NOSTALGIC NEW NORFOLK (2)

Early Morning on the Derwent

The Flight Of The Peking Ducks

Yes, well one of the reasons we are here in Tasmania is to experience a cooler climate. We can already tick that box – mind you I’m sure Tassie has some much colder weather to throw our way yet. Still, we are experiencing overnight temps close to zero and daytime temps that do not make it to 20 degrees and it’s only April! I actually am enjoying the cooler weather but paradoxically missing the sunshine. I like the cool weather but what I really love is those clear, crisp autumn days at home where the sun shines down on us and the air sparkles like champagne. We did actually have one of those beautiful days a couple of days back, but I have to say those days seem a rarity. Most of the time, so far at least, the days are grey. Clouds hug the hill tops and thick white mist crouches in the valleys. A pale and insipid sun peeks sporadically through the greyness promising warmth but not delivering. To enhance the feeling of gloom, smoke left over from the bushfires mixes with the low clouds and creates a spectral mist everywhere – making everything seem slightly fuzzy around the edges. Oh, perhaps that’s just my failing eyesight!

Rural Contrasts

In my last blog I mentioned our friend Lee (she). Now Lee (she) has a beautiful daughter who currently works and lives in Perth. As we were planning on visiting with Lee (she) for a little while, she (Lee) has asked if we would like to House Sit while she (Lee) visits the beautiful daughter in Perth for a couple of weeks. Well – what a wonderful idea! We agreed to go and visit Lee to see what the drive-way and parking situation would be like for our van and so a date was set for a visit. She (Lee) lives in Kingston, high up in the hills towards Mt Wellington. DD bravely drove through the Hobart traffic (about half as bad as Perth traffic) to take us to Kingston. We managed to find our way to the gravel roads that lead into Lee’s place and then proceeded to ‘hill climb’ our way to the home. The roads are gravel, narrow, steep and pot-holed, but DD is confident we will manage to get Jezabelle into Lee’s driveway. I hope the bloke is right! As there is a circular drive we should be able to exit OK too.

The house is a cedar style home nestled into the hill-side and boasts some delightful views through the heavily wooded mountainside and across the Hobart waters. She (Lee) is, like me, an animal nut and has an abundance of wildlife she watches out for from her wooden bower. Numerous Pademelons hop up towards dusk to see what goodies they might score from Lee’s vegetable garden and at night a few possums wander around looking for titbits. She (Lee) tells me there are also a family of owls who roost in the surrounding trees at night, serenading her with their mellow hoots.

Derwent at Rest

She (Lee) also has a beautiful and sensitive elderly border collie, Daisy and a rambunctious young Maine Coon cat, Bugsy. Did I mention in my last blog, that she (Lee) is manic, frenetic and somewhat nutty? Good, saves me explaining that a second time. During our first visit, she (Lee) made us incredibly welcome (something for which I shall be eternally grateful) and proceeded to try to give us her entire library (considerable) and an array of homemade relishes and sauces to take away with us. The library of course, was just a loan, but there are only so many books one can fit in a caravan. She (Lee) is a keen gardener and had an abundance of tomatoes which she had been bravely attempting to bottle into sauces and relishes. She (Lee) seemed to be awash in the stuff. I must say it is all delicious too!

She (Lee) was disappointed when we refused her hospitable invitation to stay for dinner. She had already made us lunch. At her insistence (we didn’t need much pushing) we agreed to return a week later and stay a couple of nights, thus getting a feel for the critters and the house before taking on the responsibility of house-sitting. The next week saw us, minus van, once again taking the ‘hill climb’ to the little house in the hill. This time I was able to reciprocate a little by taking a few odds and sods with us to try and balance Lee’s incredible generosity. It is somewhat like taking Ice to the Eskimos mind you. There seems to be nothing really that she (Lee) needs.

Morning Diamonds

During our first visit, when she (Lee) was inviting us to come and stay with her, it evolved that I had never tasted Peking Duck, and that DD remembered fondly Lee’s preparation of that succulent dish in his somewhat misspent youth. I have since learnt not to even hint at something you would like in Lee’s presence as she will then go out of her way to make sure you have your heart’s desire. She (Lee) immediately promised to make preparations for Peking Duck on our return. In the interim period, between visits, we were regaled, via email, of the exploits of the two unfortunate birds who were to grace our plates later in the week. These poor plucked creatures, had to be soaked in vodka (poor babies) and then hung to dry for a couple of days. Hanging vodka soaked plucked and pinked ducks is no easy feat when one has a mischievous young cat whose legs are permanently hollow, a foxy old collie and swarms of wasps.

We received emails describing swarms of wasps streaming after the pink and plucked ducks followed by the exploits of an eager young cat who obviously considered these pink treats would suit his tummy very well.

By the time we arrived for our two day visit the ducks were just about to be placed in the oven away from the predations of drunken wasps and anxious cats. In due course, despite what seemed to be domestic chaos, the ducks arrived on our plates with all the traditional accompaniments and we and our fellow guests were treated to a wonderful ducky treat. I am such a terrible old hypocrite – I really love ducks – they are such beautiful creatures and the sight of ducks swimming placidly about on the water always warms my heart, and yet, and yet, I can sit down and consume duck and thoroughly enjoy the experience. Oh the shame!

Daisy Peeking Wistfully at the Peking

She (Lee) absolutely blitzed the ducks – they were amazing and delicious – then, bless me, she produced the most incredible Sticky Date Pudding which she served with home- made liquorice ice-cream and dollops of cream. Oh wow! Needless to say we all consumed way too much food and some of us, who you ask, ‘why not me’ she said, consumed a wee bit too much of the liquid refreshments as well.

