Friday 20th October, 2023.

Heading towards hills smothered in a smoky haze, the reality of how dry it is really hits us. Trees look so parched that the leaves are shriveling up. The grass is becoming more crispy and crunches as you walk over it. The wildflowers are still hiding below the surface waiting for a decent dump of rain to show themselves and allow everyone to enjoy the springtime. Not even daring to turn any machinery on lest we become those city slickers who inadvertently start a fire. And this is no where near as dry as it has been in previous years. Setting up camp for the week we watch the sun set through the smoke turning the sky several shades of red then fading to pink. What a sad but beautiful sight.

It’s been seven weeks since returning to Australia after what we like to call our mid life crisis holiday of six months. (Certainly way more fun than buying a sports car!) Arriving back at our property was like a breath of fresh air. The endless space in every direction and the complete silence that envelops you at times reminded us why we love this place so much. Tending to our various fruit trees has taken up a lot of our time as has planting several more over the last few weeks. Every hole dug for each tree needs to be quite large so we can add plenty of organic matter and each tree also needs to be fenced to protect it from the very cute but naughty and hungry Wallabies. It becomes quite a long and expensive exercise but we just keep focusing on the long term and smile with delight thinking about all the fruit we will eventually be able to devour from our grove.

Mornings begin with a steaming cup of coffee whilst being entertained by the Red-necked Wallabies. Tiny joeys perform zoomies around the paddock whilst a couple of males have a play fight then just as quickly give up and go back to grazing. The resident magpies perform a sing song that seems like it is just for our benefit. Maybe it is considering I fill there water dish daily. The nights and mornings have still been quite brisk so staying tucked up in our cocoon with our coffee has become quite the ritual.

Trying to keep up with the hiking we have explored Bald Rock National Park on a couple of occasions recently. Completing the Border Track and the Bald Rock summit we enjoyed the beautiful big blue skies and scenery around us. Bald Rock is the largest granite rock in the sourthern hemisphere rising 260 metres above it’s surrounding bushland and almost 1300 metres above sea level. Whilst we may not have hiked the kilometres we were completing in Europe we did thoroughly enjoy ourselves. Girraween next week!

Evenings are spent enjoying a refreshing cold one and watching the sun slowly drop behind the hills making way for a big bright starry night. Sometimes neighbours drop in to share some laughs after a hard day and sometimes it’s just us and the jump club settling in for the evening along the creek🦘!

With the extreme dry weather and the wind and smoke the flies have definitely arrived early and in force this season. Trying not to hit ourselves in the face whilst batting away the annoying insects has become the norm at the moment. It’s time to break out the fly nets that’s for sure, in order to help keep our sanity. And it’s time to organise a shed and house plans. Whilst we have started the ball rolling in regards to quotes for a shed, ( I never thought I would be so excited to design and organise a shed😆) we are still deliberating on exactly what we will build for the house and where.🤔 But hey what’s the hurry! I’m just happy to enjoy the local traffic jams and be entertained by the wallabies every morning.

To think that literally this time last year we had mini water falls cascading through our creek and could clearly see where all the springs on the property are. Talk about the land of extremes. Come on rain!!!