday we went to Sherbrooke forest in the Dandenong Ranges NP, its an English persons dream, especially if that English person is in need dire need of cream teas, which can happen if one has been travelling far and wide on the dusty red earth under a scorching sun or working on a farm say with hundreds of flies trying to land on ones face.

There is a parrot feeding area at the picnic area, $4 gets you a bag of seed and a tray to feed the birds that will land on peoples heads, arms, whatever they can and then squawk at each other if another bird try's to land on their tray. We watched some people feed the cockatiels and then 4 buses of Asian tourists arrived and most of them piled into the feeding area with their seed trays but after a few minutes all the birds flew away and sat at a safe distance in the trees because there were too many people now.

 

After watching the bird feeding we went for a walk:

Eastern Sherbrooke Forest Walk

7.1km, 2 hour loop. Grade: Moderate to Difficult
This is a round trip starting and finishing at Grants Picnic Ground. The route follows Lyrebird walk, then Neumann Track, passing through cleared areas of bush created by the successive wildfires of the early 1900s. At Paddy Track junction follow the track downhill before climbing Welch Track and following Coles Ridge Track back to the picnic ground. Most of the walk is through Mountain Ash and Messmate Stringybark forest. There are steep sections on Paddy and Welch Track which may be slippery when wet.

 

 

We didn't intend to walk this far, we were after a short loop walk so hadn't taken any provisions or water with us but we did see a male Lyre bird, then a few yards down the path we saw a female. Lyre birds a bit like a peacock.

This was quite something, I don't think they are seen very often. Like the Echidna sighting, this was another first, perhaps I'll do A Big Year! The Lyre birds are amazing mimics, they'll mimic other birds and whatever else they hear, in this example the bird has got an entire construction yard going on:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WeQjkQpeJwY

After the walk we had a cream tea and checked out the Rhododendron Gardens, there were no Rhododendrons because they had finished for the season but it was still lovely. It had a souvenir shop full of nice things, we bought some nice things. On the way back the road went through some lovely twee villages with endless tea shops, if we hadn't already have had a cream tea I'm sure we would have stopped at Miss Marple's Tearooms!

Another lovely day seeing a really nice part of Victoria. John made a delicious dinner, mmm bacon, eggs, had browns and salad and a glass of wine.

A day in the city and news summary

I took the train into the city, John had marked some points of interest on the map. From Flinders Street station I ambled up through the little lanes and arcades that echoed boutique lanes of Rome and Brighton with all the cafes and jewellery shops. I found a nice chocolate shop where I didn't have to sit in the middle of a crowded noisy lane. The chocolates were expensive and splendid, I had 3 exquisite chocolates and a coffee, a rather decadent morning tea but I'm not exactly fat.

I visited the State Library which has some free exhibitions.

A very big place....

In a very small space.

I got the free inner city tram a few times and got a nice take away salad lunch. Yes see that offsets the chocolates, ha! Mmm yummy!

YUM!

Oddly, whilst eating the potato bits I thought about Brighton Pier. The original Brighton, the one in the UK. I finished the day after a walk around the art gallery and through the botanic gardens.

For interest recent news headlines include:

• A student dies near Broken Hill whilst on a school camping/hiking trip in the 41 degree heat.
• A crane in the Melbourne collapsed in on itself after a fire broke out in the cabin at the top.
• A coach crashed into a bridge at speed because it the driver didn't realise it was a low bridge, on the same day another truck crashed into the same bridge.
• Arsonists are setting rural places on fire and causing forest fires.

Popular TV shows include:

• My Kitchen Rules
• I'm a celebrity get me out of here
• Downtown Abbey
• Doc Martin
• Home and Away

Most excellent shortbread

Today was forecast to be a really hot day so I went for a swim at the beach in the morning before it got super hot. It was too hot for much else outdoor wise except I did walk to the supermarket in the mega heat to get some baking supplies, my main concern was getting back before the butter melted.

