Daylesford Autumn Dispatch - Sunday, 26th March 2017

Dear Friends, We’ve finally enjoyed some rain this week & the ground is very grateful for it. Green shoots are sprouting out of our lawn, the roses are in bloom, the tomatoes are ripening & even our dwarf red beans are almost ready to be picked.

Last week’s Dispatch attracted quite a few comments – everyone seemed to love the ChillOut photos plus the one of Bilbo & Bam Bam together. Thank you so much for finding time to give me some feedback & let me know that you are still reading & enjoying after all these years.

I thought I should let you know how well I am going these days with my chronic fatigue. The regular early morning walk around the Lake energises me for the day, as well as being a lovely thing to do with Wes & Bilbo. I try to make appointments in the mornings, when I have the most get up & go, and if I can’t, then I make sure I have a quiet morning before an afternoon commitment. I used to need to rest after lunch, but I now find I can usually achieve up to 4pm, by which time I am ready for a pot of tea & a sit down.

At breakfast last Sunday as the sun peeped out from behind the clouds

I can’t face large crowds of people I know any more, but that is manageable & I am grateful that I am not in bed for half the day as I was at the start. There is no medication I can take, but I am doing my best to avoid infections, have the flu injection each year & keep the pneumonia prevention updated as well.

Apart from the rain, this has been a fairly normal week for us, with a few extra highlights thrown in. Normal for me means a walk every day; two sessions of gym; a fringe trim or nails or both; a few phone calls with my sister, Leanne; catching up with a friend or two over a pot of Jasmine tea; a morning of Mah Jong with Dot (year 18 of playing this wonderful game); cryptic & normal crosswords daily; logic problems; online Scrabble games with Jane, Lyndall, Wes & Moshe; a few hours sitting at the computer; as many hours as possible reading books, and quite a few hours watching footy, cricket & favourite TV series (usually crime).

Wes spends most of his time on the computer with his various projects – the main one is the ‘Villages of the Hepburn Shire’ with Brian Nash, where Wes is providing the words to Brian’s paintings.  They visit a spot each week and find something special that identifies that place, which turns into a painting.

The First Annual Kingston Rodeo with the stolen grandstand in view

Wes also spends many hours on Ancestry & is often consulted by people from cemetery trusts, as he seems to know more about his buried relatives than anyone else they can find to ask.

He is also kept busy in the garden and has been mulching the roses lately as well as plants heaps of geraniums that he has propagated. And finally, he spends time each day planning & then cooking exciting meals most lunchtimes. I have been known to create interesting salads to go with fish, or to bake cakes suitable for visitors or afternoon tea snacks, or to turn a few different fresh fruits into yummy fruit salads, but that’s about it these days.

Bilbo’s life is very governed by what day of the week it is. Monday, Tuesday, Thursday & Friday follow a regular pattern – early walk, bone, sleep, get anxious around 4pm, eat dinner at 5.30pm, sleep, get anxious around 8.30pm, have an apple & go to bed. On Sundays, there is no early bone, only an apple, as he gets fed again at the Sunday Market & at breakfast. And on Wednesdays, there is no early bone, because Sandra arrives at 7.30am, gives him a 5-minute cuddle, and then another apple as she leaves around 10.30am.

We’ve had some wonderful highlights this week – on Monday evening the Hepburn Shire Council agreed unanimously to keep the Daylesford Cinema in the Rex. The Cinema will be moved upstairs to a new location & will be totally refurbished. This will occur as quickly as possible and the Cinema will stay in its current spot until the new one is ready for occupancy. With any luck the Cinema will only be closed for a week or so.

We received a surprise & very welcome morning visit from Ted Bailey (89), an old friend from Brunswick Rotary days, who was on a trip from Castlemaine to Ballarat with his good friend, John (90), who have been friends forever through their membership of Powerhouse. Fortunately, I had baked a fruit cake & they both got stuck into it with gusto.

Bilbo can relate to this!

We had been invited to join Gayle & Fraser Gibson, their daughter, Gabby, & her son, Fraser, Fraser’s friend, Terry, and his brother, Fergus, to lunch in the MCC Committee Room to celebrate Fraser’s 70^th birthday. It was a wonderful occasion & we were so thrilled to have been included in this group. Our gift to Fraser can be seen in this photo!

L-R Gayle, Fergie, Gab, Fraser Jr, Fraser, Wes & Karen

Yesterday was the Grand Final of the AFLW & what a great match it was. We were barracking for Brisbane, but the Adelaide girls were just more determined & fully deserved their win by 1 goal in front of 15,600 fans at the Gold Coast. We were in tears watching the presentation, which was done with all the pomp & ceremony of the men’s game, including young children giving the winners their medallions.

