We are living in Australia for 12 months. Before leaving the UK we held a party at our house in Chailey
No sooner had we arrived than it was Steve's birthday.
The office
Monday 23rd January saw Ruby and Olivia's first day at their schools
There is loads of wildlife around here. In our garden we have seen several lizards - here are two -
plus this brush turkey.
There have been lots of parties at Glenda's house - they've got a pub under their house!
We spent the week before Easter at Noosa, going to the beach every day and finishing off with a visit to Australia Zoo, which is owned by Steve Irwin, of crocodile hunter fame.
For the ANZAC Day long weekend we went to Sydney
We spent a day at Katoomba in the Blue Mountains. The scenery is fantastic. We went to the Three Sisters - the more intrepid of us (Steve, Steve and Olivia) ventured down to the little bridge connecting them to the main cliff. You can just see it on the second photo. There is a really steep staircase all the way down to the ground (we only went as far as the bridge!)
At the beginning of June, Steve's Mum and Dad arrived for a five-week holiday in Australia. Apart from a week in Melbourne, they spent the whole time with us. We arranged various little trips for us as two of the weeks coincided with the school winter holiday. We also arranged a horse-riding lesson for Olivia (part of her Christmas present from Grandma and Grandad!)
The first trip was to Moreton Island, an hour's boat ride from Brisbane, where we stayed in a beach front "unit"
We hand-fed dolphins, had a go at archery and went sand-toboganning.
We went snorkelling - the wrecks were scuttled here deliberately to provide a reef for coral to grow and attract lots of fishes. Unfortunately Dad nearly got washed out to sea and had to be rescued by a man in a motor boat, so he and Mum didn't make it to the wrecks. Olivia got there but was frozen (her wet-suit didn't fit very well) so she came straight back. But Steve, Steve and Ruby got some good views of the masses of fish.
Next on the agenda was a three-day guided eco-tour in this bus. We came face-to-face with a baby python at Daisy Hill., and with a somewhat larger one at the Bearded Dragon, Tamborine.
We saw some wild kangaroos, went to several rainforests, went platypus-spotting (not all of us actually saw one!) and saw some dolphins at Fingal. We also went to Fleay's wildlife centre.
We stayed for three nights at Palm Beach on the Gold Coast. We went to Byron Bay (Australia's most easterly point) and saw dolphins swimming in the surf, and went to Seaworld (loads more dolphins of course) where we also went on this tame-looking ride. It wasn't tame!
We went to the beach, did a spot of fishing
I simply had to include this picture - I always thought there was something fishy about their beer! (For the uninitiated, "green" means "raw")
In September we had a picnic lunch by the river then waited for nightfall, when we witnessed one of the best firework displays I have ever seen. The whole thing was finshed off by two F1-11 fighter jets passing low overhead whilst dumping burning fuel. There is a movie file you can download here but be warned - it is 9MB.
We had an outmeeting-style BBQ for them.
This month it is 20 years since we (Steve and Deirdre) met so we went away for a couple of days without the kids! We stayed at a fabulous B&B at Yandina called Ninderry Manor where the proprietors cook delicious Japanese food. This is the view from out breakfast table. On the Saturday night we went to the nearby Spirit House restaurant which was equally delicious and very atmospheric.
This is the way to watch cricket - on the big screen at South Bank. This was the first day of the Brisbane test - Ruby and Steve went to the 'Gabba for the third and fourth days.
We had another week at the Gold Coast. We went to Seaworld (again), to the top of Q1, which is the 20th tallest building in the world, and the tallest residential building, and we went horse-riding near Tamborine.