Now we come to the flight of the Peking Ducks – we all sorted out dishes and the general residual chaos that emanates from a night like this, but at the end of the night we still had two not just plucked, but pretty well...................................ducks to dispose of – well the frames of the ducks at least. Now, I did mention that she (Lee) has a somewhat flimsy hold on sanity– yes, I do believe I did – so I was not too surprised when at the end of a brilliant evening, she (Lee) decided that the ducks deserved to be set free to fly off to whatever home they had come from. To this end, she (Lee) cast the poor denuded creatures, now minus not only their feathers but also their pretty pink flesh out into the dark night skies, hoping against hope that they would despite all their sad depletions, fly to freedom once again.

Reluctant Sunshine on the Derwent

It would appear that it was I, not she (Lee) who was not quite sane as in the morning, when we peered somewhat anxiously over the balcony where the freedom flight had taken place, there were no ducks to be seen! They had obviously taken their opportunity and flown away, featherless and fleshless, back to their home. As there are no carnivorous critters living in Lee’s back yard and both the Daisy the Dog and Bugsy the Cat had been confined to quarters overnight, we can only conclude the ducks made a break for freedom. Now I feel better about consuming the poor creatures as it seems I was able enjoy my repast whilst not impinging on the welfare of the ducks. Amazing!

We had an wonderful two days visiting with Lee and are looking forward to spending another couple of days with her before house-sitting on the 7th May for a couple of weeks.

The only down note about all of this was DD losing his wallet. On the way to stay with Lee, we stopped off to grab a few things to take with us (the ice to Eskimo stuff) and then as we had not stopped to eat lunch, decided to be very naughty and stop in at Mackas for a quick bite. Yes, I know, we should never have gone there, and everything that happened subsequently was very much our own fault. We learned this bad habit after mum passed away last year. The Funeral Directors were right next door to a Mackas and we went there for a fortifying coffee one day. They do have excellent coffee! It was a sad day indeed, as in the 10 plus years we had been together, we had never been to a McDonalds store – until last August. Whilst there we thought we would try their Angus Burger – bad mistake! They are actually nice! Since then, we have from time to time repeated our crime and gone again into the Golden Arches for a happy but very guilty meal. This day, the same thing happened and as we were walking back to the car after our meal, DD noticed he did not have his wallet. We could find it nowhere and DD rushed off to the bank to cancel all the cards while I retraced our steps trying in vain to locate the lost wallet. There is incidentally a very important lesson to impart here. Under no circumstances get behind the wheel of a car when you have just lost your wallet and the ramifications of the loss are still racing through your head. My very sensible and grounded bloke nearly managed to get us killed or at least severely maimed in the first few moments after the loss had become apparent. Even DD with his Very Good Brain did a minor panic during that drive to the bank.


Glorious Autumn


Of course, it was my fault. I had insisted that DD change his jumper before leaving to visit Lee – I had shockingly insisted that he wear something clean and not quite so moth-eaten as his usual gear. What a wicked woman! It turns out that the pockets in the fresh jacket are not very spacious and THAT is why said wallet jumped out of his pocket. As I said, My Fault – OK – Whatever! What probably was my fault was that I did go back and check where we had been sitting at McDonalds and saw nothing. I spoke to the other people in the cafe and the staff, but nothing.

When we told Lee about the loss, she was confident we would never see the wallet or its contents ever again. She (Lee) assured us in dark tones that the folk in New Norfolk are directly descended from the bad hombres who were imprisoned on Norfolk Island (true story actually) and as such would not have even let the wallet touch the ground before scooping it up and utilising the contents for their own nefarious purposes. The fact that DD did think he might have dropped it on the ground outside the local TAB added somewhat to that sad belief. I, having one of these nefarious convicts in my own antecedents, felt a little wounded by her inferences of inherited impurities.

DD has always been a super lucky cuss (he has me doesn’t he?) and later that afternoon he received a call from the McDonalds cafe – the wallet had been handed in after my visit! When we finally collected it 2 days later it was completely intact – even down to the couple of hundred dollars inside it. As I said, very, very lucky! In the meantime we had cancelled our Visa cards and arranged for my son Brett to pay DD’s driver’s license which had fortuitously arrived in the mail at home the previous day. We have since received the new cards in the mail and all is back to normal. Lucky, lucky man! The people of New Norfolk can hold their heads high as they are obviously amongst the most honest folk on the planet (along with yours truly of course). Full marks too to the young manager at McDonalds as he did all the right things, down to putting the wallet in the safe for us until we could collect it.

Afternoon Delight

So our visit to Lee was eventful and enjoyable. DD has his wallet back and all is well with the world. I have to say a positive word or two about my bloke here too. My granny once wrote in my autograph book “A Man worthwhile is one who can smile when everything’s gone all wrong” – DD is just such a bloke. He can get very odd indeed over small stuff, but when a major like this happens, he is calm itself (once the Visa has been cancelled that is) and even managed to remain quite cheerful; he didn’t really blame me, well, not much anyway and he kept his equilibrium through the whole experience. Priceless!

We are now at the time of school holidays again and so have decided to stay in this lovely caravan park until the 5th May when we will tow Jezzy up the ‘hill-climb’ to stay with Lee. I will keep blogging between now and then however, as we still have a couple of escapades I have not filled you in on, and we plan on taking a few more excursions from here as well.

Stay tuned as I come back to regale you with the horrific story of the bum-numbing, nerve tingling near death excursion to the peak of Mt Wellington and the case of the slavering camels. Until next time, laugh well and fly free – Steph.

Priceless