PEOPLE AND PLACES

 Jeff, Julie and Daryl in the lift at Pacific Bay Resort

 Jeff, Janice, Daryl and Julie at Wollomombi Falls

 Janice, Peter and Julie at
The Armidale Folk Museum

 Peter and Julie at Dangarsleigh Warm Memorial

 Julie rugged up for the cold

 Jeff rugged up for the cold at Gostwyk

 Peter checking out the date on the tap.  l946.

 Jeff and Julie looking at the grave of an 18 month old baby in the Uralla Cemetery.

 Rod and Lyn at Uralba, Moonbi

 Rod in his easy chair.

 Rod and Jeff in the workshop shed.

 Lyn, Julie and Erin in Erin's kitchen of her new house in Tamworth.

 Lyn, Clair,  Rod and Erin in Tamworth.

 Daryl, Jeff and Julie at Ainslie House Motel, Scone, having breakfast in the restaurant.

 Jeff and Daryl at lunch in the Royal Hotel in Windsor.

 Janice and Julie on Diggers Beach Coffs Harbour

 Julie and Janice at Ebor Falls.

 Janice, Peter and Julie in Peter's loungroom in Dumaresq.

Mindy, Janice, Julie and Peter at the Gostwyk church.

 Erin, Lyn, Clair, Rod, Janice and Julie in Erin's loungeroom.

Janice and Julie at breakfast at Ainslie House, Scone.

  THE WATERFALL WAY - COFFS HARBOUR TO ARMIDALE
WOLLOMOMBI FALLS - ON THEWATERFALL WAY
Don't you just love old chimneys?  The are a monument to pioneer families.  Some indication of the temperature this region plummets to in the winter.  Three fireplaces so close together.

Our first glimpse of Wollombi Falls through the trees on the short walk to the lookout.

 The great gaping gorge.  Wollomombi Falls are one of the highest falls in Australia.  We have seen it raging after heavy rains and reduced to just a trickle in drought time.

 After we left Coffs Harbour we went through Bellingen, full of craft shops and cafes.  Very arty.

 The old Hammond and Wheatley Emporium whereJim Muldoon helped with the restoration work. He made the wooden curved bow at the top of the building.  The Emporium is full of shops.  We didn't stop so it will have to wait till another holiday.

 The rich alluvial flats of the Bellinger River.

 As we began to climb the mountain up to Dorrigo the waterfalls began.

 The winding narrow road on the way to Dorrigo.  There is one bend on this road that can never be widened due to a colony of rare frogs that inhabit the bushland just on that bend!

 The beautiful Dorrigo Plateau.  They grow potatoes in Dorrigo and I once visited a daffodil farm there and we picked our own daffodils.

 The Dorrigo Hotel

 Sleepy Dorrigo. This building on the corner of the main street used to be an emporium,  Something happened in the family and the shop was just closed up, still containing all its stock.  It remained closed for about 20 years or so.  I saw it when it was all closed up and really would  have loved to have looked through all their wares.  Now it is a secondhand shop, but unfortunately was closed the morning we were there.  My brother Peter said he has never seen it opened.

 There is a train graveyard at Dorrigo.  All these trains and rolling stock were purchased with a view to opening a train museum.  They were being acquired while we lived in Grafton.  We had a tour of some of them when they were waiting down at Glenreagh.  Most of them got up the mountain before the trainline deteriorated too much.  Now some of the trestle bridges on the line have declined and are impassable.

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The 'museum' has now gone broke and the trains are beginning to deteriate.  There must have been 100 engines!

GRAFTON - A VISIT BACK HOME 

Crossing the mighty Clarence River into Grafton.  Looking down river towards Maclean.

 Our old chemist.  We knew a couple of the girls who worked in here over the years.  It was where we had all our photos developed as well.

 One of my favourite house in Dobie Street.  In the time we were in Grafton it was used as a Nun's home and then sold privately.

 The Small Sisters' house in Alice Street.  This is where Yvette and Alicia had their piano lessons.  The house had never been altered since the elderly sisters were born.  It had 12' ceilings, original wall papers, brass picture rods mounted on the walls.  Alicia had her lessons in the front room while Yvette had her lessons out the back in the kitchen dining room, which was along the verandah from the main house, with the verandah open to the elements.

 Westlawn School where all the children spent their happy infants and primary years.  It was a lovely little school with a lovely big grassy playground.  I remember some plovers set their nest in the middle of the playground and guarded their eggs ferociously.  The Principal  put a fence of sticks around the nest and banned the children from playing near the nest until the eggs had hatched.  The lawn was mowed by weekend detainees from the Gaol.  When they had finished all their mowing they used to play touch football until the van came to take them back to the Gaol.

 !03 Cranworth Street.  Our first house was provided by Jeff's work.  It was brand new when we moved in.  It was straight across the road from Westlawn school.  In was also on the bus route.  The first time I caught the bus with 3 little girls and a pram, the bus driver said "Don't fold up your pram.  I'll get it!"  He put it in the boot of the bus fully erected and when we got into town he took out the pram and set it on the footpath for me.  I was astonished.  The whole trip had cost me half of what it had cost at Engadine and the bus driver didn't start the bus till we were all seated!

