To start 2023 with some excitement I am joining Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge. The challenges are divided into series which cover 5 weeks. This year starts with the series theme of Body Parts Human or What??And this weeks topic is – Eyes.
For me the answer was simple. The Big Galah. Australia has over 150 big things made specifically to attract tourists. The Big Galah is 8 metres high and is found outside a road house in Kimba. Kimba is half way between Sydney and Perth. In Australia galahs are found everywhere, often hanging out in groups. They are a type of cockatoo which is pink and grey.
I love the Big Galah. She is gorgeous. Her eyes call tourists and other travellers to stop their journey and visit. When I saw her I stood staring at her for a good 5 minutes from many angles. As I moved it felt like her eyes were following me. Thinking about her still brings a smile to my face.
This week is Inspiring Max’s 8th birthday. When I started blogging on Mother’s Day 2014 I didn’t have a plan. I learnt as I went and took each new experience as it came. Like my life really. During the first few years I found inspiration easily. The older I am however the more distracted I get. As I am nearing 60 I am looking to the future. Retirement is coming so work needs to give way to fun. What changes do I want to make and how will I achieve them. Now is the time to start planning. This will ensure I achieve what I what and not have hours lost to distraction. To help my motivation I found the perfect quote.
To give this quote even more power I have added it to a sunrise photo I took from my drive way only weeks ago. For me this will mean starting with a weekly plan that is then dividing it into a daily one. This week I am going to start with a blogging plan. This will ensure that Inspiring Max has direction and over the next two years I can aim for 1000 posts. I am currently sitting on 665 which was only increased by 90 since my 6th anniversary blogpost, due to a lack of planning. Having a plan for the A-Z challenge this year made blogging fun and doable again. Blogging is fun. And I want more fun in my life. To do so I will stop overthinking things and start making them happen.
To begin to round off this year’s A-Z challenge I thought I would share with you more of the amazing coastline. Torquay to Port Fairy is 299 kilometres via the Great Ocean Road. This journey runs along the south western coast of Victoria. And can I say that none of it is the same. Around every bend the views were constantly changes, often taking away one’s breath. The other very interesting variant was the weather and the season. For this reason I am sure that the next time we visit, the experience will be different again.
During our trip every now and then something would surprise me. So I thought I’d put some of them together for today’s post.
Ruby Glass
I discovered Ruby glass at Cape Otway Lightstation. It is panes of red coloured glass that is put in lighthouses with a special light that shines lower out to sea. Because the Ruby glass doesn’t shine as far out to see as the usual light if a ship’s captain could see it they knew that they were too close to shore. Off Cape Otway the Ruby light would shine up to 6 kilometres out. This was because the reefs in many place went out to 4 kilometres. I was also interested that originally the ruby glass was made by adding gold to the glass mixture.
Pyrenees Pies
I couldn’t believe it when were walking down the street in Avoca, Victoria and saw the bakery’s menu. You could choose from crocodile, venison, emu, camel, kangaroo and buffalo pies as well as the usual range. If it had of been lunchtime I might have been tempted but I still am not sure which one I would have chosen.
Thong Tree
Walking along the Murray River at Barham we came across this thong tree. It was outside the caravan park but had no explanation. If we visit again we will bring a donation to the tree.
Bra Fence
In Mathoura on the Cobb and Co Highway a bra fence was commenced in 2018. The idea was to help educate people about breast cancer and fundraise for cancer treatment in the area. It was a huge success and now 4 years later they have added a prostate cancer awareness section with people adding underpants (jocks). Everyone is encourage to leave bras or jocks on the fence in memory of someone they know who has suffered cancer. There is a donation box.
Sand Sculpture
It was grey, overcast and rainy when I walked on Warrnambool beach to explore this vision further. Initially, I thought that it was a giant sandcastle. It wasn’t until I got close that I realized it was an amazing sand sculpture. The intricate detail was so creative. I don’t know why it was there. It was in pristine condition so my guess was it must have been done earlier that day.
