Sunday, 11 March, 2018

Another week gone by - the time seems to go so fast!  This was Dad's second week of teaching and it went well this week.  The guys continue to be enthusiastic in class asking more questions and everyone passed the exam at the end of the week.

My week was filled again with classes at the Leisure Centre and Tai Chi and knitting at the Seniors' Centre.  This week was also the monthly meeting of the library book club.  The book we read was called 'Caleb's Crossing' and I actually didn't finish the book - I just couldn't get into it.  The story was sort of interesting, but not interesting enough to read anymore than I did.  There was a good discussion about the book during the book club meeting - there were about ten women there - and after the discussion finished, it was time to just socialize with everyone.  They are a friendly group - we'll see how next month's meeting goes.  The book for April is 'Catch-22' - one I remember was read a lot in high schools, but not one that I ever read.

On Friday, my friend, Thea, picked me up from the Leisure Centre and we spent the afternoon together.  Of course, we started out with an iced chocolate and then had lunch by the pond near the Leisure Centre.  It's always nice to hang out with friends and have a good chat. 😃

 Iced chocolates with Thea

The view from our picnic by the pond

Yesterday, Dad and I drove to a quaint little town east of Perth called York.  We thought it would be nice to get away for the weekend and check out some other places around this area.  We started off going to the Peace Park Charity Markets - we thought that we might find some different things for sale there, but it was really just a garage sale in various stalls.  York has kept a lot of their heritage buildings (you know how much I love that old-style architecture) and so Dad and I spent 1 1/2 hours walking up and down the main street listening to a self-guided walking tour which Dad had downloaded onto his phone.  It was really interesting learning about the history of the different buildings.  Along the way, we stopped for some cake for morning tea at the local bakery.  Next stop was Penny Farthings Sweets - a (lolly) candy store - we enjoyed poking around the store, especially me since there were a number of lollies which reminded me of my childhood in Wagga.  We ordered some Chinese food for lunch and ate it in Avon Park by the Avon River which was really nice and then walked along the suspension bridge which goes over the river.  After lunch, we drove to the York Ice Cream Company to taste their ice-cream which had been touted as the 'best ice-cream you have ever tasted'.  Dad ordered passionfruit and I opted for their award winning licorice ice-cream.  It was expensive ($5.) for 150ml and, although it was tasty and very flavourful, Dad and I both agreed that we would rather have a Kawartha ice-cream.  After a visit to Mount Brown Lookout to see a view of the town of York and look for a geocache (we were successful), our final stop was at the Tipperary School Museum.  When we got there, a volunteer called Ken gave us a tour of the one room schoolhouse and told us some of the history of the school along with some local history.  He was a fountain of knowledge and we really enjoyed our time there.  On the way to our Airbnb, we searched for two more geocaches and were successful both times.  Our host at the Airbnb, Erin, was waiting for us at her place which was a little out of town of the next place we visited today (Northam).  She and her husband built a little add-on to their house for family who come and visit from England - when there is no-one visiting, she puts it up on Airbnb.  It was a fabulous place - so large and everything was so comfy - we very much enjoyed relaxing for the evening in the big leather chairs and had a great night's sleep there.  In the morning, we ate a fabulous breakfast which Erin provided (croissants, yogurt, fresh cut up fruit and orange juice).

York Town Hall (excuse my thumb shadow on the left - I am still getting used to taking photos on my new iPod 😏)

The Castle Hotel

 Old blue car we saw on the street

The Davies Building

York Motor Museum

York Courthouse Complex

 Dad with his banana cake for morning tea (it was supposed to be a carrot cake, but we weren't watching the girl closely and didn't notice she put in a banana cake)

 My mud cake - pretty tasteless which was very disappointing

Western Australian Bank

Penny Farthing Sweets - such a trip down memory lane walking through this lolly (candy) store

 View from the picnic table where we ate lunch

Dad with his Chinese food (honey chicken) for lunch

Our lunch guest

The Avon River - views from the suspension bridge

Dad and me on the suspension bridge

Me eating licorice ice-cream

Dad eating his passionfruit ice-cream

Look what someone added to this tree to make it so cute 😊

View of the town of York from Mount Brown Lookout

Living area where the teacher lived - one large room attached to the school (one classroom) at the Tipperary School Museum

Written on a slate in the one room school at Tipperary School Museum

Dad sitting in a student desk at the Tipperary School Museum

Ken, our tour guide of the Tipperary School Museum, sitting in the teacher's chair