 The flood drain from North Street through to Carr Street.  The girls rode their bikes to school along the bike path beside the flood drain. Cows used to graize along the flood drain at the end of Carr Street.  The reeds were to protect the frogs.  We had an enormous variety of frogs.  I miss them.  Especially when it rains.  We don't have ANY from here.

 The Gallagher's house in North Street.  They always had a prize winning garden. Elva used to say that Mike must garden with a miners lamp in the dark to get as much done as he used to in the garden.  They had a great BMX track out the back for their 4 sons.

 Earl Street looking north towards Junction Hill.  Cars used to roar along here at 100kph making a huge dust cloud when it was dry.  The cows used to come down twice a day along the road and turn left to be milked.  I spun out in the gravel on this road once with Felicity.  We got the car stuck in a ditch and had to walk home and get Jeff to come back and get it out.

 Our lovely house in Carr Street.  We did a lot of the building ourselves. Jeff did all the verandah railing as well as making the 'whalebones' for the bull nosed verandah.  The girls painted their bedrooms.  The stained glass windows in the entrance and stairwell came from Jeff's father.  He was taking them to the dump and I rescued them about 10 years before we built the house.  At the time I didn't know what I would use them for, but they were just perfect in our house.  My brother Rod built the kitchen and the wash stand vanity outside the toilet.

Phil and Belinda's lovely old house that they restored. 

 The beautiful Christ Church Cathedral in Grafton where we worshipped for 22 years.  It was wonderful going back and seeing all the old 'aunties' and our lovely friends.

 Lunch at the Crown Hotel on the riverbank.  So wonderful catching up with so many friends.
Gwen, Alan, Ian, Coral Lyn, Bill, Julie. Selwyn, Betty, Ron, me, Gwynne, Kaye and Cathy.

 Selwyn, Betty Ron, me Gwynne, Kaye, Cathy, Daryl, ........Billy and Julie.

The beautiful Clarence River looking towards South Grafton.

PACIFIC BAY RESORT COFFS HARBOUR

Last month we went to Pacific Bay Resort in Coffs Harbour with Daryl and Julie.  I have always loved Coffs since I had a family holiday there when I was 12.  When we lived in Grafton and came shopping in Coffs it was like entering a different world with the banana plantations covering the hills, resorts, shopping centres and car sale yards.  To me it was like the big city.

 We had a little walk every morning over to the lovely reception/restaurant area for breakfast. The weather was just beautiful and it was lovely to sit in the sun on the enclosed deck over the pond and eat our sumptuous hotel breakfast.  I LOVE hotel breakfasts.

 Our rooms were in the high rise block on the left about 3 floors down from the top.  The only 'drawback' was that no sun came into our room at this time of year.  But we hardly spent any of the daylight hours in our room.  Our balcony overlooked the lake (it was originally a creek but the Resort have two weirs which have ponded the creek on its flow out to the sea), we overlooked the golf course and over trees could see the waves as they crashed up onto Diggers Headland, and then out to see.  I looked every morning for whales but didn't see any from our balcony.

It was a short walk down to the beach.  The beach is unpatrolled and a bit rough.  The northern end of the beach was pebbly.  I found some interesting little shells though.  And as Red Rock, just a few kilometres north, is strewn with red rocks (serpentine) Diggers Beach is strewn with yellow rocks.

The view from the path to the beach.  The little island in the pond is the 9th hole of the golf course.,  Jeff and Daryl had a couple of games of golf and said the course was quite challenging.

 When Jeff and Daryl drove north to play golf at Safety Beach Julie and I spent 3 hours by the pool.  The sun was beautiful and the pool was heated to 25c.  We had a lovely swim followed by lunch at the restaurant. Fruit for lunch!!!  Orange and Almond cake with mised berry coulis and apple and rhubarb crumble.  Both were decorated with rosewater pearls, strawberries and star fruit.

 The lovely pool area.  When Julie and I appeared in the pool area two lovely wood ducks decided it was time to vacate the pool!!!  I'm sure they were enjoying the warm water.

 This hillside in the background used to be covered in bananas just 15 years ago.  As the children of the banana growers grow up they don't want to work on the plantations anymore and the old folks are too old for such physical work so they hand over some land to their children to build their house on (with magnificent ocean views) and the children pursue other careers, and the plantations are removed. Sad.


On our last morning we had breakfast at the Coffs Harbour Yachet Club. Just lovely.

 This cycad in the gardens had an amazing flower.  I had never seen one in flower before.

 Julie and I sat in the golf cart after breakfast one morning hoping the fellows might came out and drive us back to our building, but they didn't.

Dessert in the restaurant one night was English Breakfast Panacotta and was served in a tea cup.  It was lovely.