I’ve just whirled around like an amazing Mrs Mop…cleaning up after the Queen’s Birthday. The place is sparkling and I am worn out. I HATE cleaning the bath…such a strain on the back. Anyway, that is just too mundane, especially as I am now a fully-fledged fisherwoman.

Nick arrived from Sydney for the long weekend, and he and I spent long fruitless hours on the rocks and jetty, spinning and casting and getting snagged. I fell on some giant rocks and grazed my knee and bruised my shin…major OUCH…thoughts of poo pooing children in the playground…’Oh come along, that’s just a little scratch blah blah blah’ well it was sore! And very undignified.

Yesterday morning before he got his plane, we spent the whole morning in the sunshine, and although we didn’t even get a nibble, we couldn’t believe it when 2 beautiful dolphins swam around and around, and came right up to us…it was fantastic. Made up for our lack of ‘tight lines’. Talked to a fisherman coming in on a very expensive ocean-going yacht, with mighty fixed rods over the back and I asked if he had any luck…he looked a bit cagey, and said, ‘there was a heap of water between the fish!’ Made me feel better. Maybe the elusive darlings have all migrated to warmer climes. The silly man in the fish tackle shop seemed to think the squid were throwing themselves on to the hooks last weekend. I am starting to believe the myths regarding ‘fishermen tales.’!

From being a hunter gatherer full of evil intent I felt a little chastened last night as John and I went to see Jane Goodall talking about conservation to about 2000 people at Adelaide’ Ridley Pavilion.  We must be kind to our fellow man, animal, planet etc and not go plundering the oceans. Hmmmm.

She was fantastic though and it’s 50 years since she first went to the Gombi and made friends with those chimps that formed the basis of her studies and gave so much pleasure and interest to so many. I first heard of her in a National Geographic magazine in Singapore in 1977, where she had plotted out the family tree of the old matriarch, Flo. Last night it was more about what each of us can do to be a better world citizen…Oh well, I am not depleting the fishing stocks. (yet)

John and I went back to Handorf on Sunday. We ate cinnamon toast with cream and sliced oranges then walked about. It is the oldest German settlement in Australia, and quite quaint with pretty shops and an olde worlde feel.  I had my palm read by a blue eyed man wearing a red bandanna. He told me that all my major lines swooped the wrong way into my lunar mound (as opposed to my mound of venus) so it means all sorts of weird and wonderful things. Basically I remember being ‘here’ before and so am melancholic and have spells of wanting the ‘other life’ HA HA HA! Always knew I was a Russian many moons ago!

I did give thought to the pioneer women of Handorf…way back when. Whilst their men folk were off founding Australia, they tended the home steads and carried baskets of vegetables and dairy produce on their backs down to Adelaide. I suppose as the crow flies on The Pioneer Women’s trail it must be about 20 miles. On the homeward journey they were required to each carry two bricks for the construction of a church. It must have been a struggle for those women on the steep slopes on such a narrow track climbing back up in the heat or in the rain or fog.

By  contrast we zoomed off in our mighty modern motor to see the great Murray River. It was vast and brown, and home to the paddle steamer, Marion, which is similar to the Waverley that plies its way around the west coast of Scotland.

We searched for a nice place for lunch but it was all a bit dire.  Then, just as we were about to settle for fish and chips (again) we saw a guy with a sign for roast pork rolls and fresh yabbies. $5 each. We decided to have that. My yabbies looked OK, they were big and I tore into the shells, all set with my lemon wedge…but oh my goodness, they were mush with a very large black vein….UGH. John was struggling with his roll…. So we binned it all, and as we crossed the street imagine our surprise when we saw a sign.

‘Yabbie races today in the pub lounge. Race starts at 12.00.’

Presumably, after the race they’d been popped into the pot and been boiling away for about an hour.  Best not to know.

Got this beautiful picture of a poppy from a friend yesterday. I adore poppies, and for the last 4 years I haven’t seen the collection we bought at some garden show. Nick said they were beautiful last year in Edinburgh.

One of the ladies in the Writers Club was telling me about her sulphur crested cockatoos.

In the 80’s they had been used to using her pine windbreak and an ancient walnut tree to dine on, but both died.  She tried to plant a new hedge, interspersed with bottle brush to encourage the native birds, but the cockatoos didn’t return. Then followed 3 years of drought and water restrictions, all the conifers died and the battered bent quince tree keeled over. Possums ruled the garden, thriving on rose buds and ornamental plums. But just last week she heard a huge rumpus. The cockatoos were back, lunching on an olive tree, then transferred to a candle pine and finally, beside the house, 12 of them picked discarded plum kernels out of the gravel drive-way. It made me think of the meeting last night with Jane Goodall and her dire warnings. But maybe we, like nature and the birds can adapt to change.

Below is me in the Botanic Garden…with a fossil pine. It is the Woolemia Pine. It was recently discovered in the Blue Mountains of NSW, in about 1994 and it is said to be 200 million years old. I actually saw one in Inverewe Gardens in the NW of Scotland, where scientists say they are trying to see how it copes with different climates and temperatures. And here is John, after we walked to Brighton for some eggs Benedict!