Dad and I riding our 'horses' at the Tipperary School Museum

Riding our 'horses' outside the Museum under a Sandalwood tree

Dad showing one of our favourite geocache hides for this day - the owner of the geocache had made the cache to look like a survey marker - but the metal survey plate screwed onto the top of the marker post was actually attached to an emptied out glue stick in a hollowed out wood post

Another geocache - hidden in between two tree trunks under a rock 

First part of our breakfast at the Airbnb

Today, once we got going - it was hard to get out of the comfy bed 😀 - we drove over to another little town called Northam.  My friend, Thea, had told me it was pretty ordinary compared to York ...and she was right.  We did have a tasty iced chocolate at the cafe in the Visitor Information Centre and enjoyed walking over the suspension bridge which spanned the Avon River.  However, the self-guided walk of the main street left a lot to be desired.  It was nowhere as good as York's, so it was quite disappointing.  After checking out the silo art, we decided to leave the town and head home stopping at various geocaches along the way.  We found nine out of nine of them - we were very happy about that and considered it a successful day!

Hard to see unless you click on the pic to see it close up - I'm holding a travel bug we found in one of our caches - we will now place this travel bug into another cache and someone else will do the same - many of these travel bugs will travel around the world landing in various geocaches

Fountain in the Avon River outside the cafe at the Tourist Info Place at Northam

Pelican in the Avon River at Northam

Me with my iced chocolate at the cafe in the Tourist Info Place in Northam

View from the suspension bridge in Northam

Dad and me on the suspension bridge in Northam

Decorated trash bin in Northam

There are 12 bronze and iron sculptures around the town of Northam - they were 'installed on columns with engraved story plaques providing a unique visual tribute to the town's past' - this one is called 'Win-the-War-Tearooms' - a tearoom was set up and profits went to assist the war effort - soldiers would come to the tearoom by foot or by bicycle

This sculpture is called 'The Taxi' - the Shamrock Hotel provided this hansom cab and carriage service to taxi its customers home

'The Eclipse' - it is thought that the local river pools provided the water for the brewing process for the Avon Brewery and Ice Company

Bank of Australasia

Old Shire Council offices

Shamrock Hotel

Monument in front of the Northam Tourist Information Centre - it's called 'Five Premiers' and was erected to commemorate five previous premiers of the state of Western Australia

The Commercial Hotel

The Uniting Church

St. Johns Church

A fabulous geocache - the cache is a metal box made to look like a bolted-on bracket on this metal support post. The cache is magnetized to the post to make it look like it belongs. Quite tricky to spot!

View of Northam from Mount Ommanney Lookout

Someone had painted on these rocks - we saw them on the way down from the lookout

Silo Art - two artists were commissioned to paint these silos - the first two pics (one far away and the second a close-up of the first) were done by a British artist named 'Phlegm' - he painted 'whimsical characters in their fantastic transportation devices'

These colourful silos were painted by an American artist named Hense - he 'lobbed his explosive patterns across the silos in blocks of bright colour'

Beautiful wildflowers we came across when we were geocaching

Sunday, 4 March, 2018

It's been a busy week for both of us topped off with a nice relaxing weekend.

Dad started his course - Airbus 320 - on Monday - with 8 guys - all of them are quite experienced which is nice for Dad.  Everyone seems to be picking up the information well  - the first exam is on Monday, so that will be a good indicator if things are going as well as they appear to be to Dad.  The guys ask lots of questions which often means that they are keen to learn more about the airplane and also seem to be looking deeper than the information being taught which Dad also likes.

I spent my mornings this week at the Leisure Centre for Body Balance, Aquafit and Senior Circuit classes.  Senior Circuit takes place in the gym - the fitness instructor places various equipment in a circle and we use each piece of equipment for one minute and then rotate on to the next piece of equipment.  I also went to the Seniors' Centre for a Tai Chi class and a get together called 'Busy Fingers' - it's a group of women who get together to do different crafts (knitting and crocheting) and also a bus brings a group of women who are shut-ins to the Centre at the same time - most of them come for the social aspect - they are even provided a lunch on that day.  I walk to and from the classes and so that gives me an hour of walking every day, too.

On Thursday, I met up with my friend, Thea (she and her family used to live in HB, but returned to Perth a couple of years ago).  We picked up Mexican for lunch and then just spent the afternoon chatting at her house - it's always nice to get together with friends.

