Daylesford Autumn Dispatch - Sunday, 1st March 2015

Dear Friends, welcome to Autumn, the most beautiful time to be in Daylesford, especially as we have survived Summer without any bushfires and the weather for March is looking good. When I left you last Sunday we were heading off for what turned out to be a very small group at breakfast – Wes, Karen, Barbara & Janine. Margo popped in, but she had a better offer downstairs, so didn’t stay to eat with us.

At lunchtime I went to see ‘Paper Planes’ at our local cinema, and was so pleased I did. Wes didn’t want to see it, but I thought it looked like a lovely story and it was Australian, set in country Victoria with a period in Sydney and the finale in Tokyo. The writing, casting and direction were all excellent. As I left people were pouring in for ‘The Imitation Game’ and later, ‘Mr Turner’.

We had made plans to catch up with Kathy & Ged Lazzaro on Monday, so after Wes walked Bilbo & I did gym, we drove to Ballan and caught the train into Melbourne and then a tram to Swanston Street as we were meeting at ‘The Moat’ in the basement of the Wheeler Centre in Little Lonsdale Street. Kathy & Ged were there first and bagged a great table at the back where we sat for about 2 hours enjoying good wine, good food & excellent service. The Lazzaros flew off to Europe last night and will be away for two months, so we were pleased to have been able to say goodbye.

We arrived home at 5pm just in time to feed Bilbo who shouldn’t have been hungry after spending his day gnawing, burying and re-gnawing a big marrow bone, courtesy of Auntie Leanne. Wes made tapioca with banana and passionfruit, which was all we could eat after our lunch.

Early morning attack on the bone – note the paw holding the other end in case Wes or I should want it!

Lovely photo of Jeff & Kev dressed for lunch on the Orient Express

Tuesday was our first fasting day – we have decided to try the 5+2 diet for the next 10 weeks and have nominated Tuesdays & Thursdays as our 500 calories only days. I have put on weight that I have been blaming on Chronic Fatigue, but now that I have more energy, I suspect it is probably caused by eating too much of the wrong things. Wes feels the same, so we are trying to help each other out. Local friends swear by this diet, and the results are good, so we are giving it a go.

We had hoped to play golf early, but it was a delightfully cold and very windy morning, and we three all managed to sleep in, so golf was cancelled and I took Bilbo for a later walk around town. Meanwhile Wes managed to track down Viviane Vagh (previously Eychart, née Gauci), who married Pierre the painter and with whom we shared a few wonderful months in 1969-70, before she & Pierre went back to Paris to live. We caught up with them a few times but by the end of the 70s we had lost track of them completely. Viv is now married to Jonathan Levine (composer & writer) and describes herself as a writer-director, who has also acted and taught drama & video. She replied instantly to our emails and wants to chat via Skype, and share a meal in Paris. We are over the moon!

After a lovely interlude getting nails done with Alanna at EKO, I had a bit of a rest in preparation for going to see ‘The Imitation Game’ at 6pm locally. I arrived early, bagged the middle of the second back row and watched in amazement as the theatre quickly filled up with locals. The film was very good and I discovered the next morning that so many people were turned away an extra screening was put on Wednesday night to accommodate everyone.

We had invited Michael Ivanchenko to have an early dinner with us on Wednesday as his wife, Judi Allen, was in the Caloundra area visiting her mother, sister, and other relatives & friends and we thought we would break up the fortnight with a meal halfway through. Wes cooked a crown rib roast and breaded fish which he served with yummy vegetables. We had a lovely time with Michael, with lots of stimulating conversation and some fine red wines.

Somehow I got up early on Thursday to walk Bilbo and then drove to Ballarat to see if I could get a replacement control for Wes’s side of the electric blanket. I had to order it in, so he will have to survive for another few days. It was a lovely day, much cooler than it has been. When I was in Vincent Street, I pulled up next to John & Jan Smith, who were showing friends they met in Alice Springs all around Daylesford. They were off to Cliffy’s as The Food Gallery was shut. In the afternoon Wes went to a volunteer session at the Daylesford Community Cinema and agreed to do front of house last night, where he managed to see ‘The Kingsman’.

