The old sandstone
buildings are being restored, the botanical gardens are pretty (I loved the
Japanese garden and huge golden bamboo), and we now sit in the Rockhampton Art Gallery
sipping coffee and indulging our lap top caprice.
(Jett, by the way, has gone
and bought his own ticket for the local Eisteddfod in the next building. He
wants to be an entertainer and dreams of the time when he too will be standing
in front of a crowd doing something or rather –Albert thinks he’ll be a
transvestite of Pricilla proportions, and I think he’ll be Fredrick of The
Sound of Music, but probably he’ll end up being the ticket boy, which is not a
bad thing considering he’ll be able to watch everyone else with very little
effort on his own behalf.)
Thank you to the
Art Centres!!
I would like to
say a HUGE impressed THANK YOU to the Arts Centres of Rockhampton (our friendly
and helpful volunteer Lana Webber) and Mackay (our endearing local artist was
Susan Gee) for being civil and gracious when other aspects of the city are
not. They offer FREE (especially good
for budget conscious and raining day tours) exhibitions, coffee and rooms to
sit and read and enjoy what they have to offer. The subtle hint of a donation
is presented before your eyes (discreetly), amid smiles and good will. Much appreciated for the practical appeal on a
rainy day (did I mention that it was raining) and for uplifting our spirits in
an age of self interest and you get what you pay for.
Botanical Garden
Demonstrations
While we were in
our rain suits tramping around the Botanical gardens, we noticed the movement
of small people towards the ANZAC memorial. It happened to be ‘Under Eights
Week’. Jett, forgetting himself in the confusion of balloons, face painting and
candy give aways (beside the Dental Health Stall) was in finger painting
heaven. Albert laughed at the mothers
taking over the art of their children while I stood outside the crown-making
pavilion giving anti-monarchy speeches to any child who’d listen. (Parents
quickly pushed passed me but the kids were listening I swear!!!) We all had a fun time before moving onto the
rather sad and sorry ‘zoo’ where we had our first spotting of koalas (since
Noosa in April) and saw nicely fatted dingos drooling over nearby and
unreachable black swans. I won’t go into the debate of animals kept in
captivity, but it was rather a dismal experience which was not helped any by
the rain.
The spider
display surprised us by being dead spiders in bottles and pinned to boards
behind glass. Our mistake in that one!
Sleeping in the
street
During the last
two nights, we’ve slept outside Catholic churches. Its funny, or not, but
always on the other side of the street, there’s a pub. Jett enjoyed the choir practice during the
early part of the evenings, and the karaoke that started up later on. Fun and
games for everyone.
Final remarks
We’re in the last
leg of our trip.
We hit the 7 000
k mark just outside Rocky.
Jett has
impressed us by being friendly and outgoing and conversing with anyone who has
the time to listen.
I’ve had the
final (I think) vision of what I need to spend the next part of my life doing
(more about this later) but I’m VERY happy with everything so far.
The trip has been
great and absolutely what I needed to do, but I’m happy to be coming back to
‘civilization’ and my mother who is cooking for us as I type. After so much
information and experience, I need time to gather and sort and squeeze and
dream.
I have some ideas
for the ‘final posts’ that I want to write, but I guess we won’t be
ambassador’s by the time I get around to doing them. But that’s ok. Remember to
come back and have a little look see so you can see the finishing touches of
our trip.
Thank you for the
music, the song I’m singing….. (do you know that two lines of the lyrics to
this fatuous song say ‘I’ve always been the lucky one, with the golden hair’
(or something like this – and Cindi, if you know the REAL lyrics, I’m grateful
to your help for correction).
I’m just updating
some of our trip – and there hasn’t been a lot to say from there to here
(Glastone, 1770, Bundaberg) because its
been raining NON stop for two days. It was to be my little beach haven and
we’ve had to give it up and just drown like rats instead.
Next stop – Tin
can bay and the dolphins
