It rained a bit on the drive to Newcastle and there was a car crash that stopped the traffic for almost an hour.
George and Div and Cyrus and Lara have just moved into a new house. Varsha and Lara and Laxmi played fly and learned some new card games.
We went out to dinner at the worker’s club.
We had a swim in the ocean at Rosedale and went for fish and chips in Bateman’s Bay before we drove to Canberra.
We stayed at Borka’s house. We visited Borka’s mum and dad’s house and picked some vegetables from their garden. Belle came over with a new puppy. She and Jason cooked a barbecue dinner. Mark came over after he finished work.
We went to the National Gallery and saw some new Namatjira’s and some other paintings from the Hermannsburg School.
We met up with lots of friends at Uriarra Crossing. It was hot and very nice to swim in the river.
Borka had some great old films and photos to show us. She had a ginkgo tree and we made some tea.
We stopped for lunch in Eden and saw dolphins in the ocean. We had a look at the cemetery near the beach. Lots of people had died in accidents. We thought about what a whaling town would have been like.
Cath’s house in Rosedale is lovely. We walk down to the beach and look in rock pools. Cath has lots of interesting books. We loved looking at a big book about Symbols and Rob Brown’s disrespective catalogue.
We said goodbye to Melbourne with a visit to the Acland Street cake shops. John and Varsha managed to load her armchair onto the roof.
We drove out through the Latrobe Valley and stopped to camp at the Bairnsdale Caravan Park.
Varsha finished her fairy house in Harriet’s garden. We were very pleased with how her fairy’s eye view photos turned out.
We packed up and drove to Melbourne. The Westgate Freeway had roadworks so we drove along the port road. There were big stacks of containers and a giant cruise ship.
We did some more painting with Erica then we went to meet Lou and Lucienne and Joseph at the women’s circus show. It was really inspiring for Varsha and Laxmi. The MC was especially fabulous.
We played Cobra Paw, a new game grandma and Grandpa sent home with John. It is a speed matching game.
We went to the Geelong foreshore again and slid down a grassy slope on cardboard and went swimming in the children’s pool.
We love Harriet’s new house.
