27 Jan 2010

Our Australia Day 2010

Big Skies

Big Horizons

Climbing trees

Nature study

Chuck another snag on the barbie!

Yesterday was a biggie. A goodie, but definitely a biggie.

Australia Day 2010 for us began early with BBQ brekky at the Town Hall. Eggs and bacon for Jemimah and me followed by Vegemite on toast and a good cuppa tea. Hubby added sausages and had marmalade on his toast. You can take the boy out of England, but you'll never take England out of the boy...nor get much Vegemite in...

The ceremony came next. Our local community now has some new local heroes - our Citizen of the Year, our Youth Citizen, our Sporting heroes and our Volunteers all received awards that were rightly deserved. It is the people like them that make small country towns great places to live and to bring up our children, and I felt very proud.

I was considerably more proud at the next item when my Beloved took himself up to the podium as 'Guest Speaker'. As he punned at the time, I wonder how long we will need to live here before we are considered 'Residents' and not 'Guests'?!! Sorry I have no photo, but you can read much of his speech in yesterday's post, and it was very well received. There were some serious parts to his talk too, but I dare say the funny bit was the most interesting bit, and so you haven't missed much.

Next on the agenda was coffee and cake at the local pub. I s'pose we should have been drinking beer, but somehow that didn't have much appeal at 10.00 am, although it didn't stop the table next to us for indulging in a few pots of the amber nectar. Purely for altruistic patriotic reasons, I'm sure!

Managing to drag ourselves away about an hour later we jumped into the car for a day out in the beautiful Aussie bush and a bit of our cultural heritage at this place.

Melvill’s Cave. Mt. Kooyoora, formerly the haunt of the notorious bushranger Captain Melville, c1860-1869, State Library of Victoria.

You can see some more modern photos above...and below - and read more about Kooyoora State Park here if you want to.

We walked miles...in 32°C. Drank lots of water too. There was the final satisfaction of big beautiful views, as well as slightly smaller ones as we were able to view some cicada shells up close, as well as observe some interesting bark. We even heard the cicadas sing!

Precious Daddy-Daughter time

The reward for all that exertion

Interesting twirly bark

A cicada shell

...and a close-up of an eye

Exploring Melville's Cave

Just because it is a nice pic and I like it!

Later on at home after a swim in the pool and an icecream, we chilled in the sitting room and watched Mr Magorium's Wonder Emporium on the telly. A magical movie to end a magical day.

Yep, Australia Day was a great one for us. What did you do?

11 comments:

  1. What gorgeous photos! It sounds like you had a full and wonderful day.

    By the way, how do you pronounce cicada? Is it sih-kay-duh like I say it, or sih-kah-dah like my friend from California says it, or something else altogether? Just curious.

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  2. Great pics of our beautiful country, Jeanne!
    So glad you found cicadas.
    We did the beach/ swim/ fish n' chips thing and enjoyed both a bit of cricket and tennis....on the tv...as you do.

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  3. Exactly as I said I would ~ under the fan. Gosh it's hot up here! Liddy climbed Mt Warning [just over the border] with friends, swam at Coolangatta on the way home. Silly kid. Paying for it today. ☺

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  4. Wow! What a WONDERFUL day! Thanks for sharing so I could have a peak into a great adventure.
    Happy Australia Day (belated)
    Leanne

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  5. And me too wiped out to bake some lammingtons or Anzacs.... Love those hats!

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  6. I'll bet it was so much fun to hear your beloved's speech! What a wonderful family day and a big thank you for sharing those hard-earned views.

    We snuggled up with Cuddlepot and Snugglepie.

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  7. Hey Jeanne...love the clouds, love the bush, love the family, love the cicada's! What a beautiful family day! xxx

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  8. What a busy Australia Day! I like the photo of exploring the cave, the silhouette looks quite Indianna Jones like....! Hope your adventures in there were not too much like one of his lol.

    We mananged breakfast in Mildura at the Old Mildura Homestead and then back here to a friend's house for a good ol' Aussie BBQ complete with backyard cricket, yellow and green zinc and a swim in their pool.

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  9. Your cicadas are not quite as ummm... physically unappealing as our locusts. :)
    It sounds like a fun day!

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  10. Australia day was our wedding anniversary. We had a quiet day at home and then Steve and I went out for tea.

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  11. Hi Jeanne,
    What spectacular photos of our wide brown land, which wasn't very brown in your photos.

    Now, don't tell me that you're still climbing trees???

    Have a great week,
    Blessings,
    Jillian

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