I WAS MILES AWAY.....

Have you seen the movie ‘The Castle’? You could smell the serenity from the porch of our farm cottage at Mystery Bay, and it didn’t smell like aeroplane fuel like in the movie.


When we got there the kids immediately went and filled the bird-table with seeds and bread. This brought the local parrots out in their droves, much to their delight.


We then went for a long walk on Billy’s Beach, were the king tides of ’74 left a gravel deposit that still sits proudly like a little mountain in the middle of the beach.



There were mullet in the shin-deep shores swimming around like flashing soup. Probably stirred up by a predatory fish a bit further offshore, and the less said about that the better I feel.


We fed the resident horses, and let their velvet noses nuzzle our necks and hands.

Blair collected some shells.


I found a knitting chair on the porch.

Then, we went inside and stoked up the fire.

Late in the afternoon, sunset came and basked us all in orange glow. Spectacular views of Mount Dromedary in the distance framed the sun as it sunk into the west horizon.

We took the boat out on the river and caught our dinner, bream and flathead taste so sweet when caught and cooked within hours, the guests in the other cottages were very jealous of us at the communal bbq.

The kids socialised with the other kids staying in some of the other cabins (co-incidentally one family lived ten minutes from our place), and the adults had a few dinners together at the communal bbq area.

Another day we visited Tilba Tilba, where we bought some cheese and browsed the wonderful arty shops – we even got some vegetables into us for lunch, and I spotted a lady knitting.


Alan and I even got away for a night to a romantic restaurant.


It was the perfect unwind and we’re all ready now for the deluge of school term 2. Back to swimming, dancing, birthday parties, homework tantrums, uniform pressing and early starts.

This term we are going to enter the untested waters of the School Bus.