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So Whats New ?

23rd June

Not much happening here recently we've been focussing on renovation work again. So we spent a lot of time working on the garden clearing the front area and planting it with native bush planting. We also created some possum proof veggy patches. Big wood frames with large mesh on the sides to prevent our resident possum from moving in and eating the veg for us.

We've also engaged in a somewhat vain attempt to get said possum to move out of the house and into the wild where she is supposed to be. After much work Rich built and erected a possum house in one of the trees that she seems to be quite fond of. Despite possum manor in the tree she didnt move in so we engaged in some more devious tactics like destroying her nests in the loft and putting a light on throughout the day so that she couldn't sleep. Didn't work either so hopefully some time she'll move in, perhaps when its warmer.

We had a good go at fixing up the last bedroom which is now done, we fixed up the artex with plain plaster decorated and fitted out with new wardrobes and a bed. So this is a big acheivement as it means that we have finished Phase 1 of the renovation work. All the major internal work is now done. We're progressing work on the outside now with big building work to repair one wall externally and then in the summer we can start working on the back garden the built in BBQ kitchen and the deck.

Rich has been working in Perth on and off recently. So last weekend we had a weekend away during one of his business trips. Perth is pretty cool and the port area of Fremantle is a lovely old port town, really pretty.

We have a busy few weeks ahead, this weekend we'll be in Bendigo, then we have friends round for dinner, another party and then holidays coming up so its all very exciting.

8th April

The Yarra Valley was a great trip we had 4 days of escape into the stunning hills, valley and wineries that make up the area. On Good Friday we headed over to the valley, through stunning countryside to visit a great garden and a local art show. Our accomodation was situated up the side of the hills on the edges of the valley, the views were just amazing and it was a real escape.

Over the rest of the weekend went visiting a 'few' wineries the wildlife sanctuary and getting out to explore the bush in the national parks. There is a great art gallery in the valley with stunning views and an exhibition about artistic representations of bush fires. It was very moving. We also got across to Kinglake, the site of one of the huge bushfires from Black Saturday in 2009. People are just about getting back on their feet but the forests are still devastated and the impact is just incredible. Its absolutely disgusting to think that some of those fires were deliberatley set by arsonists.....

The real highlight of the weekend though was an easter sunday when we took a hot air balloon flight over the valley. It is the most chilled out, relaxing experience floating along with no noise or stress and just going where the wind takes you. Check out the photos of the valley on the photo page.

Since we've been back we're back to the renovations though, and we're into the garden now especially as its a bit cooler and wetter, everything is growing like mad. We've made a start on some of the flower beds and the veggy patch might get a bit of attention this weekend once we finalise its location. So its all good and progressing nicely.

1st April

Nicola arrived to stay with us on 19th April, so we have still been having a break from renovations. In a few weeks we're going to start again, this time in the garden though as its prime growing season, most days around low 20s and a fair bit of rain.

So in the last few weeks we've been out doing the tourist thing again, going surfing (that is such hard work) visiting the 12 apostles again (I never tire of that view) and off for a day in the wonderful spas of Hepburn Springs.

We've also officially added to our menagerie, as well as the fruit bats who are still visiting to finish off whats left of the figs, we've actually seen our resident family of possums. Now we'll have to figure out a way of getting them out of the house and into the trees where they are supposed to live. The good news at least is that they're ringtails which are the cute ones and not brushtails which are the vicious angry fat ones.

Rich also did the corporate triathlon again, with a "really" fetching Hatch branded outfit this year. I'll leave you to be the judge of the quality of said outfit......

Last weekend was the Australian Grand Prix. It was a really good weekend of racing, no real coups of visiting famous people this year sadly. The best we could do was Jackie Stewart and Adrian Whitmarsh both from a decent distance.

For easter we're off to the Yarra Valley for 4 days, the plan is wine touring, bushwalking, visiting galleries and of course, eating a few chocolates !!!

11th March

Well I'm finally sitting down with time to update, this feels like the first time since.... oh I bought a wreck of a house !!!

Last weekend was labour day, so we got Monday off as public holiday, Fortunately this meant that we actually got a renovation project finished, which also happens to be the 2nd to last job on the inside of the house so we were pretty happy finishing this one. So after weeks of stripping really lovely artex off the hall, repairing plaster, sanding wood and finally painting we have a beautiful hallway and one end of the house is finished - hooray.

