Christmas Letter 2022

It was quite sad and a little unsettling to watch my car being towed away at 8:00am the next morning.

It was not until we opened the curtains in our room that we fully appreciated why the word "waterfront" was included in the name of the motel. If we had been any closer, we would have been IN Lake Albert!

We had plenty of time to enjoy the bird life while waiting for Ian.

During our stroll to the town to find some lunch, we found this ostrich. It commemorates South Australia's one and only true bush ranger, John Francis Pegotty (1864 – 1899). Can you work out his mode of transport?

Ian duly arrived later in the afternoon and somehow we managed to get all our luggage into his car for the trip to Adelaide. Thanks, once again, for coming to our aid, Ian. We really did appreciate it! We were given a very nice Hyundai Sante Fe at the airport. This suited us very well for the rest of our time in Adelaide, the trip back to Melbourne, and the several weeks that went by before I was finally able to collect my car from the repairers. It was very easy to drive and had several features new to me such as Lane Keeping Assist which, as the name suggests, kept your car in the current lane. If driving with Cruise Control, the car automatically braked if the car in front slowed down, and automatically sped up again if the car in front had done so. Amazing!

Our accommodation for the next 8 nights was at a comfortable Airbnb home in Victor Harbor. We thoroughly enjoyed our time in Adelaide, some of it shared with Ian. Highlights were: The Victor Harbor Horse-Drawn Tram, Urimbilla Wildlife Park, Ingalalla Falls, Rapid Bay Jetty, Waterfall Gully, Cleland Wildlife Park, some photos of each of these places will be found below.

Having almost finished completing the new Victor Harbor-Granite Island Causeway (very solid concrete), works were going ahead to remove the old one (a much more "romantic" wooden construction).

Ingalalla Falls

The old wooden jetty at Rapid Bay has also been replaced with a shorter concrete design.

It was not too hard to see why the old jetty had to be replaced.

Rapid Bay Jetty is a world-renowned diving site.

Satoshi with a new friend at Urimbilla Wildlife Sanctuary.

Just a few guinea pigs!

The opportunity to pat a koala was part of the admission fee at Urimbilla! As there were only two other people in the enclosure at the time, we could stay as long as we liked.

At Waterfall Gully with Ian

This koala at Cleland wildlife Park had a very contented sort of look!

A Regent Parrot

This koala was a little more active!

We had to pay a little extra for the privilege but we were able to hold a koala at Cleland Wildlife Park. They are SO heavy!

The picturesque town of Strathalbyn boasts a particularly beautiful church. I had seen and photographed the exterior of St Andrew's Uniting Church (was Presbyterian) on several trips but had never been inside. We hatched a cunning plan to achieve this - we would attend a Sunday Service. We duly set off from Victor Harbor on a Sunday. When we arrived, it seemed like our plan had been thwarted - the congregation was filing into the church hall instead of the church! We decided to give it a miss. As we headed back to the car, we noticed that one of the church doors was open. At that point, a gentleman came back to his car which was parked near ours and began a conversation. When I heard that he was an official of the church, I asked why the church was not being used for the service. The answer was that the heaters were broken and it was a lot warmer in the hall! We asked if we could see inside the church but he said he didn't have time to show us. When I mentioned that one of the doors of the church was open, he was surprised and asked us to show him which door. We took him to the door and we were allowed inside! It has to be said that the interior of the building does not really match the grandeur of the exterior but at least I could tick something off my "bucket" list!

St Andrew's Uniting Church, Strathalbyn

The older part of Strathalbyn has a number of antique shops and museums to cater for tourists. We visited Gilbert's Motor Museum which houses a large number of cars, all of which have been beautifully restored.

We arranged to meet Jeanette, a long time friend and ex-Melburnian at Hahndorf and enjoyed sharing lunch with her at one of the many restaurants.

Old Tailem Town is an incredible collection of historical buildings (more than 100) all of which are literally crammed full of "stuff". We spent almost a whole day wandering around and still didn't see it all. The town is owned by a gentlemen in his 80s and he has no hope of maintaining it properly. As a result, everything is becoming very run down. This is disappointing because the collection is, I think, of great interest. The cliche "it has to be seen to be believed" is very apt for this place! I took hundreds of photos and, once again, it was a difficult task to choose just a few to include here.

The motto seems to be "why have only one of something when you can have ten or more"?

An attempt at an artistic bicycle photo. Again, note the quantity!

The general store

This brought back memories of the free milk in schools program. I can well remember having to drink milk that had been left outside on warm days! Apparently the scheme was first suggested by Robert Menzies. The program was abolished by the Whitlam Government in 1973.