Wes & I both had a country experience yesterday morning.

He & Brian Nash were at Woolnough’s Crossing, when they met a farmer, who invited them onto his property. They ended up standing on the back of his ute as it bumped around delivering hay to his large cows. When the farmer rang his wife to tell her why he would be late for lunch, she reminded him that she has a Brian Nash painting that she absolutely loves!

Meanwhile, I went with our friend, Janine Hawker, to Lyonville Hall for the inaugural Lyonville Harvest Festival. It was a delightful thing to attend & we spent a happy hour there chatting over tea & scones, after we had surveyed the fruit & vegetables on display.

   

   

It was no surprise to us when this won the best Basket of Produce

Footy has started again and both our teams lost their opening games. Wes was very disappointed that Carlton weren’t able to match it with Richmond on Thursday night in front of 70,000+, whereas I was thrilled that Collingwood, which led at one stage, only went down to the reigning premiers by 14 points. We watched as much footy as we could over the 3 days and there is still more to come, but we are trying to juggle seeing the 4^th & final Test as well & were thrilled to see Steve Smith make yet another century, his 7^th in India. We are not sure that 300 is a big enough total to worry the Indians when they come out to bat this afternoon our time. The game is being played in Dharamsala with the Himalayas in the background.

A most picturesque site for a cricket ground. This is the first time Test Cricket has been played here. 

Daylesford Autumn Dispatch - Sunday, 19th March 2017

 

 

Dear Friends, we had a great time at the ChillOut Parade after breakfast last Sunday. There was a big crowd in attendance & probably the most people involved in the Parade ever. Bilbo was beautifully behaved, even when the motorbikes revved up in front of us. People came to pat him, to take his photo & to remark on his relaxed pose.

Bilbo & Bam Bam in harmony at breakfast before the Parade.

After the Parade we came back home & Wes spent time in the garden, while I watched the Collingwood women have a good victory over GWS at Olympic Park in Melbourne.

         Dame Edna on the left & Max Primmer looking stunning in gold below

Police, Precious Paws & the Wizard of Oz characters were part of the colourful line up

On Monday, we walked early & picked up a few bottles & a towel that had been discarded. There was a mess on the main barbecue area, but we left that for the next lot of walkers as it was too dark for us to be able to do properly. Barry the fisherman was in position again after a week’s absence & the only obstacle to our walk was a German Shepherd that was tied up to a van parked next to where we usually park & start our walk near the Lake House. We decided not to risk annoying the dog and had a chat to Bilbo about how hard some dogs lives are & to think twice before complaining because he, at least, has an inside bed & would never be tied up outside all night in a place he didn’t know.

As it was the Labour Day Public Holiday, we decided to celebrate with breakfast at Boathouse Daylesford – always a lovely spot to visit. We grabbed chairs looking out the window onto the Lake & enjoyed very yummy meals – chorizo breakfast for Wes & smoked salmon for me.

Afterwards we visited the Daylesford Museum to see the display celebrating the 20^th ChillOut Festival. There was a 90-minute video, words & pictures (including a photo if Wes when he was Mayor supporting the cause) about each year’s event & a few props as well as one of each of the T-shirts designed for the volunteers to wear, quite a few of which are still in our wardrobe. We were disappointed there weren’t more memorabilia – would love to have seen a few of Max’s outfits from over the years, but at least the Museum is firmly behind ChillOut after years of antipathy.

On Tuesday, we were amazed to see a small round trampoline on the diving deck at Lake Daylesford. We can only hope that the owner is on Facebook & discovers from Warren’s post where it has gone, although it was still there this morning. The 10am film was ‘Hidden Figures’ which I went to see along with 20 others & we all enjoyed it very much indeed. Afterwards, Judi & I had lunch at The Food Gallery & found ourselves talking about the film most of the time.

That afternoon, Nick came to give me a massage and brought some of his honeycomb as a gift. He is so thoughtful & like most generous people, doesn’t want anything in return – I offered zucchini, tomatoes & herbs, but was knocked back on all three.

Dot was unable to play Mah Jong on Wednesday as she had an appointment, but I visited Muffins & More after gym for a pear & ginger muffin & a pot of Jasmine tea. I used to have breakfast early before I went to gym, but find that I can exercise much better on an empty tummy. On Wednesdays, Sandra comes to clean at 7.30am, so by the time I get back from gym, it is after 9am & she has well & truly taken over our house! Wes spent the morning in Barbara’s garden, mostly hosing, which probably caused the lovely rain we had that night & the next morning early.