In other news, our fig tree in the back garden has been merrily cultivating a huge crop of figs which not only us but most of the local wildlife also like to eat. Everything was going well, netting and all until the bigger birds managed to poke a hole in the top of the netting. The birds are actually clever enough to get out again but the fruit bats that turned up 2 weeks ago... another story. One got stuck and after a whole lot of fighting and screetching from the little fox the wildlife rescue people finally got him untangled from the netting. They wouldn't shift until the sun had gone down though, so after a few beers and a chinese we came home to annoy 3 bats out of the tree. It lasted about a week and we had some back again 2 days ago. So I think we've given up and we might just let the wildlife have whats left.

Rich's birthday yesterday - thanks to everyone that sent cards and gifts. We'll go out and celebrate some more this weekend.

We've updated the photos as well, so you should see some of our holiday to SA back in Feb.

Bye for now.

14th February

Well we're not getting any better at keeping things up to date, must get back into this....

Busy few months for us again, the house renovations continue (for anyone who didn't believe us first time, it was quite a wreck, we must be mad taking this on) on the plus side we're getting our money back quickly. Also since Heidi's parents arrived to stay in November things have moved much more quickly with extra hands, especially ones that don't work Monday to Friday 9-5. Since the last up date, the guest room is finished complete with sanded floor (that was fun but more on that later) and the piano room is complete, with baby grand piano ! hurrah !. We've also managed to get the ensuite bathroom finished which is just bliss.

Floor sanding is boring... so much so that there is no way on earth we're ever going to volunteer for it ever again, can't even listen to the radio as the machine is so noisy. Add to that the incredibly poor maintenance at the hire place and it becomes a form of torture to get the work done. We dutifully picked our sander up for a 24 hour hire at 6pm on Friday night and started work, the sander however had other ideas and managed to do approx 30 mins before stopping working. So we rang the store and arranged to pick another one up as soon as the place opened on Sat morning. 7:30 am we're waiting outside the shop for it to open and get a new sander... this one lasted till approximately 95% of the job was done, then failed again. So another fun filled trip to the DIY store to replace it with the last one they have, have a fight with the people there abour the fact that they kept breaking down and finally finished the sanding and first coat at approx 9pm. Not fun , NEVER again !!!!

Work slowed down for a while as Rich helped out building the set for a local panto group. Heidi watched the 2nd nights show with some trepidation at the set's structural integrity but it managed to hold together and last the remaining 5 nights of the run - Phew.

We had a weekend trip with Heidi's folks to Sydney in December. Still a fantastic city and the harbour is as beautiful as ever, a good time was had by all.

We had christmas in Geelong, a day full of eating and drinking, excellent fun. BBQ and cocktails in the sunshine is most definitely the thing to do. We also all took the opportunity to visit the first day of the boxing day test, Australia Vs Pakistan at the MCG, it was a fun day out but the cricket was fairly rubbish particularly for the session after lunch and before tea where in 2 hours a while 25 runs were scored.... oh dear god ! Fortunately after Ponting came in, things picked up a lot and the end of the day was entertaining cricket (if you like that sort of thing).

Rich has been working around the country, he's had weeks away in Wollongong (NSW) at the regional office, 2 day stints in Queensland and country Victoria visiting mines and power stations. He also had a week up off the furthest north coast in Groote Eyelandt, a tropical island paradise with a huge mine on it off the coast of the Northern Territory. Heidi is convinced that its just an excuse to get out of the painting.

We've been off to see a few concerts in December and Jan with Green Day and Them Crooked Vultures touring down under. Excellent concerts and Franz Ferdinand is the next one up in early March.

For the last 2 weeks we've been touring the Great Ocean Road on holiday. We left Geelong and toured along the south coast of Australia stopping at Lorne, Port Campbell, Port Fairy, Mount Gambier, Robe, The Coorong National park and finally to Adelaide. An interesting trip full of wine and food. More to follow on that soon with some photos.