On Friday, I decided to treat myself and so I got a pedicure - I just love having my feet pampered! 😃  I chose a bright orange for the nail polish - I always choose bright colours - it's my wow factor! 😃

See my pretty toes 😃

Yesterday, Dad and I went geocaching for the day.  We packed a picnic lunch and headed off to King's Park which is a huge park here in Perth - it's right on the water and is a really beautiful place to be.  We searched for 8 geocaches and were successful in finding 7 of them - the one we couldn't find, we are going to return to at a later date as there were too many people around to give it a good search.  When you are searching for a geocache, the idea is to not allow people see what you are doing as they might get curious and go and look at it and take it or move it or whatever.  We had a fabulous day out - the sky was blue and the sun was warm and there was a slight breeze - there is no way we could have asked for a better day off.  😃

 King's Park is so busy on the weekends

 Dad and his iced chocolate for 'morning tea'

 If Dad gets one, I get one 😃

This tree was planted in memoriam of a soldier who died serving his country - Private Harry C. Rojo II Batallion - Pozieres - 25 July, 1916 - aged 20 - planted by his father - Pozieres is in France - the Battle of Pozieres (23 July, 1916 - 3 September, 1916) took place northeast of the village of Pozieres, during the Battle of the Somme.  It was written that Pozieres ridge "is more densely sown with Australian sacrifice than any other place on earth" - there were many trees planted for other servicemen who had died during a war in which Australia fought in

 Stand-up paddleboarders on the river

 A hen's party set up in the park (like a bachelorette party) - there were cushions around a large table for the guests to sit on

 Set-up for a wedding in the park by the river (there were a few weddings in the park yesterday)

 Black Swans by the river (the river is called the Swan River)

 Boats at the marina

 Children kayaking in small kayaks just their size

 A pelican on the river

One of our geocache finds

 Our picnic lunch - sandwiches, pickles, veggies and strawberries - so yummy!

 A lunch guest 😃

 Where we found another geocache - this one was very well camouflaged

 This geocache was really hard to find - we had to climb this small hill which was covered in leaves - it was quite slippery and so was a bit of an adventure - but we conquered it 😃 and we even found two travel bugs to take to other geocaches in the future

 Speedboats on the river

 A really interesting looking tree

Old church (part of which has been demolished) in a place called 'Sunset Hospital' - Sunset is a former hospital and aged care facility - it was set up in 1906 under the name 'Claremont Old Men's Home' and housed up to 750 men - it's made from large stone blocks quarried from local limestone and I love the architecture - we met a couple there who explained the history of the hospital to us - it is a very interesting story - it is now a heritage listed site - the previous government planned to renovate the site - that government lost the last election and the current government has not done anything to the site - it looks quite dilapidated right now, but hopefully, in the not too distant future, it will be returned to its previous glory

The area in which we did the geocaching is a really posh area - there were many huge houses, but this one caught my eye - the circular part of the left side of the house is all made of glass

Sunday, 25 February, 2018

We were busy the first part of this week (no exercise classes for me :-( - between haircuts, lunch out with the girls, a facial, chiropractor visit and a trip to Bundaberg, we filled up the first three days of the week really well.

Last Saturday, I took Robyn out for a birthday lunch and it was a bit of a bust, so Monday was our 'Take Two' lunch.  Robyn suggested we try the 'Sticky Fig' when I told her that I had been there for morning tea and it was really nice.  She and I met our friend, Jan, there and we had a really lovely time chatting together and a really delicious meal there, as well - they also made a yummy iced chocolate.

Me and my iced chocolate

Robyn, me and Jan

On Tuesday, we went to Bundy (a 90 minute drive from HB) because our camping trailer needed its one year maintenance service. Dad had a number of items for them to check out as well as the basic service, so it took all day.  While we were waiting for the service to be completed, we spent the morning shopping at various places and then met up with my uncle Ray (Poppy's youngest brother) and his wife, Julie, at a local club.  We had a lovely two hour lunch catching up with each other - we haven't seen them in a number of years.

Ray, Dad, Julie and me

On Thursday, we flew to Perth - we will be here for eight weeks, seven of which Dad will be teaching  for - one of the weeks, we will be going on holidays as that is when Dad's friend, Garth, will be instructing the class in the avionics, navigation and communication portion of the course.  We are thinking of driving south to an area called Margaret River as we have been told that it's a really beautiful place to visit.

Friday, we went to our friends' place for dinner - Thea and Martin lived in HB for three years before returning to Perth - it was so nice to get together with them.  After a delicious dinner and conversation, we played a number of games of cards which was fun.