We sat down to watch Collingwood play Hawthorn in Launceston that night and were very delighted with the win by the Pies. It is such a rare event – of course the Hawks fielded mostly seconds’ players, but a win’s a win. We look to have found a few good players for the future as well as the ones that showed some promise last year.

This week’s vase of very delicately-shaded pink & apricot roses

Wes did the early walk on Friday, while I tackled DA’s Friday Cryptic Crossword. I was about halfway through when it was time to go shopping at Coles. As I drove into Vincent Street, there was a hot air balloon above me, so close I could almost see the colour of the occupants’ eyes! Everyone was standing dead in their tracks watching and wondering what would happen. Eventually the balloon disappeared and probably landed at the Hepburn Footy Ground. I stopped at the Library to deliver my eight completed poppies for the Centenary celebrations.  

Bilbo & I joined the Bushwalking Group, which this time was in Eganstown, on Bald Hill Track. There were only four of us with two dogs, as Malcolm, the leader, brought his rescue dog, Cara. Cara & Bilbo were very happy to meet each other and Colin & Helen, the other two walkers, didn’t mind at all. It was a beautiful Autumnal day with the temperature around 20°, which is perfect for bushwalking.

After lunch I went to the U3A Film Group at The Grande in Hepburn Springs. We saw a low-budget, but totally engrossing film called ‘Locke’ starring Tom Hardy. The whole of the film occurs in his car as he drives from work to London. Everyone seemed to have enjoyed it as we stood around in the sun afterwards having tea & seriously good treats.

Wes spent most of the morning in the garden and most of the afternoon on the computer finishing the big box of correspondence from the early 70s that he has been wading through. In between we sat outside for lunch of baked salmon with coriander & lemongrass, boiled spuds and a green salad with many ingredients from our garden. At night we sat down to watch Carlton play West Coast somewhere in WA, but the camerawork was terrible and the Blues weren’t much better, so gave that up, watched an eerie episode of ‘Playhouse Presents’ and went to bed.

Lovely photo of Wes in 2013 at Threave Gardens, Scotland, with a Pine we would love to own – not sure where it would fit!

                                                   

Yesterday it was muggy with early light rain. Bilbo & I walked around the Lake in complete darkness except for my torch. We arrived back home for Bilbo to have a bath and afterwards Wes cooked us both a beautiful breakfast – scrambled eggs with salmon; baked Roma tomatoes from the garden; wilted spinach, and baked mushrooms stuffed with salmon & parmesan. We had decided to indulge early, as we were off to Ian McKenzie’s 70^th Birthday with drinks & canapés from 2-6pm, so a big lunch would have been a mistake!

We had a lovely time at the party – Ian & Josie have a large property down an unmade road in Musk and they had invited about 70 friends & family to mark the occasion. Gary Thomas did the catering, there was a background singer, and they had employed two waitresses to carry around food and another to look after the bar, so they could enjoy time with their guests. We hadn’t been to their home before and were most impressed with the outside entertaining area. I didn’t try and catch up with everyone, but sat in a corner with Wes listening to Val Farrell talk about her self-published book ‘Cockatoo’ celebrating the three cockies she has owned in her life, and to Margie Thomas talking about her work as a Friend of Cornish Hill. We left after the cake was brought out as Wes needed a rest before doing front of house at the Daylesford Cinema.

Ian & Josie celebrating in style yesterday

The morning had flown by with Wes doing wonders in the back garden, making room for another rose from Ken this morning if he is at the Sunday Market. Little did we know that Daylesford was to get a mini-tornado at about 7.30pm last night, which did lots of damage, including the loss of a huge old monkey-puzzle tree in Central Springs Road. Fortunately we had nothing worse than the tomato pots and a lemon tree falling over, but the boys next door found a branch from their big tree on their decking; some friends have lost lots of trees; others can’t get out of their driveways or streets, and there is a lot of debris around the Lake, which had gone wild with water spraying high into the air at the height of the storm.

Once proud monkey-puzzle tree reduced to debris last night outside the Uniting Church

We are off to Trentham this afternoon to spend time with Bob White. Today is the first anniversary of his partner, Kirk’s death, and Bob has decided to scatter his ashes at three different venues and we have been invited to participate. There will be a wake at Chaplins afterwards.