25th October

Ok so here's the apology that we haven't updated for a while, which I have been told off about by a few people now. Truth be told we have been so busy renovating the house we've hardly done anything else at all. But on the plus side we've now done about 50% of the internal jobs that we wanted to do and as summer is starting to come we are spending more time outside doing interesting things or just enjoying the garden (which is a whole new heap of work but thats another story !!!).

So since August, we've been mainly working on the house, we finished the master bedroom and dressing room. All wall knocked down, new doors and frames, new plaster, full redecoration, good old ikea wardrobe system and fitted carpet. We've been moved in there for weeks now and it is fab, it was a real celebration to get that finished. Now as Heidi's folks are coming out to visit in November there was a big push on to complete the guest bedroom for them to stay in of course !. So the next job was to tackle 2 rooms, the guest bedroom and Heidi's piano / music room and study. This was easier than the other jobs as it was mostly redecorating only and sanding the floor. Now if the local hardware store could hire out a floor sander with a reliability of longer than about 3 hours we'd have been laughing, as it was 2 days and 3 sanders later we finally got the job done and uncovered a beautiful hard wood floor in one of the rooms. All this is now done, (hence the reason I get some time to update the web site) and we've already had our first guests to stay and try the room out. We have ordered the stuff for the ensuite bathroom renovation and will start ripping that out soon... its non stop at the moment but one day.... maybe not today... and maybe not tomorrow.... but one day... it WILL be finished !!!

Other than that we've had a long weekend away up north in Newcastle which is about 3 hours north of sydney and on the edge of the Hunter Valley wine region. Much wine touring, exploring and soaking up the atmosphere was had by both of us and it was a great break. So there are some photos of this on the photos page.

In between the renovating Rich was also training hard for the Around the Bay in a Day cycle ride. A 210km slog from Melbourne down the East side of Port Philip Bay, across the bottom on the ferry and back up the west side through Geelong to Melbourne again. He did the ride last weekend and was suprisingly good afterwards, especially as the furthest he'd ridden during training was 120km. Pics on the page again.

Anyway best be off, will try and keep this updated more frequently again, will go put some photies up now.....

The Cycling team, approx 150km in to the ride

10th August

So we took some time off from the renovations and escaped to country Victoria for our wedding anniversary weekend. We went up to Seymour (about 2 hours north east of us) to explore and do a bit of wine touring. We visited the Tahbilk vinyard, a very old winery which is famous for its wooden tower. The tower was used as part of the wine making process so the grapes were brough up to the top and then dropped down through the various stages of the process before finally ending in the vats in the cellar.

Then we moved further north to Benalla and Ned Kelly country. Benalla was the nearest major town to where he lived and as he was a bit of a Larrikin, it was where he spent more than a few occasions in the local jail. We visited the town museum where amongst other somewhat random collections of things we saw one of the mobile jail cells he was locked up in and the blood stained silk sash he was wearing on the day of his last stand. We also saw the worlds longest and smallest whips... fair dinkum.

After this country touring we headed up into the Victorian Alps for a spot of skiing. Heidi's first attempt so we both took beginner lessons and after some aborted attempts at stopping (usually resulting in falling over) and one altercation with a beginner snowboarder where Heidi ran straight over the top of her and ended up in a big tangle of legs and skis, it wasn't too bad. There was some great apres ski too, with saunas, dinner and drinks so overall good fun. The only down side was the weather with poor visibility both days you could pretty much only see the 4 meters of snow direcrtly in front of you, as we were so slow moving it wasn't a problem for the skiing but being able to see the mountains would have been much prettier.

So after our break, its back to the renovations, we've knocked a wall down, ripped up a couple of carpets and are currently attempting plaster repairs again... here's hoping we're better than last time we tried plastering (couldn't be much worse though to be fair). So its busy busy busy but we are making good headway so fingers crossed that in a month or so's time we'll be finished on the master bedroom and can start getting the guest rooms done. Then we can have some stay over guests ! (so far we've only had dinner guests twice... no point in wasting time and anyway the dining room and kitchen are fine.

Will update again soon with more photos.