If we were having coffee I would tell you that I can’t believe it has been nearly 3 months since our last chat. To be honest this is very similar to my real life coffee catch-ups that aren’t very regular. As you possibly know by now for 4 weeks of this year my husband and I went touring in Truby. ( Our slide on camper and Iveco. ) On many other weekends before and after, I was working to make up my shifts. After work I mean to blog but often don’t make it to the computer.
If we were having coffee I would tell you that I am again participating in Blogging from A to Z. Writing a blogpost daily is helping get my mojo back. Also, having a theme, our recent holiday, makes the decision of what to write easy. So, it is simply a matter of writing it. Each day I find this to get quicker. Just like when I started blogging in 2014 and I was following the daily word prompts. I have also realsied that when April is finished I still have a lot of other topics to write about.
If we were having coffee I would tell you that my daughter has moved home after living in regional NSW. She is easy to live with so beside the extra stuff around, everything is going smoothly.
If we were having coffee I would tell you that I have spent a lot of time covering my new secondhand books in contact. One of the things I love about traveling is going to second hand book shops. It is a great way to support the local communities and increase my library. Sometimes I have specific books that I am looking for, otherwise I accidently find new authors. My husband can now work out my book style based on the artwork on the front cover. We were even able to find some of his much rarer books at reasonable prices. Below is a photo of most of the novels I found.
If we were having coffee I would tell you how surprised I was back in January to hear our most famous children’s group had won the Triple JJJ’s Hottest 100. This countdown features the most popular song for the previous year. It the classic example of doing what you love and success will follow.
If we were having coffee I would ask you what is happening in your world.
Thanks to Natalie for hosting #weekend coffee share
Deniliquin, a small town in south western New South Wales wanted to be famous. They wanted a festival that made a statement about who they were. After much deliberation and collaboration the idea of celebrating the ute was born. In country Australia utes are everywhere. They are the backbone of country life. So it is no surprise that the first Deniliquin Ute Muster was a huge success. Held in October each year people come from everywhere to celebrate all things country and utes.
The first Deni Ute Muster created a Guinness World Record for the number of utes gathered in one place. Over the last 20 years this has been exceeded on several occasions.
Over the years the festival has grown adding more fun things to include all. There is now a blue singlet count, ute parade, tradie challenge and many other activities including stars of country music. Below are the poster and layouts for this years muster. I would love to go one year but I think Covid will need to be more under control before I join the thousands. We did tour the Deni Ute Muster museum and had a great time learning about it.
I personally love how the ute theme has spread throughout the town. Deniliquin certainly did put itself on the map. My favourite was found in a park and was called Re-utilize.
Wow I can’t believe it’s April tomorrow. Where has this year gone? For me, over a month was spent travelling around regional New South Wales and Victoria in Truby. (Our Iveco and Slide-on camper). It was our first trip and we had a great time exploring our country and learning about the grey nomad lifestyle. Despite being nearly 60 most of the places we explored I had never been to before. We found many interesting places, history stories, hidden surprises and the amazing natural beauty of Australia.
Initially our aim was to travel the Great Ocean Rd one of Australia’s and possibly one of the world’s most iconic roads. It was truly breathtaking. For our remaining two weeks we made it up as we went along and had a ball. We drove over 4500 kilometres.
Whilst travelling I decided the best way to share my experiences is by again joining the Blogging from A to Z April Challenge. This is a world wide blogging challenge that I first joined in 2015. It will be the fourth time that I have participated and each time I have grown as a blogger. The goal is to post every day in April except Sundays. Most people have a theme that connect their blog posts. This is only half of the challenge however. The other equally important part is to visit other blogs and connect through commenting. I love it and have meet some amazing people on my journey and am hoping to meet many more this year.