We had planned to go to Melbourne on Thursday to visit the NGV (National Gallery of Victoria) & catch up on their current exhibitions, but Ticketmaster decided to make tickets available for the GWS & Collingwood match at 10am that morning, so we cancelled any thought of Melbourne. I was ready at the computer on the dot to obtain 7 tickets for the game, preferably with an end seat to give Terry McDonald some room, which I achieved! The game is at the Sydney Showgrounds in May – Danny & I are going to it, as well as our Sydney friends, Jane & David Knox, Terry McDonald & his good friends, Tim & Marj.

Wes planned a picnic outing instead and a very lovely one it was. First, we stopped at Eganstown Catholic Church & cemetery and went for a walk around it with Bilbo. Next stop was Powlett Hill, where Wes & Brian had found the abandoned dry stone home with pear & apple tree orchard still growing. Our picnic was held at Smeaton Mill, by the side of the water, which was most relaxing. I was a million miles away when it was time to go home, which we did via the Kingston Showgrounds, so that Wes could let me see the splendid old grandstand there, which was stolen from Smeaton (God know how!).

Brian Nash painting of Eganstown Cemetery

We arrived back home just in time for the Third Test in Ranchi to start & what a great toss to win. We were glued to our chairs & particularly enjoyed seeing Steve Smith & Glenn Maxwell bat so well together.

I had hoped to join the Bushwalkers in Trentham on Friday doing the Domino Trail, but after shopping, I felt as though I needed a quiet morning & pottered around here instead. Wes worked in the garden & Bilbo slept. We enjoyed sending & receiving St Pat’s Day e-cards & when Wes & Brian Nash visited Sailors Falls Estate in the afternoon, Wes took some Guinness along to celebrate the day.

Wes & Bilbo getting settled at our picnic at Smeaton

Yesterday, after our early walk, we headed off to Melbourne together. Wes dropped me at Strathmore and I spent my time with Leanne, while he drove to Foxtrot Charlie in Sydney Road, Brunswick, for a long overdue catch up breakfast with friend, Jon Stephens. Gerard Lazzaro drove there to meet up with Wes & collect our Tom Tom for their upcoming trip, where they will be driving in England. We were very thrilled Kathy & Ged decided to take up our offer, as we have found using it makes such a difference.

We arrived back here in time to see Winx beat a small field at Rosehill in Sydney, to record her 16^th straight win. She is an amazing horse – the jockey carries a whip, but I have never seen him use it. He just seems to whisper in her ear & off she goes like the wind.

The 3^rd Test is nicely poised with the Indians slowly but surely amassing a decent total. We will be glued to it again this afternoon, hoping Australia can take the last 4 wickets before India gets ahead on the first innings. As well, we have two AFLW matches to watch – the last games for Collingwood & Carlton are being played this afternoon. The Grand Final is next Saturday in Brisbane between the unbeaten Lions & either Adelaide or Melbourne depending on whether the Pies can knock off the Crows.

20 years ago – Wes & Ray Maloney at lunch with Joan Testro – always a wonderful experience

Daylesford Autumn Dispatch - Sunday, 12th March 2017

Dear Friends, when I left you last week, we were looking forward to Bob White’s birthday lunch at Annie Smithers’ restaurant, Du Fermier, at Trentham. And we weren’t disappointed. It was a very happy event & we were glad to have been included in Bob’s group of 35 family & friends. Wes was MC & had spent a lot of time researching important & not so important events that occurred when Bob was born & during his lifetime, as part of his introduction.

Bob with his daughter, Natalie, and son, Brendan

Annie produced a stunning meal – smoked trout with salad, followed by mussels, which was followed by lamb cooked four ways or a chick pea casserole for us non-meat eaters. Her pièce de resistance was a stunning berry roulade, which is almost as good as her finest sweets ever (in our humble opinion) – rose pavlova.

On Monday, I had a great session at gym and am really enjoying my current programme, which is helping with my strength, stamina & asthma. Wes had a good morning in the garden and the highlight was planting a new hybrid tea rose that I had brought home from Ken Rae at the Sunday Market the day before. It is called Governor Macquarie and I snapped up the only one that Ken had, as I thought the blooms were exquisite and have a perfume to match!

