My latest work which I finished about a month ago is entitled "My Rock". The inspiration for this work comes from the rock formations and colours of Porcupine gorge up here in Qld. The swirling patterns in the rock caught my attention when we were there and it has taken me some time to sort out what I was going to do with them and finally the idea of Ron in the rock.

Hope you like it.

Good morning everyone, sorry about the lack of content lately but with the festival, art competition, the purchase of the block next door, enclosing the carport into a fully lock up garage, planting, watering, dining and generally having fun, there doesn't seem to be much time left for other things LOL.

We are now only 7 weeks out from our trip and I am just letting you know that I will be blogging madly when that starts so standby. Trip iterinary is 13th to Syd, 14th to Toronto training to Montreal and Quebec, quick flight to NYC for 4 days then off to Zurich for 3 weeks. Two weeks in Egypt including 3 days sailing on lake nassar, then another 3 days on the nile, then back to Zurich, a couple of days with D and D in Brissy to recover from the flight and then home. I will have a new phone number when travelling so will send to you if you request it. Stay well and blog you soon.

DA

It's all happening HMB Endeavour arrives at 1770

Congratulations to Bikie Dave and James on purchasing Miss Guided. She is in good hands (well sort of) and we are sure that she will continue to provide lots and lots of exciting adventures to her new custodians.

Nomads - BE AFRAID, VERY AFRAID LOL LOL LOL


On the local front the excitement is building for the festival this weekend. Today say the arrival of the HMB Endeavour into Bustard Bay. Lots of locals there to witness this great event.

She made quite an spectacle sailing up the coast and finally into the bay. Also, to arrive today was Ben Southall who is about to head off on his latest adventure "Worlds' Greatest Adventure" which is a kayak
trip up the inside of the Great Barrier Reef following in the footsteps of Captain Cook. He heads off on Saturday from the Festival site. Good Luck Ben.

Jayco Expanda for sale

The time has come for us to say Goodbye to Miss G. We are putting her up for sale and here are some pics for those that are interested.

A last chance to enjoy a quiet moment under the awning.

Front bedroom

Lounge and dining looking toward the front

Looking from the door past kitchen to back bed.

Slide out lounge, fridge, bathroom looking towards back bedroom

Kitchen
Pantry and storage

Second bedroom

Looking from second bedroom to the front

Shower and bathroom

She needs a good home.

All at Sea

The other day we headed out to Lady Musgrave island to do some snorkeling and what a day it was. The weather was perfect, 28 degrees, hardly a ripple on the water as you can see from the pic. Lady Musgrave is 35 klms off the coast and to see it this calm was amazing. The snorkeling was spectacular, crystal clear water with unbelievable visibility. The coral island is a national park so no fishing which means that the place is teeming with wildlife. There are several turtle spas which were working overtime with loggerheads and green turtles lining up for spa and clean. Fantastic day.

Our new security system is now in place at the gate so no one can get by during the day, I suspect it is not so effective at night LOL. Our new guards are a pair of owls that have adopted the palm tree at the bottom of our drive.

Adrian and Denise were here for Easter and Adrien took this pic of our house. Great pic.

The Boys are back

Finally we feel as if we have everything here and in place. For those that knew us at the hotel, you will know these two gentleman. It is great to finally have them up in a home where they belong. They now greet everyone as you come through the front door. Gotta love 'em.

Where else but Queensland

Perfect one day and ---- the next LOL. Well we were warned about the fickle weather at this time of the year and it is living up to its reputation LOL. Di blames me totally and says that until we moved up here Qld was always perfect -HMMMMMMMMMMMM

Pretty ordinary day today so got some painting done on the new one which is currently called "My Rock" and represents Ron in rock, well sort of : - )

Last night Mark and Caroline came to dinner and it was their first anniversary of being in Agnes, so they arrived with a bottle of Verve and one of Grange, what a way to celebrate LOL. Many drinks later and one of Ron's great Banana and Passion fruit souffle's we all called it quits and went our merry merry ways LOL.

AAAAAAAAAH yes our pool

As you can see another perfect day in paradise. We dropped into the pool the other day to take some pics for the next Sunrise newsletter and what a day it was. Not only did we get some great pics but ended up spending a couple of hours reading, swimming and generally lying around LOL. At one point we looked up above the pool and 6 sea eagles were circling around us - bliss.

There goes another one, just like all the other ones LOL

How does that song go ? I'm a lumberjack etc etc etc'. Never let a tree get in the way of Ron and a saw but in his defence it is over the fire trail. To celebrate his ability to topple almost anything on the block, he just bought a new Skihl, what will he do with that LOL.

Look what I did

It was a dull overcast day so off to the red rock we went for a fish.  The day at the rocks started very slowly with Ron on one side of Red Rock and moi on the other. An hour went by when he appeared asking if I was having any luck as he was getting not a nibble. We decided to give it another 15 minutes to see if our luck would change.