26th July

We're finally here ! we moved house last weekend and are now almost totally moved in ! Well we have all our stuff here and the living room, dining room and kitchen are unpacked and pretty much set up. We're doing some work in the bedroom area to extend the master bedroom and make a walk in wardrobe / dressing room so at the moment we're camped out in one of the other bedrooms as our bedroom. We've had the builder in and hopefully we'll be starting soon on that work. Other than that its been shopping for stuff to do the house up with working and strippiing wallpaper. Its all very exciting though.

We have a weekend break coming up, we're heading into inland victoria on wednesday evening having 2 days exploring up in north vic and then we're going across to the mountains to go Skiing. I'll update again with some photos (probably of me face down in some snow) when we get back..

Other than that Rich is off training for the round the bay cycle ride again. He had his first 75 k ride 2 weeks ago and he's off again today on an 80k ride.

Must get back to the wallpaper !

Byee for now.

28th June

Well the waiting is nearly over but not quite, we've been packing, packing, packing and will be getting the keys to our new place in 17 days ! HOORAY ! Its not all been work though, as well as the mundane stuff for moving we've still been out enjoying ourselves.

A few weeks back we went to Melbourne for the day on the long bank holiday weekend that we get for the Queen's Birthday (ha ha, we get that day off, and you Brits don't hee hee, the Irony). We spent the morning wandering around the city and went to the theatre to see Avenue Q in the afternoon. For those who haven't heard of it, Avenue Q is an adults version of Sesame St and it was really good fun. Definitely worth the trip. In the evening we visited the great complex that is Crown in central Melbourne. It is based around a casino but it is just a massive entertainment complex with shopping, cinema, restaurants, bowling, amusements and more. Rich had quite a few beers but still managed to beat me at ten pin bowling ... (boo!)

Rich has also been wine touring with the guys from work and bringing some back for Heidi to drink.

Rich has signed himself up for a charity bike ride around Port Philip Bay (the bay which has Geelong on the West and Melbourne to the North and the East. Its a 210km ride in a day, which is in October, so he really need to get some training in. Up until last week, it has been a bit tricky in that he didn't actually have a bike. After weeks of searching for a 2nd hand one for training, Heidi finally lost patience and bought a top notch racer bike for Rich in the sales complete with fancy clip in pedals and computer. Last sunday it was ridden back from the shop and today he took it out for some proper training on a 30km ride. Rich would like to describe this as "very good and completely without incident", however, in actual fact, it was quite reasonable but as we have a few quite steep little hills in this area (one which we live on the top of) and as the bike is designed for racing (not really for hill climbing) on returning home, he ran out of gears and slowly fell into the grass verge when he couldn't get his feet unclipped from the pedals. It was all good though as it was a very slow impact incident and no injury other than a slightly mucky bum and a bruised ego.

Yesterday we had another trip to Melbourne to visit Becky, Steve and little Harry. We had a great day with late breakfast, a walk around the shops, Wii sports and then a really good steak at a local pub / restaurant.

So we're entertaining ourselves as well as getting ready for the move. We'll keep you up to date with whats going on with the new house in a couple of weeks time.... (Telstra permitting).

14th June

Apologies all for the big gap in information, we've been fairly busy.

Late may we went on a wine tour, off to the region of 'Surf Coast' with friends from Rich's work we toured 8 wineries in the day and bought a lot of wine (a lot of which we have since drunk !). There are some excellent vinyards round here and Shiraz and Pinot Noir are the specialities. Some wines we're keeping for a special occasion but the rest are just getting drunk... thats what wine is for. It was great fun and we're planning another tour to a different wine region in the not too distant future.

We also went to our first live Aussie rules game. Heidi's Uncle from Tassie came over and we went into Melbourne for the showdown it was fantastic and of course our team "Geelong Cats" won - HOORAY !!! Actually they gave the opposition a complete thrashing it was great. The atmosphere in the big oval stadia is just amazing and everyone really gets into it. This was especially true of the guy sitting in front of us. He really was very into it and liked shouting a lot at the opposition... which mainly involved him mouthing unintelligable noises and spitting profusely on the man in front of him. I was so glad I was behind him, otherwise I'd have got a free shower... not fun !!!