While Wes prepared at the Daylesford Cinema to show the Oscar winning film, ‘Moonlight’, I had a lovely catch up with Gillie at Muffins & More. I was so pleased I went to see the film as it is absolutely stunning & totally engrossing. It would have been a travesty if ‘La La Land’ had beaten it for the award. In the afternoon, we were totally entranced by the cricket in Bangalore again – what an amazing Test this has been.

After gym on Wednesday I played Mah Jong with Dot in Muffins & More, which was great fun as always. I think the honours were even by the time we parted. Wes spent the morning helping Barbara, including filling her car up with petrol. He cooked us a beautiful lunch, then headed off to spend the afternoon with Brian Nash discussing their project.

I visited Leanne on Thursday – left at 7am as it was going to be a very hot day & I needed to do some painting for her before the temperature reached 33˚. We had a busy and productive time together and I was pleased to sit quietly when I got home again in the afternoon.

We were both tired on Friday morning, but did our early walk around the Lake, and I went shopping at Coles, before we both decided to have a quiet morning instead of the activities we had each planned. Below is a photo of our first ever cucumber, with our best zucchini & the first of our grosse lisse tomatoes.

Our street has been as busy as it has ever been over the past couple of weeks. Technicians have been installing NBN cables everywhere and there has been a Ditch Witch parked at the bottom of Houston Street, making access quite tricky. As well Mark & Lesley have been doing renovations to no 74 and there have been 5 or 6 tradesman vans parked along either side of our road, which also makes access difficult. Finally, over the past two nights, there have been two enormous moving trucks parked next door to us at no 76 and getting out of our place has been fun & games. Those of us living here are driving very slowly in and out as the visiting tradesmen all drive too fast & it can be quite dangerous if we should meet going in opposite directions, as our little bit of Duke Street is really only wide enough for one vehicle at a time.

Fortunately, most of them have disappeared for the Long Weekend, but their places have been taken by the many who flock here for the Annual ChillOut Festival, now in its 20^th year in Daylesford. I’ll have photos from this morning’s parade in next week’s Dispatch.

Just love this cartoon – Snoopy at his most delusional perhaps!

Yesterday, after the walk, we got stuck into the house & garden. Wes spent the morning watering, pruning & tidying up the back, while I fed all the vegetable plants & did the washing & ironing.

We watched Collingwood & Richmond play a thriller at Moe before Wes went to be the projectionist for a special screening of ‘The Wizard of Oz’ in celebration of ChillOut.

Overnight, we finally had some rain – not much, but enough to make everywhere look so much better. As well there was a full moon, so our walk wasn’t in pitch dark as it has been all week. Bilbo & I are about to head off to the Sunday Market, then we will leave early for breakfast at The Food Gallery and park somewhere that allows us an easy escape after the parade has finished.

We woke to find that the ALP had a landslide victory in Western Australia – the Liberals had made a deal with Pauline Hanson & it turned out to be a monumental error of judgement.

Finally, we were very sad, along with thousands of others, to read that this beautiful Azure Arch in Malta had disappeared without trace overnight during the week. This photo of cousin Leigh, me & Wes was taken in March 2010, when we had a wonderful visit together to this stunning country.

Enjoy your week and I’ll be back in touch next Sunday.

Daylesford Autumn Dispatch - Sunday, 5th March 2017

Dear Friends, because there were only three of us available for breakfast last Sunday, Barbara cancelled it, so after the walk & Sunday Market, Wes & I headed to Hepburn Springs to try breakfast at Blue Bean Love Café. It was funky, as most Hepburn places are, and we enjoyed good service and an enjoyable breakfast together.

In the afternoon, we were visited by our lovely neighbours, Rob & Dene, who came to chat over cups of tea & ended up with glasses of wine when Brian Nash also arrived!

Monday was a perfect morning – after our early walk, where we were delighted to see Barry the fisherman back after 3 weeks in Thailand, I headed to gym & Wes tackled the overgrown jasmine in the front garden.

We had lunch at Boathouse Daylesford with Libby Stewardson, an old friend of Joan Testro, and her daughter, Anne Mallen. This was the perfect venue to chat with people I had never met before and we spent a very enjoyable couple of hours together. Libby has lived in Switzerland for the last 50 years – moved there for her husband’s work with 4 children under 5 – which must have been quite a challenge. Anne is the oldest & she shares her time between England & her home in Footscray.

We shared memories of Joan and learnt all about life in Switzerland. Libby, aged 83, comes to Australia every year to catch up with family & friends.

