Daylesford Summer Dispatch - Sunday, 4th December 2022

We're feeling the guilt - Morse is in Eureka Kennels while we are gallivanting around South Australia!

We had a busy week getting ready to go on holidays - isn't that always the way? Last Sunday, after a quick trip to the Market, and a speedy washing & putting away of goodies, we drove to Strathmore to spend time with Leanne. It was quite a long visit as there was lots of do, apart from wishing her a very early Happy Birthday. 

That afternoon, we were thrilled to see the Melbourne AFLW team win their first Premiership by narrowly defeating Brisbane in a hard-fought, engrossing game of footy in Ipswich in 31° heat. Their captain, Daisy Pearce, was elated & couldn't stop talking, smiling, congratulating & praising - her post-match interview was most memorable!

Gorgeous bush in our front garden

On Monday, we spent School designing our Christmas email, which was delivered on Thursday morning with our Christmas letter attached. Google has enabled us to do so much more with emails than we ever could with Outlook, and we are grateful that we made the change during early COVID lockdown. We still use Word documents & mailing systems, but Google Email, Calendar, Contacts, Sheets & Keep is far superior to Outlook's similar programmes. 

Wes spent the whole of Tuesday in our garden, getting front & back ready to cope without us. I'm not sure the weeds take any notice, but every gardener I speak with assures me that the weeds are bigger & better this year after all that rain, which at least makes them easier to pull out by the roots. 

On Wednesday I had a fringe trim, while Wes vacuumed the floors & did end of month back-ups on our desktops. Daylesford town was fairly quiet, but will be very busy by the time we get back home I am sure. That afternoon I was glued to the first day of the 1st Test against the West Indies in Perth, which saw Australia rally from the loss of an early wicket to be 2/293 at stumps. 

Healthy strawberry patch

Wes spent Thursday weeding in the front garden, hosing everything that needed it, including the cars, and doing a last mow of the back. I enjoyed a good final Zoom for 2022 with Old Friends. It has been wonderful to have the weekly contact with Kathy, Karen, Lib & Joyce this year, and we are grateful for the occasional participation by Squiz. Hopefully we'll all be fit & well & ready to start again on 19th January.

We set off for Beachport early on Friday morning, as Wes had taken Morse to Eureka Kennels the previous afternoon. I divided up the contents of our fridge between us, Glen & Judi, while Wes packed the car including my golf bag with each of us having six clubs (I'm left-handed, so we can't share). We had planned to stop in Dimboola for breakfast, but realised after a couple of hours that we weren't going to be anywhere near it. However, we were headed for Dunkeld & decided to break there instead. Wes had found a Trip Advisor recommendation for a Scottish Deli, which sounded ideal, even though we couldn't remember having seen one there on our last visit. On closer examination, he discovered the Deli was actually in Scotland!

We settled for Izzy's Café & enjoyed vegetarian breakfasts served by smiling, uniformed staff, with good table spacing, self-serve napkins & plenty of water. Neither of us has had a fried egg for years, but our Irish waitress misread the request for scrambled eggs.

We arrived here at Beachport right on 2pm & checked in via various codes. Our apartment is spacious with views of the beach from every window. Our only problem is we can't lower the air-conditioning from 21°, so have been quite warm at night. Each night gets better as we find ways to cool our bedroom with the drapes closed during the day. The bathroom temperature is set to 26°, which is even worse, but I am gradually reducing that. Otherwise we are very comfortable with reclining leather chairs, good lighting & an excellent kitchen.

We had local fish & chips on Friday night - crumbed flake, calamari rings & yummy chips. The leftover chips went to the seagulls the next morning on our early walk, where we traversed the long pier as far as we could go without interrupting the fishermen. 

We had a longer walk after breakfast - along the beach, where there is a good boardwalk and then a well-kept path. The views along the way were lovely & we met plenty of dogs being walked or frolicking in the beach. On our way back we visited the Lobster Pot & bought a crayfish & oysters for dinner last night. The friendly staff cleaned the cray, added ice, lemon & parsley & sent us off feeling warm & fuzzy from the experience. 

Needless to say, we enjoyed a fabulous meal with a bottle of Cofield Sparkling Shiraz, while we watched the West Indian team fight back in the best possible way.