The exterior walls of this house are made of cow dung!

Apparently, when tar was first used to seal roads, farmers would flatten the tins with the steam rollers and make use of them for the walls of buildings.

Never have just one of anything!

We had a floor polisher exactly like this in my childhood home. The orange disc was a light. Underneath there were three brushes which could be easily removed so that different kinds could be used according to the task being undertaken.

You think this is a lot of different kinds of barbed wire? This is only a tiny part of the collection at Old Tailem Town! Who knew there were different kinds of barbed wire anyway?

I disapprove of traps such as these, but the quantity of them!! Note the condition of the railway carriage in the background. If you are thinking about visiting Old Tailem Town, my advice is to not leave it too long!

One does not walk around Monarto Safari Park. It is billed as "the largest safari park outside Africa" and this is probably correct. There is a bus which takes you to the different sections and, in same cases, drives right through the enclosure. The size of these enclosures, while being great for the animals, is quite limiting for viewing or photographing. The highlight of the visit was "Lions 360". In this experience, one is inside a cage within the lion enclosure. The lions are attracted to the cage by the use of pieces of meat. It was a wonderful way to get closer to lions than I ever had before. We were warned, however, of the possibility of being peed on!

It was a requirement to wear a mask during "Lions 360".

The words "you might get peed on" are not often foremost in my mind, but they were at this moment!

This lioness was "hiding" behind this tree. The bus was between her and another lion. As the bus passed, she pounced on the other lion! It seems that cats are the same regardless of their size.

Clayton Farm Heritage Museum is located near Bordertown. We could not find whether or not it would be open and so we phoned. The President told us a lady would meet us at the gate. Once again, we had a private tour. This lady had been associated with the town and the farm since she was a child. She appeared to be around 70 and she knew everything and everyone! Everything was explained in great detail and she was able to answer all our questions. The history of the farm was fascinating and it is well worth a visit.

The Homestead

This bag was made by weaving a number of shoelaces together!

We had a concrete trough like this at home but it was a set of two rather than three.

The silage barn was where feed for the cattle was kept.

This trough was made by hollowing out a log and then adding each end.

Inside the barn

We admired the Silo Art at Kaniva

Serviceton has a population of 120 and a huge railway station. This is because the states of Victoria and South Australia had different railway gauges (the distance between each track on a railway line). South Australia had standard gauge (4 ft 8 1⁄2 inches) and Victoria had broad gauge (5ft 3 inches). This meant that all passengers and all goods had to change trains on the border. Serviceton Station was where this happened. It was in use for almost 100 years (1889 - 1981). We arrived at the station and nobody was around. After a while, a rather rough looking man came over and just stood near us. I was a little unsettled by his unexplained presence so I asked him if he knew whether there were tours of the station available. "Yeah, I can show yous around" was his drawled response. Whereupon a large bunch of keys was retrieved from his pocket and he opened the front door and spent the next hour or so showing us every aspect of the station. At its height, it included a kitchen for customers' refreshments, dining area, ladies closet and waiting areas, booking rooms for Victoria and South Australia, general waiting areas and a customs office. In the basement were large cellars for storage, guard areas, a mortuary for bodies being shipped across the border and a lock-up which was used for prisoners who were being transported interstate. We were shown all these aspects of the building and also the small flat for the use of the Station Master. We found out that this gentlemen lives in the town and took over custodianship of the station because "there was nobody else to do it". He was full of knowledge about the building and his love of the place was palpable. I was reminded of the saying "Never judge a book by its cover."

All stations should be equipped with a piano!

I'm pretty sure this item would not be for sale anywhere now. I remember it from my childhood though!

On our way through Nhill, we stopped at the Australian Pinball Museum. This is a collection of about 50 pinball machines, the earliest from 1931. It was possible to play most of them for $1.

Note the "flippers" on the driveway!

The oldest machine at the museum

The Giant Koala at Dadswell's Bridge was almost a casualty of the 2020 bushfires.

Our last zoo visit for this holiday was to the Halls Gap Zoo. This is another well-run wildlife park and it has a wide range of animal species.

The first wattle of 2022 (for me anyway)

A Currawong

I can remember these amusements well. They were in shopping centres in my childhood and required a sixpence to operate! How amazing to find one at Halls Gap Zoo!

We chose to do the meerkat "experience" at this zoo. It was great!

A lovely rainbow, seen from the township of Halls Gap.

