Bacon and Eggs for breakfast, good company. Now if only my parents had good coffee, it would be perfect!
Spent the morning in Bungendore, visiting one of my favourite shops/galleries, the Bungendore Wood Works Gallery. If only we had the money to buy the pieces that we like… and the mansion to display them!
A quick visit to a winery that I’ve been meaning to go to for years, Lark Hill didn’t have any larks in evidence. If there were any, they’d been blown into the ocean by the wind over the vines. Its only 2km from my parents’ house, so after eight years it was about time to visit and sample its wares!
Then donning our disguises, Joey and I drove around Canberra for the afternoon pretending to be tourists. There was an icy cold wind howling through the trees, so sitting in the car in the sunny spots was quite enjoyable. Felt bizarre to be visiting places I hadn’t seen for years, we drove up the street where I lived from 1969 to 1983 to look at the house, so many things the same, but also some changes. The huge old gum tree was cut down, the garden turned from a semi-jungle to a flat English-style lawn.
From the top of Black Mountain we leant into the wind and laughed at the fiction coming from the security staff. According to the security staff there is an incredible danger of dishes and aerials dropping like autumn leaves from the tower, while there seems to be no problem with the general public walking past equally high buildings in the centre of any city. Here is my somewhat cynical version: Prior to building the Telecom Tower, the trees around the carp-ark were trimmed down, and dotted around the place were sundial thingies pointing to places of interest, the view from the top was excellent and many tourists and locals drove up there to look around. Once the tower was opened you could wander around its base for free, roughly two stories off the ground, or pay an entry fee to go up to the observation deck to see the sites. Simultaneously, the trees were allowed to grow up and block the view from ground level. A little while later the base was cordoned off, citing “safety reasons”. The more cynical might wonder how many tourists were making use of the free view. Now there is a sign stating that the entire concourse is a hard-hat area (which must be a pain for the staff there), all except for the entrance way where paying tourists come in!
