To Adelaide and beyond

I always enjoy Dimboola as a destination.  The town first came to my attention in, I think, the 1970s when a play called A Wedding in Dimboola came to prominence in the media.  The play included raucous audience participation and, as I recall it, Dimboola seized on the idea of staging it as a tourist attraction.  I had not been there until Sandrine lived at Warracknabeal and we would rendezvous at a cute little cafe in the main street.  In homage to Sandrine, I stop there, often for breakfast, when driving from the Spirit of Tasmania to Adelaide.  This trip was a little different because we approached Dimboola via back roads from the South and not via the highway.  We indulged in a cholesterol bulging, piping hot scrambled egg/ham/cheese wrap.  Delicious.

The food was good but the cafe has lost a bit of its sparkle.  The town, however, has filled with life and all the previously empty shops are now up and running.  I was stunned, and thrilled, to see these flags flying at the plaza beside the library.

The drive from Dimboola to Adelaide is the least interesting part of the trip, though it is countered by the anticipation of getting there.

the welcoming sight of the aloes in the park next to Pearl Resort

The chief reason to travel to Adelaide is to visit Mum in the nursing home at Christies Beach.

I spent many a 15 minutes staring at this view while awaiting RAT results.  Fortunately there was no rain.

Being covid free, I was allowed to dress up like this to go and spend time with Mum, who can hardly hear a word I say.  By the second week covid regulations had changed and I only had to don a blue mask, making conversation marginally easier.

Mum and I took many trips down memory lane.  Back Chez Pearl, new adventures were planned.

We took the drive north up the coast and cruised Port Adelaide.  There was a time when Pearl and I got excited at the prospect of buying a 3 storey building there and splitting it into apartments, one for each of us and one for my Mum.  A pipe dream but lovely to see that it now appears to be a well kept family home with a bike track running alongside.  After The Port we made our first expedition to find Lady Jayne's grandma's house.  Not totally successful, but getting warm...

That night, being a Friday, we observed Mars family tradition and made pizzas.

The following evening we investigated Shiraz, a Persian / Iranian restaurant that Pearl had noticed close to her place.  Without Tamasin and Nima to guide us, we were at a loss to know what to order but chose well with three very traditional dishes.  The dessert pastries looked divine but we were flup.

It was Heritage Month in South Australia and we set off to Hahndorf the next day.  Naturally it was seething with people and I didn't take any photos but we did find a Gingerbread Cafe and ate deliciously warm ginger cake.

Big day next - the pilgrimage to Port Elliot, particularly our pub and 'our usual table'.

Sadly our pub does not have the range of seafood dishes it once had.  It does have Coorong Mullet, but I have had it many times before, so this time I thought I'd try their lambs fry and bacon.  It was superb.

On the way home we dropped off a book to Fleurieu Floosie, continuing the tradition of the Travelling Library.  Long may it continue!

The next day marked one week of travels.  After I had visited Mum, we went to a U3A presentation just over the way from Pearl Resort.  It was a popular and lively event with a lady talking about life in the early 1920s.  She even wore clothes from the period and looked dashing.  An added pleasure for me was a book cupboard beside the venue.  Inside, begging to be taken, was this book:

so I could expand my holiday to France too!  Amongst all the fabulous photos

there are recipes that I may even make one day.  They look delicious

but don't hold your breath...

The Pig takes flight (boots n all)

Time to visit Mum again in Adelaide, and it's always best to go the long way 'round.  So I flew to Canberra...

It's winter and I  wore my boots to Hobart airport because they would take up nearly my whole bag were I to pack them.  This was quite a good strategy.  As claimed on the box, they are seriously comfortable but I was a bit warier about the claim that they were safety boots.  They had seemed too cheap for that claim.  However they set off the alarm on the walk-through metal detector and the security guy suggested they were steel-cap toed.  Which presumably is true because when I walked through again in holey socked feet, the detector let me through, and the x-ray scanner thingy seemed satisfied that I did not sport a knife in my boots.

I had a delightful flight to Canberra on a very small plane with a very solicitous steward.  I did not avail myself of the complimentary booze but partook of a small bag of salted crisps - years since I'd had them.  Lady Jayne and her two Ladies in Waiting chased me around the airport.  I have no idea where the public pick up point is - of course there is work being undertaken so it's not just outside the baggage claim area - and I kept being given instructions by security guys that virtually saw me circumnavigate the airport.  Eventually we espied each other and zapped off home.

The next day Lady Jayne and I, sans the Ladies in Waiting who were at school, went to the National Museum of Australia to view the Feared and Revered Exhibition.  I had long wanted to see it and it didn't disappoint.  It did overwhelm, but I stuck to the simple stuff, which is what I like best.

These modern Aboriginal depictions of women made using traditional fibre weaving techniques certainly weren't simple.  Just simply beautiful.

This fabulous exhibit in the museum foyer reminded us we were off on a road trip to Adelaide the next day.

So off we set the next morning, wending our way through country lanes (sort of) to Bendigo, our destination for the night.  Finding a motel in peak hour traffic was a little fraught but we eventually found a place between a Catholic Girls School and a cathedral, and felt very blessed.

Dinner in The Shamrock pub was also a blessing - an Indian-style seafood dish and a big glug of wine because we could walk back to our digs.  Bendigo is a beautiful town and a night time wander after a full day's driving was divine.

The next morning we did a small wander around town.  I wanted to see the Arts Precinct.  Bendigo celebrates its architecture and mining heritage with panache.  Mining is part of Lady Jayne's heritage too.

And then on the road again, destination Adelaide via Dimboola.