Towards the end of May, our Director of Music at St.John's, Lachlan McDonald, went on leave. We were without an official Director of Music until August when James Leitch, who is visiting from England, was appointed for the rest of the year. James has fitted in with the choir and organists really well. Having been an organ scholar at Carlisle Cathedral, he knows his "stuff" but leads with encouragement, gentleness and sensitivity. Satoshi and I took James and his fiancée, Caroline, to Phillip Island for a day. As we chose to go on Thursday, 22nd September (the beginning of a long weekend) we found that a LOT of other people had the same idea so it took quite a while to get there. We visited the Koala Sanctuary (where we found James had a great skill for spotting koalas before anyone else), Pyramid Rock, and the Penguin Parade. It was fortunate that I had booked for this as all the tickets were sold by the time we arrived. I assisted James to catalogue all the choral music at St.John's. This was a bigger task than we thought and took many hours to complete. I enjoyed spending time with him because of our common interest in Anglican Church Music.

James and Caroline

Our second Steamrail event this year was a train ride to Ballarat. The train was hauled by two steam locomotives, and Russell, Linton, Satoshi and I enjoyed our time together in one of Steamrail's old-style carriages with a corridor down one side and individual compartments. After a very nice lunch at a local pub, it was time to make our way back to Ballarat Station for the journey home.

My friend Chris Hepworth celebrated her 70th birthday this year and Barbara McSkimming, Prue Field and I treated her to lunch at Cloudehill Gardens in Olinda. We met each other through teaching at Chatham in the middle 90s and the friendship has endured. We had a lovely lunch and then wandered around the beautiful gardens.

Prue, Tim, Barbara and Chris

Musically, I enjoyed a variety of concerts. These included MSO concerts where the orchestra played the music during the showing of a film: "Fantasia" and "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1". The MSO chorus sang Rossini's "Messe Solennelle" at the Melbourne Recital Centre. Other choral concerts included Mendelssohn's "St.Paul" and Haydn's "The Creation". The Gilbert & Sullivan Society put on a concert at a private garden in Sassafras called "Come into the Garden, Maud". This included a number of old Victorian Songs and was most enjoyable. The musicals "Cinderella", "A Christmas Carol" and "The Phantom of the Opera" were all great (the last being an indoor production at Melbourne's State Theatre, not the one in Sydney!). There was an organ recital given by Thomas Heywood in the Melbourne Town Hall to celebrate the organ's 150th birthday. It was also a pleasure to attend several concerts in which Jenny's and Darryl's grandson, Ben, participated. Ben plays the oboe and has been studying music at Monash University.

Very sadly, I had to say goodbye to my lovely cat, Min, on October 10th. She was over 17 years old which is a pretty good innings for a cat. I was, of course, very upset about her passing. Her main objective in life (apart from eating) was to sit on my lap. She loved nothing more than sitting there while I watched TV or DVDs and she slept on my bed almost every night. It's easy to say "Oh, she was only a cat" but she was really part of the family. She had been gradually failing (from kidney disease) for several months so it was not a sudden shock when she needed to be put down but the final parting was still very difficult. Because she hated going the vet, the vet came to our house and Min passed from this life laying on my lap in familiar surroundings.

My favourite photo of Min as a kitten

Min in 2014

The last photo of Min, a little over a week before she died.

After about a month, I began to think about a new kitten. A search of pet adoption websites was fruitless. I found an advertisement for kittens at a pet shop (on behalf of an adoption agency). I visited the shop and found some lovely black and white kittens together with a sign that read "No further applications for adoption will be received". Asking at the counter, I found that there had been 100 applications for those 5 kittens! Oh dear. A little while later, we heard that one of Satoshi's sister's cats had had a kitten but that they were going to keep it. A little while passed and then we heard that they had decided not to keep it. We made the trip to Chisato's place in Melton on Saturday 19th November. I decided that the little kitten would certainly "do"!

The first meeting with Fudge

Two weeks later, we made another trip to Melton, this time bringing Fudge home. She has been very confident and curious since the moment she arrived. Butterscotch, on the other hand, was not so sure - there was a bit of hissing at first. We kept them separate for a while, then gradually allowed them to see each other a little more each day. After about a fortnight, they got on very well. Now, there are just a few hisses from Butterscotch when Fudge jumps on her (fair enough, I'd say!)

Fudge learning to use the iPad

Fudge has grown a lot in the month we have had her. She was born on the 20th August so she is four months and two weeks old as of 6th January. As you can see at the top right of this photo, the curtains have suffered a bit!

The end of 2022 did not turn out as expected at all. I tested positive to COVID (for the first time) on Tuesday, 13th December. Fortunately, although I had most of the classic symptoms, they were mild. Unfortunately, I missed out on a lot of teaching and many of the “end of year” functions at school. It took until Wednesday, 21st December for the RAT to return a negative result.