More recently we've been taking things a bit more easy. It is the depths of winter here after all (not that I have needed gloves or a scarf, its just not that cold, most days its around 12-14 deg C, so quite temperate really. Mainly we're packing and planning for the house move which is another 4 weeks away but there is a lot to do. No doubt we'll be offline for a while as Telstra is brilliant at being rubbish for service. We've got a big for rent sign outside out rental now so fingers crossed they find someone soon so that we don't have to pay any extra rent. Can't wait !!!

11th May

Hello there everyone, Heidi here ......

So this weekend we had some fantastic plans, off to Torquay for the farmers market to get some great local produce for dinner, then down to the beach for a spot of surfing, and on to a local rotary club art exhibition. It was a great plan....

Off we went to Torquay to the farmers market, where there were some 8 stalls. On the plus side we did get some excellent steak from a local organic grass fed beef farm and some stunning huge field mushrooms... not much else though.

Then we went off to the surf shop to get a board, they had a sale on so rather than renting for a few more weeks of practice, Rich bought a board. After much discussion with the guy in the shop we decided that a large hard board would be good and keep us going for quite a while. Down to the beach and Rich went off for half an hours surfing, then we were going to swap over. However after half an hours surfing, Rich came back onto the beach board in hand and mentioned that 'the board hit me on the head'.. I was putting stuff away in the bag so wasn't really looking at him too much, until he then said 'it made me feel a bit sick'. When I turned round to look at him he had blood pouring down his face ! So after 1 attempt at surfing on a proper hard board he smashed his head open ! It wasn't too bad but I did have to take him to the doctors for 4 stitches and he is still feeling rather sorry for himself.

After that we did actually get across to the art exhibition so it didn't mess the whole day up but it did add a new element in which we hadn't quite factored in ... oops !

Next weekend is wine touring... bring it on !

5th May

Wow so its been a while since we last updated this. We've been pretty busy.

This last weekend we went to Apollo Bay, its a little town down the Great Ocean Road and is really well placed for exploring the shipwreck coast. It is just stunning. The 12 Apostles (a rock formation along the coast) is just beautiful along with the other big rock formations. We also tried out fishing, despite being quite apprehensive about it its actually kind of theraputic. Rich got quite wet when he got hit with a wave, I'm not sure he quite got it he was supposed to be catching fish out of the surf using the line and rod, he instead got quite wet !

Other news we've bought a house ! very exciting and its been a busy few weeks getting the surveys and mortgage sorted but thats all done now and we just need to wait for settlement before we can mvoe in and get things how we want them. So pretty buys few weeks coming up, expecially as Rich is working away almost every week at the moment on new business. This week he's in Portland, about an hours flight west of us.

We also got our beer back from the micro brewery and its good. Although its not quite a proper English bitter so we'll just have to drink it and brew some more... tough work that !

13th April

Heidi's Uncle, Aunt and cousin from Tasmania visited for the easter weekend. On Good Friday we attempted to go to the Queenscliffe seafood festival, but with one single road in and out of Queenscliffe, arriving there at 12 noon, or at least arriving on that road some 15km from there we hit a HUGE queue. Such that the only reason we moved forward at all during our 20 minute wait was due to other people giving up and turning round. So we did the same and instead had a good lunch in nearby Ocean Grove before heading over to Torquay for a walk along the beach and a fantastic ice cream.

On Saturday we sampled the shopping delights of Pakington street in Geelong, our own little boutique street. People shop at different rates. Some are slow and steady. Some go all in at the start. Adele, as we found, starts slowly but REALLY catches up in extra time. We had lunch at Lamby's in central Geelong and spent a hour entertaining ourselves in the National Wool Museum. The evening was taken up with a trip into Melbourne, for the Kears to watch Cirque Du Soleil (which by all reports was fantastic, and people should not be able to bend into shapes like that) and for the Shermans to entertain themselves at Steve Coogan on for the Melbourne Comedy Festival. Which (suprisingly to Heidi) was actually really entertaining and very funny. Although we felt as though we were sat between two planted laughers to get the crowd going. The woman next to Heidi periodically 'hooted' with laughter, and the woman next to Rich was crying with laughter, it was good but probably not 'quite' that good. 99% of the jokes cannot be repeated on the internet for fear of censorship and causing offence but this one....

