A Shorrolds Christmas

It's become tradition for a Shorrolds reunion every Christmas...

We did a pre-Christmas pizza fest then Christmas morning some champagne and mince pies.

Our Cunnamulla Fella

Before you make the rabbit stew you've got to catch the rabbit, he would chant as he spent hours and hours teaching Ryan and I to ride. How many city kids knew three ways to hold the reigns on a horse bridle, to check inside their boots for snakes, how to shoot an airgun or boil a billy tea? How many city kids had pulled a calf from the pregnant cow tied about the 4WD? Well not me, but Ryan did.

With our Cunnamulla Fella it was dinner in front of Frank and Kay from Channel 7 news, a quick kip before a comeback later for the evening movie. After dinner in our pjs and slippers, we'd stomp happily through the damp grass, torches in hand, hunting for the horses to treat them to their evening biscuit. Morning runs in the ute or the jackeroo for papers and scratchies were ritual. Always a scratchie, one for all four of us. Over morning cuppas we would all laugh over our meagre luck, $15 was probably our biggest win, but in the bigger picture weren't we lucky.

Our Cunnamulla Fella was tough as nails and soft at heart. If he said we could do something, then we could do it. On horseback staring down a steep and sandy descent that would take us splashing across the river - he said we could do it, so ok who were we to doubt it, and we did it. I thought I was the Man from Snowy River on a grand adventure.

Bushman's treatments for the order of the day. Sharp words were only once traded and it was the day I'd had enough of sitting over the boiling hot bowl of steam and eucalyptus with a tea towel wrapped around my head, he wouldn't let me stop until my asthma let up, and you know what, it bloody well worked. 'Course it bloody did' he would grin.

We know the Cunnamulla Fella was a horseman through and through, but whether it was a running race at QE2, a soccer game at Mitchy or softball games from Brisbane to Toowoomba, he and Nana were there.

He'd come to the phone - 'Renee or Ryan of the Overflow' he would slowly say as his greeting. The 'Over and Out' when it was time to wrap up. Always a cap or a hat, always a leather belt, even if it was to hold his trackies up!

Our Cunnamulla Fella battled back from illnesses and ailments, like a cat with nine lives, and he was in our lives longer and larger than we could have ever hoped for. Even in hard times we would laugh. Whether he was telling us that Nana could only get the token role of triangle player in the church choir so they didn't have to hear her sing, or when we were talking about the vegetable garden he was looking after at the village. 'Looks great Pa,' I would say 'Cool you are doing that' - 'Yeah,' he said. Then 'No, not really, it's pretty shit'...and we both just laughed..and of course there were the politically incorrect moments when his dark sense of humour would emerge, you know those times you know you shouldn't be laughing, but it's just too funny.

And now our Cunnamulla Fella has said bye for now, and he's back on his beloved Bessie, and out droving with the boys...

From Clancy of the Overflow

Clancy's gone a droving 'down the Cooper' where the Western drovers go
As the stock are slowly stringing, Clancy rides behind them singing
For the drover's life has pleasures that the townsfolk never know

And the bush hath friends to meet him, and their kindly voices greet him
In the murmur of the breezes and the river on its bars
And he sees the vision splendid of the sunlit plains extended
And at night the wonderous glory of the everlasting stars.

Cinque Terre

Chris and I have just come back from Cinque Terre (5 lands), Italy. Was a great few days of walking, walking and walking (it's 300 steps up to one town alone), eating REAL seafood pasta and calamari and just enjoying a glass of wine while soaking up beautiful views. Also, I love people watching in Italy. I could just watch Italians talk to each other, and go about their daily business all day. They are just so colourful and animated and they love the simple, good things in life... The place we stayed was awesome, and we were surrounded by vineyards, in which the locals were working hard getting in the grapes for next year's vintage...

Also a highlight was Trattoria dal Billy where I enjoyed the best Italian food I've had. Billy himself was a highlight, but the menu was amazing. Chris doesn't really love seafood, but at the recommendation of the lovely Italians sitting next to us we shared a squid ink seafood pasta which even Chris loved, which I think shows how fresh the seafood is if even a non-seafood lover is impressed. We sat here waiting out a pretty wicked storm, watching the lightning crack over the vineyards. The place was full of characters, including one of the waiters/owners - when I asked him if he was the brother of the owner of our room, he said 'yes, bastard' and never came back and served us again! I kept seeing him around town and hiding from him after that...guess you had to be there for that to seem funny, but it was!

Near Riomaggiore train station - no need for a car, just the train and your walking shoes

Manarola main street

The equivalent of the Saturday morning sausage sizzle in Monterrosso

View from Aria Di Mare where we stayed, in Manarola, the second of the five villages

With a balcony like this, no need to go out...


Looking back to Manarola


Manarola is carved into a hillside rock and is supposedly the oldest of the five towns

There are heaps of walking trails around the Cinque Terre and most of them uphill; my calves felt like knives were digging in some days!


Also heard so many Aussies on the trail - most Aussies I've ever heard on one of our trips. That Getaway story must have worked...


And Bulli insisted on exploring off trail - you can see him in the green shirt. This was after he got up a bit tangled up in the scrub below when he went off the beaten track. I had to use my zoom to try and find him...

Up among the vines. We bumped into our host Maurizio up here. The locals work so hard in the vineyards. One stormy night we could see the torches of three people up on the hill working late in to the night...

A wave from Chris from the top of the tower in Vernazza, town number 3

View near the Convent in Monterrosso

Up in the hills, way above the walking track

Local wine and snacks from a lovely wine bar and garden

From a park on the point in Manarola

Vernazza

A walk before the storm

You can dive into the swimming hole this way...