I made my most excellent shortbread, beat that MKR!*

Reviews of my most excellent shortbread:
"mmm this is really good, I'm going to have some more" John B



My most excellent shortbread recipe

*My Kitchen Rules. A competitive cooking program where contestants cook for other contestants and the judges in their own home in their own pop up restaurant. Most of them are highly confident of their cooking ability and quite nauseating, although I've observed its the women in the group who are the nauseating ones, they also get highly excited and silly when the judges arrive who they clearly idolise as Gods, which is weird as the judges are just people who eat food and criticize it. They are chefs who are clearly getting paid lots of money to eat other peoples food. The producers have excelled at finding the most irritating examples of the Australian accent to showcase. It's a strangely additive program.

Brightons of the world unite, a bike ride into the city

I borrowed John's bike which was new and nice to go for a bike ride. I'm too knackered to explain too much so here's another great infographic:

60 kilometres! Sixty. Kilometres. 40 Miles people.

On the way back I was in need of water bottle refill, and look what I found:

Houlihans! I didn't even have to tell them I was a Houlihan they just could tell I was a splendid sort of person. Of course they refilled my bottle. And where was it? Not far from this place:

Hi 5. It was even a splendidly overcast day with a bit of rain dribble to make me feel right at home.

Melbourne city centre

Nice tram and bike lanes

So to recap that was sixty kilometres.

60!

Planning, planning, planning and a picture of a dog.

Where does the time go when I'm planning? It's also boring so I try to get a few weeks worth done in one day. I went for a walk in the morning to the beach and then got on with various tasks like laundry, bike adjusting - John said I could borrow his bike, and tent setting up, another borrowed tent a bit different to most so I set it up in the garage to check how it went together and a whole day of planning on the computer.



Trying to figure out the poles on the tent

Milly, John's dog which used to be Josie's dog spent the day sleeping with her back to various corners, sometimes she'd have a bit of dream and her legs would twitch. Apart from that she wasn't much help with the planning.



Milly

After a lovely dinner John drove me out to a place along the coast where was a jetty and an old submarine in swimming distance from the beach. It was a lovely evening and whilst I saw no one in the water in the morning, at 7pm it was very busy.

Nice in'it?

The plan is to stay with John in Mentone for the rest of the week and then head down the great ocean road area and staying at airbnbs and campsites, then go back to the East of Melbourne and explore the National Parks and nice wet and green bits over that way, after that I've found another house sit in the Yarra valley north of Melbourne, then it will be almost time to fly out to Hong Kong. Not bad for a day's planning.

Well its almost half ten at night, I'm going to have a cup of tea now and go to bed and watch a ted.com talk. TED.COM people. Not Ted the movie, quite different. No teddy bears.

Echidna!!! The incredible story....

Reviews of Echidna!!!! The incredible story....

'I can't read so the pictures really brought the story to life'
'The best story I've ever read'
'I like shiny objects and bright colours, this story had neither'
'What's an Echidna?'

and now for Echidna!!!! The incredible story....


Echidna at Mornington Peninsular

ECHINDA!!!! seen at

 

Mornington Peninsula

Also witnessed by..

John, Josie's Dad*

Echidna. The happening.

*Don't worry the burger did not contain Echidna, but the burger did topple over.

The End.

NB: Apparently there's a writer's festival on in Melbourne soon, I'm thinking of submitting Echidna!!! The incredible story.... I think it's got a broad appeal.

South Australia - summary and a bit of nerdiness.

A round up of the month for those who like some nerdy statistics.

Flew to Sydney. Indian Pacific train to Adelaide.
6 nights in Adelaide.
Hired car, went to Kangaroo Island for 4 nights on ferry.
Back to mainland, wwoofed on flower farm for 3 days, escaped.
1 night at a backpackers in Adelaide city. Drove to Jamestown, wwoofed on Vineyard for 6 days.
Went to Flinders Ranges, camped for 2 nights.
Back to Jamestown to vineyard for another 3 days.
To Adelaide for 4 nights, returned car.
Overlander train to Melbourne.