Paul Calf: rant rant rant "Why do people always have a go at David Beckham eh ? that really annoys me when people say he's stupid. Well you wouldn't go up to Steven Hawking and say, 'you're sh*t at football', would you ? you know, you put him on the wing, barely does anything, scores a goal but it was a deflection...... etc etc etc."

Sunday was a day of reflection (as Easter Sunday should be) mostly due to the copious quantities of wine, whisky and brandy that was consumed and the 3.5 hours of Guitar Hero played on returning from the theatre, (yes Rich finally found someone to play GH with and he's a happy chappy). Although when we finallly dragged ourselves out we had a pleasant stroll along the waterfront and round the botanic gardens. Lunch was excellent as always at Barwon Edge on the riverside. Thanks to the Kears for great company on a great weekend.

Today Rich finally managed to persuade Heidi that surfing really was good fun so we both went for a lesson. Heidi begrudgingly admits that it is actually quite good fun and she's not as bad as she thought she would be. If we keep that up we'll both be as skinny as rakes though, it is knackering.

We're also still on the big house hunt and we have actually found somewhere we like. So now we're into haranguing over prices and sorting out all the paperwork. All good fun.... but the house is great, if we get it sorted we'll put some details on here. But its just fingers crossed at the moment.

5th April

A more chilled out weekend this weekend. We've been off brewing our own ESB, proper beer to put in our mini kegs in our fab little chiller and in 2 weeks we'll be going back to bottle and keg it. Very exciting.

Today Rich has been for his first Surfing lesson at Jan Juc (home of the infamous Bells Beach and the Rip Curl Classic Surfing competition.) Even in his first lesson he was standing up and sliding onto the beach. Unfortunately we don't have any photos of him doing this as Heidi couldn't figure out which one of the 50 surfers on this beach was Rich (and she couldn't believe he'd be standing up so soon !!!) But here's one of him carrying his huge learner board.

30th March 2009

Hi. Speechless (almost). What a crackin' weekend. We visited Melbourne. We went to the opening Formula 1 Grand Prix of 2009. We saw high octane action, rip snorting rock 'n' roll and mingled with the stars.

Calm...calm. Okay, we arrived in Melbourne last Friday evening. A great location in the up-and-coming docklands district near the impressive Etihad stadium and the major transport hub that is Southern cross station. We crossed with a few footy fans during our stay as it was the opening weekend of the season. For the uninitiated this is Aussie rules or AFL. They seemed fairly peaceloving - winners or losers - and a slight contrast to their European footy counterparts. Our newly adopted favourites, the Cats, (Geelong) won this weekend, just, against last season's grand final winners. Revenge!! Hark at us getting into the footy...

Back to the main event. There were two very full days of excitement on track and off at Albert Park, the Grand Prix venue, plus we caught up with a few friends. On Saturday morning we scoped out Albert Park, then had brunch with young Harry (plus his lovely mother and father), in a cafe that boasted 48 different brekky style egg dishes. Next came the final Formula 1 practice session and some other automotive action followed by a few beers with some new friends. The F1 qualifying session was the star attraction of the day with the newbie Brawns stealing the show and a good British boy taking top spot.

Sat evening we headed into the hotspot of Melbourne Italian culture, Lygon St, and had fabulous italian dinner watching the world go by on the street front. The cafe culture here is just brilliant.

Sunday was a day of sheer brilliance, early start so that we could get out to the circuit to walk down the pit straight. Unfortunately the garages were still asleep I think (noone was at the circuit !) but it was still pretty cool to be on the track. Then rather than get stuck with rubbish circuit food we headed out to make the best of Melbourne's breakfast scene (breakfast out on a weekend is really big here and it is a very cool thing to do). Then back to the racing with the formula ford, and the V8 supercars before the big event. Our fab special GP advantage tickets got us into a special bar at the back of the grid so that we could watch the teams setting up while enjoying a cold beer in our stubby holders (individual can chillers for the uninitiated). The race was great, a fantastic atmosphere and pretty exciting given the completley uncertain outcome.

As if that wasn't enough excitement for one weekend, after the race The WHO were in concert which was brilliant. All the favourites was just spectacular and great fun even when some random bloke came over and started filming it on his camera right in front of us. Well he will have good images of Roger Daltry doing Substitute, but he'll have vocals courtesy of Rich and Heidi (Serves him right really !!!).

