Earthrace visit .......

The international environmental boat "Earthrace" visited Warrnambool over the Australia Day long weekend. We took Hughie down to have a look over it and thought that Ben & Chloe might be interested. A short phone call later, and Tim brought them down for a tour.

The vessel itself is smaller - both in height and width - compared to what I expected, but it is spectacular. A bit gimicky, I think but very unusual. They should paint if black and hire it out for the next Batman movie - it would make an ideal Batm'boat. Or, alternatively, for the next James Bond movie.

I shudder to think how I would go in it on a long voyage - very cramped inside. I imagine it would get swealtering down below in warmer weather.

Notwithstanding all the above, a very worthwhile visit as it is certainly something "different".

The Carnival is over .......

As mentioned in the previous entry, we have been to the Warrnambool Seaside carnival at Lake Pertobe. Had to rug up a bit as the breeze was quite chilly, but that didn't manage to put a dampener on things.

Started out with something fairly sedate - a mini truck ride and then on to a couple of jumping castles - one based on the Cars movie and one on Jurassis Park. The Cars one probably proved the more popular as it had a couple of good slides.

From there we moved on to the Dodgem Cars - certainly a favourite with Ben who seems to have some very good, natural driving skills. This was special, however, as he and Chloe shared the car. You could see that they both loved it - Ben because he was doing the big brother bit and Chloe because she was able to share the moment with him.

Played a few of the sideshow "skill" games to no great success - they won a few little trinkets, but enjoyed the challenges. Ben then wanted to try the "Rocket" ride, so Chloe went on the mini-train ride. She got the best of it here as Ben got a bit jittery in the confines of the rocket, so we gave it a miss, even managing to get a refund for our troubles. Congratulations to the "Carny" running it, he was very understanding (well, very is an overstatement, but it didn't take too much convincing for him feel some compassion).

The Bungy-jump trampolines were the next attraction. Both are used to something similar as they have a trampoline in the back yard. But, with an attendant assisting and with the benefit of safety straps they were able to let it all 'hang loose'. Gained some great height and although it's the most expensive attraction there, they get quite a long time on the apparatus. Chloe proved to be a bit light in weight to gain really big bounces without help. Both definately looked as though they were trying to enter the stratosphere though.

Finished off with one last go on the Dodgems. Turned out we had a spare token after they announced that the last run was about to start, so we got Hughie on board. I must admit, between myself and the Ben/Chloe cars, Hughie came in for a bit of a pasting - in between Ben/Chloe and myself trying to take each other out.

We were out of there about 10.30pm and heading for home. Thankfully no school the next day.

Home grown roller-coaster ...........

We were planning to go to the Warrnambool foreshore carnival for a bit of entertainment - mainly for you know who, plus Ben & Chloe.

Chloe decided she didn't want to wait, so set up her version of a roller-coaster in the back patio. Chairs for everyone including the safety bar across the front. Those of you familiar with the old Red Faces programme may find the attached picture reminiscent of the Australian Bob-sled Team act that scored so well on one of the early series.

At the given word, off it went. Throwing the passengers to and fro and up and down as it looped through its course. About the wildest ride we've ever been able to get Robbie on.

We can only hope there will be something as exciting at the carnival itself.

Myth-Ben-sters ............

Ben is an avid fan of Mythbusters and thought he would try out one of the Myths for himself.

He borrowed two local phone books (don't worry, I won't damage them! Yeah, sure, we thought - remembering back to when a young Adrian or Lorelle might have said something similar) Anyway, he proceeded with the labourious task of interleaving all the pages in the two books. Next step was to see if the myth was true or not.

"See if you can separate these two books" he challenged. Well, we all tried. Not even two strapping, strong adult men like Hughie and myself could get those books to even move a millimetre apart. Didn't matter how hard we pulled, no success.

Well done, Ben. MYTH CONFIRMED

Now all we need is for someone to separate them using the "un-interleaving" method. Then we can start looking up numbers again (at least I can use the white pages on the net until then)

Who said Big Brother was finished ......

Got a surprise phone call on Thurs 15 Jan - Hughie, Robbie's eldest brother wanted to visit for a while. He arrived Saturday afternoon, having spent a bit of time with other brother, Bruce.

Sunday, we did a bit of a tour around the traps and went on the Warrnambool Boat Cruise's short voyage along the Hopkins River. Very peaceful and really shows off some of the newer developments happening along the shores of the river. Took in the breakwater and Thunder Point - of course had to locate the trotting and greyhound tracks (I think they plan to go to the dogs on Wednesday - Robbie, of course, went to the dogs years ago).

Monday, we played 18 holes of golf at the Deakin Uni course. Modesty prevents me from saying who won, but I was quite pleased with my efforts considering I probably haven't hit a golf ball in anger for five years.

He will be staying for a little while, so I can use the opportunities that part-time work provide to show him more of the sights around the district. Will probably have another hit of golf or two.

Life begins at 40 ...........

Subtitled: You only get 20 years for murder

Yes, we celebrated the big 40 years of wedded bliss on Jan 11th. We scrapped giving cards and presents for Anniversaries some years ago, opting instead to simply go out and have a nice meal together.


We chose Breakers Restaurant for this occasion as we have been there a couple of times before and have found it to be very pleasant. Things didn't start off really well when we found that they hadn't reserved a table in the desired location for us (organised, so I thought, at time of booking) but that was the only glitch. The food and service was up to the usual standard so no cause for complaint on that score. They have a good reputation for seafood and it is well deserved. Robbie strayed from her usual fare and chose the steak which was also excellent. Wrapped up around 9-ish so we then went home and shared a bottled of Penfolds Salenger - a bit up-market and more expensive that we normally have, but worth the extra.

Christmas/New Year 2008 .........

It's been a while since I made a post to the blog, but then things have been pretty quiet. Enjoying the part-time work which is enough to keep our heads above water. This change in lifestyle has led into the Christmas period very nicely and being a quiet time of year for the type of work I am doing has meant for a very relaxed time.

Adrian and Chrissy spent the Christmas week in Perth with her family, so we had our big Christmas day on the preceding weekend. As will be seen by the photo, lots of presents, although things aren't quite what they seem - no we're not that flushed with funds that we personally bought out every store in the district. Ben & Chloe got into the spirit of things by wrapping lots of little trinkets to be given out on the day and this swelled the pile of gifts under the tree. It was a great day and just about every present hit its mark.

On the Monday, we did the usual Christmas lights tour. Much the same as past years, but still some fantastic displays that had Ben & Chloe gasping. One difference, and big improvement, was that I programmed the tour into my SatNav and then just followed instructioons (could be a first for me!). Although I know the streets fairly well, it did make things much easier, alleviating the need to constantly look for street signs - very handy given the amount of traffic that was obviously following a similar route to ours.

One of our better New Year's Eve celebrations then concluded the "season". Lorelle, Ben, Chloe, Berty Boy, Lilly, Robert (Lilly's son - boy has he grown - fair bursting out of his seams, he will have his head in the stratosphere if he gets any taller), Rod & Gwen all contributed to a relaxed, entertaining and great night. No wheel chair in sight but Lorelle opted for tricycle racing. All it needed was the Hutchies and the competition would have really been on. Wonderwoman brought things under control again and we settled back into some gentle imbibing and lively discussion. Could hear a few fireworks in the area around midnight, but didn't see any lighting up the neighbourhood.