Here is an excellent map showing in detail where I went, the red lines are by car, blue by ferry and black by train. The black line coming in is the Indian Pacific from NSW and the black line at the bottom going out is the Overlander to Victoria.

 

Viva Hans Vegas and 12 hours on a train.

Before I left Adelaide I caught a fringe show at The Garden of Unearthly Delights in the Spiegeltent (mirror tent). I saw Viva Hans Vegas, a splendid sparkly Vegas style cabaret act. I laughed for the whole hour, it was exactly the sort of show I wanted to see. Later on the train to Melbourne I sat next to a lady whose husband worked as a journalist for an Adelaide paper and said he worked with Hans who is actually Matt Gilbertson and works for the same paper but 'Hans' came out at festival time.

With one final day with the car I went back to Victor Harbour as last time I was there I didn't have much time because I was en route to the funny farm. Cuthman took me down there and I walked over the pier to Granite Island, there's a splendid walk around the island and at one corner are some rocks with the same formation as the Remarkable Rocks on Kangaroo Island, but here you don't have to run the gauntlet of kangaroos dashing across the road, the expensive ferry crossing and not much else to do. My advice would be skip (ha ha) Kangaroo island and spend a day at Victor Harbour instead.
I returned the car and had just enough time to look in a few galleries and get the tram back to my airbnb south of the city.

North of the city and south of the city are two different places. The northern suburbs, not to be confused with 'North Adelaide' which is lovely, but past that into uninspiring suburban sprawl where people drive like idiots on the main roads, you know someone's doing to do something stupid if they are diving a Holden (Vauxhaul) commodore or Ford Falcon ute. Cuthman refused to be flustered by them, I set the cruise control to the speed limit. But South Adelaide is where people who like nice things live, there's the tram, it goes to the beach, separate cycle lanes, sensible driving, noticeably fewer commodores and utes.
After another lovely airbnb experience my host took me to the train station the next morning which was very kind considering it was 6.30am! The Overlander is part of the Great Southern Rail group of trains but is no where near as grand, I was in Red class. That's ok, the seats were roomy and I had a nice person to sit next to, it's a day service only arriving 6:30pm in Melbourne.
Most of the scenery was flat and the trains maximum speed was 85kph. The sky got greyer and greyer as we neared Melbourne and I kept falling asleep, at which point my neighbour wanted to talk a lot, I was on the brink of slumberland, and whenever there was a gap in transmition I would nod off again and then she would say something else and I would say 'mmm..' to show I was listening albeit it with my eyes shut. She mentioned a friend of hers runs an airbnb but doesn't enjoy it because she wants her privacy and doesn't let guests use the kitchen or cook anything. It sounds like her friends has a traditional BnB but is advertising on airbnb, which is actually a different market. Most guests on airbnb do it because they want to feel at home, can't use the kitchen? don't want to speak to your guests? Don't advertise on airbnb!!! I said her friend had totally missed the point of airbnb which was a shame.

Soon I will arrive in Melbourne and I'll be staying with Josie's Dad -John who I met when we walked the Milford Track some years ago. After a day on the train I'm looking forward to stretching my legs. The train stopped about 2km from the station for 20 minutes at least for no reason. At the terminal I had to get a ticket to Mentone but there were no signs for tickets or information only coffee and coca cola and exit, who designs these frigging places? A sign pointed up the escalator for local trains even though they were clearly all on the same ground level, I went upstairs, along the upper concourse and found the info booth, bought a ticket, went back downstairs and eventually a train on the correct line came and I could leave the station.

Australian train summary: slow. stops for long time without explanation, scenery gets tedious after several hours.

John was waiting at the station, at home there was spag bol, wine and ice cream and converstation. All things good. Time for slumberland...