The last official day of Summer was a hot one – we walked early, then Wes went off to the Daylesford Cinema to prepare to show the film, A United Kingdom. I had a fringe trim & then joined 15 others to see this well-acted, true story, which we all enjoyed very much.

While Wes was catching up with Bob White at The Food Gallery, I went to EKO to have a facial & manicure with Emma & Alanna. This is always a lovely experience and I emerge feeling much better for the treatments.

Peaceful entrance to EKO

Margie Thomas dropped in to home in the late afternoon to discuss the future of the cinema & brought a gift of 1 dozen eggs, which were very welcome indeed.

On Wednesday, the first day of Autumn, it was another hot day. We walked early, I went to gym and then played Mah Jong with Dot until it got too hot. Dot was very excited to tell me all about her grand-daughter, Bethany’s, wedding the previous Saturday. Wes spent the morning with Barbara, but they worked indoors solving computer issues instead of venturing outside into the heat.

At 5pm Wes headed off to Sailors Falls Estate, where Rob & Marg McDonald were again hosting Aperitifs. Quite a few of their guests were also heading to the Daylesford Cinema that night for a Rotary presentation of a 60 minute film showing Seven Women of Nepal, who have been helped by a young Australian woman Stephanie Woollard, who took pity on them when she realised (aged 19) their plight as disabled and therefore, scorned women in Kathmandu. The cinema was full & everyone was moved by what she has achieved in getting women to learn to read & write.

Bilbo & Bunny fast asleep!

We were due for a fortnightly day off and had planned to visit Cinema Nova in Carlton on Thursday to see a few films, especially ‘Lion’, which we had missed here. I discovered that we could see it in Ballarat, so we headed there for the 10.30 session and found ourselves in the comfort of the back row of their Showcase cinema. We loved the film and particularly admired the acting of Dev Kapel, whose Australian accent was faultless.

After lunch at the Knife, Fork & Spoon, across the road in Lydiard Street, we headed back & found ourselves upstairs in an old Gold Class cinema to see the stunning film, ‘Fences’, which features Denzil Washington at his very best. In fact, every actor in this film is wonderful and I was pleased to read that the original play won a Pulitzer Prize for drama back in 1987. The playwright, August Wilson completed the screenplay before he died in 2005.

Yummy lunch in Ballarat – crab omelette for me & vegetable lasagne for Wes

On Friday, we walked early under a star-filled sky, before I went shopping at Coles. Wes dropped me off in Camp Street, and I joined 12 others on a lovely walk through a part of Wheatsheaf I have never been before. One of the walkers, Vera, asked me if I knew of anyone who could fix concrete tanks. I said not, but promised to ask the question on the Daylesford Grapevine when I got home, and sure enough I had two helpful replies in 5 minutes and was able to ring her with a name & phone number.

Wes & Brian visited Powlett’s Hill, which has very little apart from a dirt road and a stunning derelict crofter’s cottage with fruit trees and Fool’s gold rocks. Brian gave Wes a beautiful painting he had done surreptitiously of Wes & Bilbo on the Wombat Trail in Trentham. We have found a spot for it on the wall right next to ‘Karen & Casper’.

We were very sorry to read during the week of the sudden, but peaceful death of Betty Amsden OA, a great philanthropist, who we were lucky enough to meet a few years ago at a Guide Dogs of Victoria lunch for supporters. She died aged 90, after a lifetime as an accomplished businesswoman who established one of the first modern aged care facilities in Australia. She chose to give her money away during her lifetime, and the Tributes to her continue to flow in from beneficiaries of her largesse – The Arts Centre, The Australian Ballet, Victoria Opera, to name but a few.

Yesterday we heard that Danny Spooner had died peacefully after a very short battle with his aggressive cancer. Everyone has lovely memories of the special concert he put on recently – he knew how much he was loved and had the perfect chance to say goodbye.

Wes answered an emergency call from the Cinema and helped out at the 5.30pm session of ‘Lion’, which was well-attended and enjoyed by everyone there. He met someone who knows the family & was able to confirm the accuracy of the film. Meanwhile I had a huge washing & ironing day back here – put on the first load at 5.30am before we went walking & folded the last towels at 7.30pm. In between there was plenty of sport to keep me going – three exciting women’s footy games; one close men’s game & a fabulous first day of cricket at Bangalore, where the Aussies bowled out the Indians for 189 & were 0/40 at stumps.

We have been invited to ‘Du Fermier’ in Trentham to help celebrate Bob White’s 80^th birthday today and are looking forward very much to doing just that!