Martin, Dad, Thea, and me

Yesterday, Dad and I spent a couple of hours geocaching - I wasn't thrilled with our 'find' percentage - we were only able to find two out of four caches.  However, even though we were not very successful, the day was  warm, the sky was blue and it was fabulous to be outside.

 Our first 'did not find' geocache area

 Where we found our first geocache

 Tomato Lake where we looked for our two geocaches

 Me looking out at Tomato Lake - so many different kinds of birds there

Where we found our second geocache

Sunday, 18 February, 2018

It's been a good week!  Dad and I are both back to full health!

I got back into my exercise routine this week - it was nice to get back into yoga, aquafit and tai chi. I also had another facial with the lovely Helen.  I also got together with friends this week for..........you guessed it................another iced chocolate or two 😂  The first get together was with teacher friends and then, yesterday, I got together with Robyn to celebrate her birthday.  First, we went for a swim at the beach and then to a cafe we have been to a ton of times as they have a fabulous quiche.  When we got there, it turned out that they had no quiche and were only cooking hamburgers as the main cook had left already.  We were disappointed in the meal - the hamburger was not cooked properly and also was not very flavourful.  The fries were very tasty as was the iced chocolate, although it wasn't very cold.  We decided that we would give this cafe a miss from now on.  We are going out again tomorrow for lunch -a 'take two'.

 Robyn and her iced chocolate on her birthday

 Me and my iced chocolate at Robyn's birthday lunch

The view from the cafe where we had Robyn's birthday lunch

Tuesday we had a call from the missionaries to say that their dinner appointment had fallen through and could they come over to our place for dinner (we had suggested that this past Sunday).  We gladly said 'yes' and ran out to get a roast chicken and salads.  We love having the missionaries in our home - we had a new one (Elder Puckey) come to Hervey Bay while we were on our cruise - he is from New Zealand  and it was nice to get to know him and to see Elder Prows again.  They shared with us a nice spiritual message about the importance of reading the Book of Mormon each day. 

On Wednesday night, Dad and I picked up the Louws girls (Scarlett and Indiana) and took them to Hungry Jack's (Burger King) for dinner.  Their parents, Ben and Lisa, wanted to go out to celebrate Valentine's Day (they took the 4 month old twins with them) and so had asked me if I would babysit.  I really like looking after these two - they are so cute - and such good listeners.  They have a play area at Hungry Jack's and there were a number of kids there, so the girls had a fun time playing there.  After we finished there, I drove Dad home and then drove to the girls' home.  I had picked up some library books and so I asked the girls to decide which ones they wanted me to read to them before it was bedtime.  Of course, they wanted me to read all 10 of them - so, I did. 😃 

Indiana (Indi) and Scarlett

We bought a new lawnmower not long ago and on Thursday and Friday, I got to use it - I love it - it's so much better than the first one we bought.  I always like mowing the lawn and it's such good exercise.

Me mowing the lawn with our new lawnmower

Dad's week was less exciting than mine - he spent his week fixing stuff: trailer stuff, house stuff, scooter stuff, fence stuff.  I prefer my week to his. 😄

I have decided that writing down what we want to complete in a week is important for me - otherwise, it is so easy to just diddle the time away and nothing gets done.  I made up this chart last year and found it again when I was cleaning up.  I used it this week and, although we didn't achieve every goal we had set out to do this week, we did a much better job of it had we not used it.

The chart showing the goals we wanted to achieve each day this week (eg: scripture reading, exercise, chores, reading, piano, knitting....we started doing this one on Wednesday and I highlighted the ones we achieved (oops, forgot to highlight what we completed on Saturday and Sunday on this chart) - but we did pretty good overall

Sunday, 11 February, 2018

Well, this blog entry will be short - there wasn't much going on this week as Dad tried to get his health back to normal.  I went out with my teacher friends for another iced chocolate (great catching up with friends and having a delicious iced chocolate), had a facial and a massage (always so relaxing) and I went over to Robyn's place for a sit (and a yak) in her hot tub (which wasn't so hot - it's called a spa here as sometimes it's hot water [if the weather is cold] or cool water [if the weather is hot] - it was great to catch up with Robyn after our cruise.  Dad and I both had a chiropractic visit as our backs were quite out after the cruise and we had a guy come over to give us a quote about putting in some concrete pads.  We had Robyn over for dinner tonight as she needed some help from Dad in learning how to download podcasts to her phone.  See, told you, not much exciting this week happened at all.