Or this way...

From Riomaggiore to Manarola is the via dell'amore (love path). There is a path where people have written love message in graffiti in the old tunnel, or something that has been added since I was there five years ago are the padlocks to symbolise love, romance etc etc

Our lovely balcony at Aria Di Mare, seriously one of the best places I stayed in terms of views, value, location, everything...

Saturday stroll

We had no plans on Saturday so we decided it would be good to get out of town and take to the hills. An hour on a train out of Victoria and we were in a little town called Lewes ready for a 23k walk. Lewes is a cute little market town famous for its castle, and the Battle of Lewes that led to England's first parliamentary meeting at Westminster in 1265. Anyway, we weren't there to explore Lewes, more the rolling hills of the South Downs. Click here to read more about the path we took.

The weather was a little cloudy and very windy as we marched across the top of the downs to an ancient fort. We stopped and talk to a local who pointed out some peregrine falcons gliding through the sky. As we walked on there were plenty of sheep and cows, the local cricket match was on, and people were stretched out on the grass of a local beer garden. The Sprout Society was having a raffle - can't say I've ever heard of a sprout society before! We stopped for a ploughman's lunch at a lovely little tea house and then carried on to the hills again. There was a stretch of man made canal that was a little boring, but the sight of Lewes castle came into view again about 6 hours later from when we started out, as did the sun, and by then the beer was calling...

Brick Lane

Tim is in town for the cricket and it's been a while since we saw Ben and Ara. Now that Ben has left his 'hood of Fulham for Leytonstone, it seems like a good excuse to head east for some Brick Lane curry and a stop at a four-pint rated boozer, the Pride of Spitalfields...

The West end

I was very lucky to get a great present from Chris for my birthday - tickets to Arcadia, a play by Tom Stoppard, which is currently a big hit on the West End. I've been to many musicals but not so many plays, and it is a very different experience. The dialogue in this play was so quick, snappy and witty and it was really entertaining. It did take me a little bit to get into the rhythm of it and grasp the storyline, but I always say you can really judge a play/movie/trip or any experience by how it stays with you afterwards, and I have definitely found myself thinking back to how much I enjoyed the way this story revealed itself, and the experience of seeing acting live rather than through the filter of tv. So even if I still don't understand the iteration and chaos theory, I can still say I loved this play...

Paris

Someone said 'When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life'. I disagree - when a man is tired of London - he goes to Paris! Just a hop, skip and a jump on the Eurostar train, you breakfast in London on a Saturday morning, ready for lunch in Paris.

This trip was about walking, walking and more walking, with some nice restaurant recommendations thrown in. Everyrestaurant that had been recommended to us had a queue! We did wait for the lovely neighbourhood cafe with chocolate mousse that they dish out at the table, and for the felafel in Marais.

Neigbhourhood cafe was cute - I said to the head waiter, do you have a wait list and his quick as a flash response was 'yes in my head!' so we waited on the footpath enjoying our drinks which was entertainment in itself. Poor Chris missed out on the famed chocolate mousse, blaming the girls at the table next to us for having eyes bigger than their bellies. At the felafel place you are given a ticket with a number on it and they just scream them out. Of course I have no idea what the number 40 sounds like in French so I just got in the face of the number caller sticking my ticket in the air...

And it wasn't all eating and walking...We spent about five hours at the beautiful Musee D'Orsay, the museum that is housed in a grand old train station. Full of an unimaginable feast of impressionist artists, it can be easy to take for granted how many amazing pieces of art you are actually seeing...I think it's a museum that you could easily visit over and over again and I do enjoy it more than the Louvre. I have to thank my friend Amy for introducing me to the joys of impressionist art, I am hardly a guru but I could easily spend those five hours there all over again...

Ben and Jerry's Sundae

I don't think Ben and Jerry's ice-cream has made it to Oz, but for me it's the best icecream I've ever had. Ben and Jerry's Sundae is a fun festival that Ben and Jerry's do in London every summer. Tickets are cheap and they go as soon as they come on sale. You get free ice-cream, yes that's right free ice-cream, all day long. There are lots of fun little stands, many showcasing sustainable solutions and community endeavours and some are just plain quirky like toe wrestling, mystic meg and air guitar and of course there is a line up of music. The crowd is a mix of young families, groups of trendy teens and twenty somethings and friends in their 30s just kicking back to icecream and music...

It really is good fun and a great community initiative and pr exercise by Ben and Jerry's...and as you can see from the pics the weather was rubbish (I don't usually go round wearing picnic blankets) but we carried on...

Down by the riverside

A few snaps from the walk between our place at West Ken/Barons Court, to down by the river in Hammersmith...

Does what is says on the tin - the Dove pub at Hammersmith tucked along the river

The great cafe and butcher near Barons Court Road

The Old Ship pub down by the river

Gangstas and Molls

It's been social season over here, as people leap out of hibernation and catch up with old and new friends. It's not unusual to have something in the diary every night of the week in the summertime and sometimes you have to book in weeks in advance. Work supposedly starts slowing down as many head off on summer hols with their families but I like staying in London over the summer - Wimbledon, cricket, evening Tour De France highlights, bike rides along the river and bbqs...

Anyway, one of the fun parties recently was Holmz' and Beechey's birthday party held at the wonderful Atlas in West Brompton...(Yes even when overseas aussies and kiwis insist on twisting the names thoughtfully given by people's parents and there are many people whose real first names I don't actually know!) Theme was gangsters and molls and everyone looked fabulous...