April 2016 – lauranceblog.com

I’m no Brisbane Bard

Back in the 1950’s the Queensland capital was thought of as an overgrown country town and helping to cast off this unstylish notion was the elusive Brisbane Bard.
The phantom poet wrote and left his verse in cafes all over the city, providing a snapshot of life in the city and his identity is still a mystery, even to this day.
Until now we have spent very little time in Brisbane which today is dashing, dapper and up-to-date

The descriptor of our snappy CBD 6th floor apartment omitted the fact it was located 30 metres directly above a freeway. But the double glazing was so effective we were completely unaware of the speedway below until we actually stepped out onto the balcony. Attempting breakfast on the verandah would have been like eating in Daniel Riccardo’s formula one pit stop.
From our balcony we could almost touch the newly installed walking bridge across the river which looked as if it was designed by John Bertram and the crew of Australia II. Only masts—no winged keels!

Over four days we took our senior’s Go card and travelled both up and down the Brisbane River on the City-Cats; took the city loop bus in both directions; ate at the Paragon fish restaurant at Eagle Pier and Italian along the Southbank and mangled with the crowds in the Queen St Mall.

Driving back up to Toowoomba we detoured to the Wivenhoe Dam which caused much havoc with its water releases during the 2011 Brisbane floods

And for something different today we drove from Toowoomba to Allora and Warwick; the former a village which was home to Mary Poppins author Pamela P L Travers at 61 HerbertSt.
Allora next week hosts an open and ‘drive-by’ garden show so today we did the lot as a simple drive by, also taking pictures of the classic Queensland architecture.

Cotton on

Every Monday our mindset has for years always been Isabel’s druthers for embroidery—stitch and bitch—being the family’s colloquial terminology for Mum’s preferred hobby.
Staying in Toowoomba with Dorothy O’Connor we get to discuss with her son Rodney (Qld DPI) the various types of crops grown in this region; with cotton a hot-ticket item here abouts.
Today, being a Monday, found us making our way through the fertile black soils of Cecil Plains on our way to a lunch in Dalby with our caravanning friends Maureen and Buddy Statham.

What a find! 24 giant cotton reels loaded and ready to go to the local gin.

Lunch at the Coffee Club was a menu of mirth with every mouthful; Dot’s sheep station years spent at Mt Magnet versus Buddy’s mobs of Angus cattle, Maureen’s recent visit to the Melbourne flower festival and her advice of touristy things we need to get done on this holiday. (We first met the Stathams caravanning at 80 Mile Beach last year and caught up later on our journey at the Condamine pub, which is their local)

Tomorrow we trio head for Brisbane and a chance to spend four days exploring the Queensland capital from our 2 bed apartment on the river. We’ll be needing another chair on the verandah!

Katoomba: a few left-overs

A brilliant lead-light Capolla of massive proportions

Obviously late 19th century guests came to the Carrington Hotel to ‘take the waters’

Sign above the Paragon Cafe door remind us of the useless laws that have been and continue to be imposed by parliaments that pass thousands of inane regulations.

and below one of the many staircases, dining room entry, the blogger in the chairman’s lounge. Lastly at breakfast on day one we were presented with a chemical product that hadn’t been invented a century ago. On day 2 this had been rectified with a supply of Danish Lurpak butter.

With the big guns on High Street

Over an extended Easter break we, the gentrified Perth branch, joined with the big guns family branch at Northcote in inner city Melbourne. That’s Jas and Stu’s house—under the big chimney— in the 1920’s picture on High Street above

It was a holiday with a difference; Jas held court each day from the heights of the old Bailey (a 12ft high aluminium set of steps); Isabel took advantage of the fine weather to take the grandies to the local parks and ice cream shop; grandpa was literally an old grumble-bum but did some cooking and Stuart practiced his hiking skills in readiness for a weekend bush hike thru the Dandenongs later this month.
Home on High is never dull.
The refit of the early 20th century mansion is progressing extremely well and now complete with bedrooms, celebrity bathroom, kitchen of c’est magnifique proportions, dining and family room.
Golden aged folk soon forget how three year olds treat their 2 y o sisters. And the marvel of how a newly celebrated one year old just gets up and walks all over the place.
Jason the gyp-boarder (him with the long mullet) wandered about the backyard gorging on the abundance of ripe red grapes on the vine. It bothered him not that a friendly neighbourhood rat shared his passion for the berries nor the fact that lorikeets joined in the harvest in the evenings.
The sparkies in their orange shirts and weighty tool belts gave enriched colour to the mix and we were forever forgetting to put out the bins on Sunday nights which, added to the builders’ rubble created a walloping accumulation of detritus.
But I digress.
The littlies could get up to 25kmh up the length of the passageway on their little bikes and it was a wonder Roma never got her toes run over. Frankie, Quinn and Roma can now all luxuriate in their own six foot circular Roman bath, or alternatively the family can wash together in a shower room replete with no less than 4 shower roses.
In addition to all of this Jas is handling one unit at uni and house maid at each change over of the Airbnb on Claude Street. And her classmate students in architecture seem to constantly complain of tiredness.

Footnote:

The cannons are Mark VII 8 inch breech loading rifled guns and were built in 1884 and 1885 by W.G. Armstrong and Co. of Newcastle-on-Tyne, Northumberland in England. The cannons weigh just under 12 tons each, or about 12,000 kilograms and could fire a shell weighing 95 kilos over 7.5 kilometres.

William’s Chimney or Katoomba?

Katoomba’s pages of time are beautifully chronicled in the Carrington Hotel (circa 1882) and we four are living the narrative just like tourists of a century and more ago.
A love-seat in the lead-light bay window, a bathroom befitting the great Gatsby—with a shower reminiscent of the Katoomba Falls–drinks taken leisurely on the front verandah; a graceful dining room recollective of High Society and art objects to keep the antiques road show going for a year.
The gracious old lady is located smack in the middle of this Blue Mountain township, right on Katoomba Road with its host of old shops which is a historical registry in itself.
Like the Paragon Cafe celebrating its centenary this year and still kitted out in a style the Anzacs enjoyed, with one exception; meal orders are now electronically sent off to the kitchen.
Fortunately we arrived in the mountains yesterday with its sunny disposition and the chance to clearly view the three sisters; for today the temperature is more like 12 degrees with thick fog and Scottish mist to boot.
Perfect for the genial graciousness of those holidaying in the late 19th century.
Julie has taken her leave of us and retired for the afternoon while Graham reads the Oz iPad edition, Isabel is listening to a talking book and doing the crossword and I am recording it all for the blog. (All happily ensconced in a lounge area best described as indulgent.).

Katoomba was originally known as William’s Chimney or Collett’s Swamp.