If we were having coffee I would tell you how excited I was last Thursday to escape town for a few days. As I was finishing work on Wednesday afternoon I felt a little manic. My husband and I took a road trip to Tamworth, 3.5 hours northwest of Newcastle. It felt so weird when we crossed the imaginary line of our LGA (Newcastle Council) because during restrictions it was the limit we could travel to. We had planned to have lunch at an historic pub at Wingen many times and Thursday was the day.
To celebrate the first trip to a pub since lockdown ended I did what most Aussies did and ordered a beer on tap. I don’t often drink beer but thought why not. It was so cold, fresh and memorable. The food was also pretty good. I would have loved another beer but time did not permit. It was great to be out of the city connecting with the country again.
View from back verandah of The Durham Hotel
If we were having coffee I ask you if you picked the winner of last Tuesday’s Melbourne Cup. In Australia it is known as the race that stops the nation and is Australia’s most famous house race. As it is over 3200 metres it is particularly hard to pick a winner for and this year proved no exception. The favourite, Incentivise was leading with 400m to go when suddenly Verry Elleegant swept in and won.
If we were having coffee I would tell you about the hydofoil surfer I enjoyed watching this morning at the beach. He was difficult to photograph but mesmerising to watch. The beach was high tide and only the surfers were out because of the conditions.
If we were having coffee I would ask you what is happening in your world.
Thanks to Natalie The Explorer for hosting our weekendcoffeeshare.
If we were having coffee I would tell you about the fun map of Newcastle I found today. It is on the side of the old Maritime museum and incorporates Newcastle’s history over the years. It isn’t to scale but was very detailed and reminded me of many things that I had forgotten.
If we were having coffee I would tell you my osteoarthritis flared up for the first time this week. I was diagnosed with a small amount of it in my hip 2 years ago but I’m guessing it has gotten worse. For no reason I woke up on Tuesday morning in a lot of pain and with a fever. In this day and age of course having a fever means you need a covid test which was negative. So with rest and pain relief it returned to normal. Eventually I will be able to have a new scan and see how much it has deteriorated but at present that will have to wait as our doctors live in Sydney and we cannot travel there yet.
If we were having coffee I would tell you that I walked past Cooks Hill Spoonville on my walk this morning. I was excited to see that the family of spoons had grown.
If we were having coffee I would ask you what is happening in your world.
Have you ever seen or heard of something local and thought I’ve got to see that. What a clever idea! As you know most of New South Wales is currently in lockdown as we battle the latest Delta variant. So as a response to the frustrations of being in lockdown and the kids not having things to do someone came up with the concept of Spoonville.
Each Spoonville community is different. They develop a personality of their own dependent on the Spoony people that join the community. Local kids are invited to decorate wooden spoons at home and add them to the others as they get out of the house to exercise.
Spoonville rules are simple.
Place your Spoony person during your daily exercise
Make sure bits won’t blow off your Spoony person as we don’t want litter
Think about using natural materials in case they do fall off – maybe twigs for arms and legs
Make sure your Spoony person can take the rain – nail polish is good for our faces
Spoony people are not keen on dogs ( furry friends please stay back)
Come and see the Spoony people but don’t stay too long and no touching. Have fun.
I heard about our local community at Cooks Hill on the weekend and couldn’t wait until today to investigate. The only thing I knew was that they lived in Centennial Park. I was clueless as to where. Never fear I googled how to get to Centennial Park from my house and off I went. I had been there many times before but I always found it by accident and when coming home. The park is 2.2 hectares and was given to the city of Newcastle as a centenary gift in 1888. After about 15 minutes of following paths and generally exploring the area I saw them, Cooks Hill’s Spoonville. They were playing under a beautiful old Norfolk pine on the other side of the park.
As I spent time at Spoonville, I wished I had young children in my life. It would be so much fun helping them design and create their own Spoony person. I attempted to choose a favourite but each time I looked I would fine a new favourite so I gave up and decided it was all so much fun. I’ll be back to meet the new Spoony friends over the coming weeks.