All of a sudden he appeared with a rock cod, 5 minutes later with this dart and another as big 5 minutes after that. Then my spot started to bite and I spent the next 30 minutes hauling in dart of all sizes, most of which I had to toss back as they were still in preschool. All in all a great day on the rock with the promise of a wonderful fish dinner to come.

 "I bought you a new whipper snipper" 

well that's what he said. Apparently I misunderstood and thought that it was mine, but as you can see I haven't had much of a chance to use it yet LOL.

Our newest neighbour has set up house at the China Beach club house and seems to be right at home.

OL' Friend

A big old Bloodwood which is just at the back of Sunrise. Must have been a massive tree when alive because it still dominates in death.

We're Safe

Cyclone devastation ? NO Ron and his chain saw devastation.

Thank you for all the calls about how we were fairing in the cyclone, well the good news is that Agnes Water was totally spared from any of the winds and rain. The Gods have smiled on us again. 

Just Hanging around on a lazy Sunday afternoon.

Fred the frill neck

Good Morning from Cyclone Alley

Febe has a new home. After years of hanging around hotel bars and the odd (unauthorised) excursion into the nearby neighbourhoods Febe has finally found somewhere to call home.  He is now in charge of house 2 and looks after those other two women




Those worldly women are hanging around at the other end of house 2. Not quite NYC or LA but they will get used to it. LOL

This one is for Bruce. Just thought you would like to see how our pool looks and it is about the same size that you were talking about. We find it great and use it almost every day. Also as you can see a perfect place to grow our herbs LOL.

I know I showed the Bloodwoods before but they just get better and better. Our whole block is now in flower. Over the last three days we have planted another 150 rain forest trees around the back of our block as a further fire safety measure. When they have grown in the combination of Bloodwoods and evergreens will look great - can't wait.

Not everyone thinks the big rains were a bad thing

This amorous coule are taking advantage of the time of plenty and getting into the swing of the season LOL. She would be about 40cm long and poor ol' him is only about 10cm. Talk about cougars LOL.

a little further down the track was this very very healthy looking "Lace Monitor". He/she would be 6 ft in length and looking very fat. Obviously there is alot of food around at the moment.

Even the trees are getting into the swing of the big wet. Our trees have grown heaps and bounds in the last couple of weeks. The grevillias are going crazy and as you can see the beautiful Bloodwoods are springing into flower and the birds think it's christmas all over again. The black cockies haven't shown up yet but I am sure they won't be far away.

Not everything is happy though. The ocean is a dirty brown with all the fresh water pouring into it. There are piles of driftwood coming up on the beaches after having been washed down the rivers and out to sea.

We have been told that the brown stain goes all the way to the reef, 40klms away.

The Flood,

We are well and dry but would love some fresh milk LOL. We have been isolated from the world since Christmas eve with access to Gladstone being restored last week but cut off again on Wednesday. Highway 1 has been closed at Rocky since christmas so nothing coming from the north and Gympie and Caloundra have been cut for the last week so nothing coming up from the south. Brisbane as you probably know is underwater so nothing coming from there.

and so we are steaming home 

Our room with a view, but not for much longer. As we steamed across the ditch the seas got bigger, the swell more pronounced and those ever present albatross where winging their way along with us.

One last lap around the promenade deck to say "Goodbye" to the crew in the anchor and chain area (they got to know me walking past, lap after lap) and a final look back at the land of the "Long White Cloud" and yep it was there in all it's glory.

The end

See you tomorrow with the flood update

Finally we are on the way home....

On the cruise there are two nights that are "Formal wear only" in the main restaurants and one of these nights was reserved for the trip home.  Lots of glamorous frocks (some not quite so), lots of perfume (the duty free shop must have been doing overtime) and plenty of suits for the fellas.

This fun couple we meet one day at lunch and from then on kept running into each other daily. As you can see they were getting right into the swing of the season. HO HO HO

Now I am not doing names because I haven't asked the 

 the table for permission to use the picture. Every night of the cruise we met at 7.45pm for the extravagant 5 course dinner and compulsory bottles of wine. One night I was missing (locked up in quarantine), another was seasick on the way over, but if possible we all made the effort to catch up on what each other had been up to. I think we were one of the very few tables that did this because on the first night the dining room was packed, but as the trip went on the tables split up and in the end we were usually one of the only full tables.  Our waiters were Percy and Michael and they had to put up with us every night.

A big thanks to everyone on our table for making the trip that much more enjoyable.

Milford Sound

We woke up this morning sailing through Fiordland, unfortunately the weather was not very kind to us as there was alot of very low cloud. But as we cruised up through this amazing place the cloud slowly started to lift and as we entered Milford Sound we finally got to see this wonderful place.

It was truly an amazing experience to sail in this very large ship up the sound. The waterfalls, the steep canon walls, the crystal clear water and the snow capped peaks.

Wonderful place and we would happily go back via road to be able to experience it from the inside.

Tomorrow the "Last Supper" on the way home