So all in all, a fantastic, fabulous weekend and we are so utterly thrilled that Melbourne will be hosting the GP until 2015 so many more fantastic weekends of racing to come. Wooo Hoooo !!!

25th March 2009

We're really excited this weekend about the grand prix coming up. We're staying in Melbourne for the weekend to make the best of the great racing all day Saturday and Sunday and so that we can really enjoy the The Who concert on sunday night after the race..... we're both REALLY excited.

So what's news anyway, it was Rich's birthday a couple of weeks back and we went away for the weekend to Daylesford a local spa town just north of Melbourne. We stayed in a Japanese themed guesthouse complete with futon, robes and Japanese food. It was really enjoyable and quite different. The wildlife up there is just stunning too, we had our own Kangaroos sitting outside or basking in the sunshine and the cockys came and went with their usual raucous palaver. We spent Saturday exploring the area and Sunday morning we spent in the famous spa bathhouse. The relaxation pool, spa, spa couches, steam room and salt flotation pool were all fabulous so much so that we had to try them all at least twice to see which was best !.

Last Sunday Rich did the swimming leg of a corporate triatlon as part of a company team. They did quite well coming in mid field and Rich did his 500 m open water swim in the bay and run to the transition point in 10:42 which was pretty good and quicker than the average by 30 seconds. If he'd actually done some proper training, he might have done even better.

Here he is 2nd running out of the water.

And here again running off towards the bike transition area.

So we've had a busy few weeks since we last updated the site, and more to come....

9th March 2009 - Happy Labour Day

Well since we last updated we've completed our sailing 'course' and been out for a few hours sailing a yacht on the bay which was pretty good fun even if it was on the first rainy day in 2 months. Now the challenge is getting out regularly to crew and breaking into the cliquey world known as the Royal Geelong Yacht Club. Weekday sails are on a Wednesday which unfortunately we haven't been to yet as they were cancelled last week due to a hurricane forecast. We might get out this week instead.

We've also been for a few more dives, one shore dive and 2 boat dives. They were both good although its getting a bit chilly now, so to go with Rich's snazzy new diving gear he's bought a new semi dry wetsuit, which should allow diving through to late autumn. Heidi hasn't got one yet, she needs to go try some on, but she has got a new thermal hoody to wear instead which is quite amusing as it inflates with exhaled air during the dive leaving her with a special conehead kind of look ! See our new fish photos for the most recent dives.

The 28th Feb was Pako Festa on Pakington Street in Geelong, its a massive multicultural street fair. Its a great vibe with street performances and a big parade. Sadly we missed the parade as we were diving, but we made the most of the food stalls and watching local bands and traditional dance.

Footy is still a bit of a mystery although Geelong are now through to the grand final of the NAB cup which is good (although they were lucky rather than good in the last match) and we've now sorted out the scoring which helps ! We still don't understand many of the other rules though.

This weekend is a long public holiday weekend so we went into Melbourne on Saturday for a spot of shopping and to visit the National Gallery of Victoria which has a good collection. We had 3 hours in there and there is still more to see so we'll have to go back another time.

Sunday we spent at the grand Geelong Highland Gathering, its the biggest in Victoria (cue the dramatic ooooh) and was actually pretty good with highland dancing displays and a big pipe band competition. Ok that bit doesn't sound so good but it was actually pretty good fun to watch them marching. The highlight was the heavy games though with the caber toss. Looks quite difficult although some of the guys were pretty good at it. There are some action shots online.

We've been off having our wildlife fix again today, down to a nearby wildlife sanctuary, one where you can actually stroke a Koala. They are just the most docile creatures, and really sweet. We also saw quite a lot of boomers (Kangaroos for the non native speakers out there) and loads of mums with little and not so little joeys. Amusingly enough, some are quite insistent on getting into the pouch even when they are clearly too big, so its either nose or feet sticking out. Most seem to opt for the feet as well.

Busy week ahead, its Rich's birthday tomorrow and we'll be doing a bit of celebrating no doubt. At the moment as well as writing this we're listening to The Who, getting ourselves set up for their concert after the Grand Prix in a few weeks. We're both looking forward to that a LOT.

Right, thats it for now, enjoy spring and the daffs over there, we'll enjoy our 'indian' summer, after a week of top temps of 20 last week, we should be back to 30s by the end of this week. Great !

22nd February 2009

We're starting to settle into 'normal' life in Aus now with Diving and dancing weekly we've got some kind of routine going. Diving is great, there are some excellent fish and marine life and this wednesday evening dive we visited a marine sanctuary which was just beautiful if a bit choppy and the visibility was excellent. Then today we've been out on a boat dive in the bay, the Blue Devil Wall which is a great location, stunning. See our photos for some of the fish, sadly the visibility wasn't good enough to really showcase the kelp and sponges (or each other for that matter). Next time......

Heidi now has a full set of dive kit, and Rich is going to see about buying some this week (while the summer package offers are still on) so its likely we'll be making the most of it and there will be plenty more fish pictures ! yay !

Still house hunting although we haven't found anything particularly exciting yet, we're still on the look out.

The footy season has started, so we're trying to understand it. Geelong are through to the next round of the cup (the equivalent of the FA cup) which is good news so far and they have a couple of absolutely brilliant players. It will be fingernail stuff when they get up against some serious opposition.

Next week Rich has us booked in for a sailing course so we'll see how we enjoy that, on the water, or in it he's happy !

10th February 2009

Hi there everyone, and thanks for all your concern about the bushfires. We're fortunately a good distance from the nearest one which is about 2 hours away from us. Also Geelong is not in bushland so we're fairly safe here.

The weather has been freakishly hot though, on Saturday 7th it was a whopping 47.4 C which was a new record in Geelong, and then the cold change came. The change is when the wind changes direction and instead of coming from the north across the big red heart of Australia it starts coming from the south.. and the antarctic ! So 47 on Sat and then a massive 22C on sunday, and its been like that all week. Having said that it has been 8 weeks since we had any rain and it would be good if we could get some now, but the clouds just come over looking promising for a decent downpour, and then just go past. I never thought I'd say this but we are desparate for some rain !.

Last week we started dancing again with a teacher who's very keen on competition styles... we'll have to see how that pans out ! At the weekend after avoiding the heat on Saturday (mostly by driving around in the car which has air con !!! running errands) and on Sunday in the cooler and very windy day we went to see A Midsummer Night's Dream in a local vinyard complete with gourmet hamper which was just gorgeous. This week Heidi has started Belly Dance classes again which are pretty fun so far, and we're going diving again tomorrow, last week was good fun so we're joining the club.

2nd February 2009

Well if I knew what my computer has done to my blog, I'd rescue it but it seems to have eaten it ! So Sorry folks but its only live from now.

We've just had the worst heatwave on record with 4 days over 43 degrees with Geelong even recording a day of 44.8 (man that is HOT)

So this weekend we took the opportunity to escape the heat and drove out to the Otways. The Otways are a range of hills to the west of us covered in temperate rainforest. Theres a fantastic treetop walk as well which we spent a good hour wandering round enjoying the scenery. After we'd sampled the delights of the forest we headed back down the Great Ocean Road.

The road was built as a living memorial to the soldiers who fought in WWI and winds along the very edge of the cliffs affording some stunning views of this area. After about 40 mins drive we came across our first Koala in the wild, they are just gorgeous and permanently sleeping. Then we headed on further to a lovely little beach for a picnic of sandwich, stuffed peppers, taramasalata and fresh fruit.

We wound our way back past the lighthouse which was featured in the Aussie kids TV programme 'Round the Twist' (which was also on the BBC) and took a long walk along the front.

On sunday the weather finally broke and it was actually cloudy, although still no rain to speak of. Rich has signed himself up for the swimming leg of a corporate triathlon which will be swum along the waterfront in Geelong. So we headed down to the swimming enclosure at the beach for him to do some training. As it happened its probably a good idea we did, not that he's not fit or good at swimming, more that swimming in a straight line turned out to be a bit of a challenge with the waves !!! So more practice needed we think !

This week the schools are all back and so things start happening again. We're going for our first dance lesson here on thursday and we're hoping to join the dive club this week and go diving after work on wednesday. So its all very exciting this week !