Sunday

Sunday was a sunny, but quite nippy, day.  We all got ready for church, packed a picnic lunch and headed out.  We arrived at church a few minutes late and quickly found a pew to accommodate us.  I was worried that there wouldn't be anyone there that I knew, or that would remember me.  It had been 12 years since we were there last and with Mum gone, I hadn't had very much contact with the people who attended the Devonport Ward.

But, as I looked around, I saw many familiar faces.  Sitting in front of us was Wayne and Maureen Lunson.  A few seats up, Mike Fitzpatrick.  The Travis family and the Horsmans

I felt quite emotional.  These people had played a big part in my life while I was growing-up.  Together, as a small branch of our church, we had saved and saved to build the building that we were sitting in.  Many parts of it was built with our own hands.  My friend Angela and I had stained the wood in the library.  For a youth activity we put the insulation in the ceiling. 

They were people who had been my Branch President, Bishop, Primary President, Home Teacher......and friends.  They were people who remembered my Mum and had helped care for her.

It was so good to see them again.

After catching up a bit with everyone, we went to the Devonport Lawn Cemetary to go and see Mum's grave.  I hadn't been able to come home for Mum's funeral, so this was the first time that I had gotten to see it.  I know that it is just a plaque, but it was important.

My Auntie Lyn had given us great country directions to find Mum's gravesite.  Down to the number of garbage cans to look for on the side of the road!  I only just found out that you could get a map on line that pinpointed the location - who would have thought???

We found the spot with out incident using Auntie Lyn's directions, but......... we had not anticipated............

PLOVERS!!!!

These birds are the things that nightmares are made of.  The Alfred Hitchcock movie, "Birds", could have been made just using these birds and no other.

I kid you not.

Many a child growing-up in Tasmania has fallen prey to these swooping, evil birds.  They are mainly aggressive during nesting time, I think they just do it for fun.  They have barbs on their wings that can scratch if they swoop close enough to make contact........they swoop very, very close.  I had warned my family about  Plovers, but this was their first experience with them.  We managed to get close enough to take a photo of Mum's grave stone.  Jessica wouldn't venture from the side of the car once she saw how close those dreadful birds came to your head.

I love my Mum and I miss her.

We drove to Latrobe and had our picnic lunch at a place called "Bells Parade."  It had changed quite a bit since my childhood, but was still very beautiful.  When I stayed with Graham and Dianne, my nephews, niece and I would ride our bikes down to Bells Parade and swim.

We then went on to my brothers' place.  My neice, Katrina, and nephews, Andrew and Jason, had come over from Western Australia to see us.  Andrew and Jason had gone up to the lakes to spend some time there with their Dad, but Katrina was there.  It was very, very good to see her again.  We had all grown-up like brothers and sisters, we are closer in age than I am to Graham and Gayle.  We had a wonderful visit and were coming back tomorrow for lunch.

This is my sister's oldest son, David, his wife Denise and their little boy, Freddie.

David loves trains and he helps to run a minature railway just outside of Ulverstone.  They only operate on the 1st Sunday of the month during the winter, so we stopped by there to have a ride.

We rode on David's train, which is a replica of a Amtrack train. We thought we would just do a couple of loops around the track, but David had other ideas!!! We went around and around and around.........

I lost track of how many times, and we would probably still be going around if other people hadn't come for a ride!! It was great fun and David showed us all of the other trains that were there.

The big kids were good sports!!

It was a good day.

Sally-Ann

The Mersey Bluff

One of our favorite places to go  in Tasmania, is The Mersey Bluff in Devonport.  When my parents divorced, Mum and I moved to Devonport and we lived within walking distance to the bluff.  During the summer, my friends and I would spend a lot of our afternoons swimming here.

We enjoyed walking along the paths.  There was a fantastic playground for Samuel.  Just a great place to go and hang out for a little bit of down time.

One summer my Mum rented a caravan for us and my sister-in-law, niece and nephews.

It was a fun week.

Located at the bluff is Tiagarra, an aboriginal museum.

If you look around the area, you can find aboriginal rock carvings.

This is taken off a lookout overlooking "the blowhole".  When I was a teenager, teenagers would jump into this......I'm not saying I did, but others may have been foolhardy enough to try.

Jessica and I on the lookout overlooking the blow hole.

I love lighthouses.

Samuel had a fun time running around the paths, chasing seagulls, trying to climb all over the rocks and get to the water.

Jim, Sally-Ann, Joshua and Jessica had fun chasing Samuel around the paths, all over the rocks and through the water!

Because it is a popular beach, there is a surf lifesaving club there.

This is a big thing in Australia.

Now, they may wear funny hats, but they are very athletic.

Found this picture of life savers in action.  They had a shot of them from another angle, but I would have had to slap on a big, blue butterfly for modesty sake.  Take note of the speedos. Speedos don't hide very much. Speedos are from Australia......not sure if I want to admit that or not, in fact, I don't think I will.

So you don't have that image seared into your brain.......

Here are two better images.

I must be getting old, I prefer this image!!

Sally-Ann

How Much Is That Doggy In The Window??

I just finished reading  "Cowboy & Wills" and I am not sure if any words that I write could express how much I love this book.

I know that it struck a chord with me because of our little boy Samuel, but this is a book that can be enjoyed even without the connection of having a child within the umbrella of autism.

The web site has a short video that is very touching.  Will put that on my blog at a later time.

I was bought to tears many time while reading and had to put the book down and come back to it.  I could see myself in the author, Monica Holloway.

I am resisting the urge to run out and buy a Golden Retriever (much to Jim's relief!), but the transformation that a puppy bought to a little boy is absolutely amazing.

I love to read and this is definately worth the money spent to buy it.

Sally-Ann

Promised Land

Today we awoke to a beautiful, sunny day.  Perfect day to go to the Promised Land

 Thought I was telling fibs didn't you???  Well, here is the proof.  The Promised Land is indeed located in Tasmania, Australia.

 

When preparing for our trip, I found a reference in a guide book that talked about the tackiest tourist spot in Australia.  I went on to read that it was in Tasmania, so, of course, I added it to our list of places to check out.  I love a bit of tacky every now and then, and you have to love a place called the Village of Lower Crackpot.

 

The Village of Lower Crackpot can be found at a place called Tasmazia.  As you can guess by the name, it has........mazes!!

The brochure reads,

"From the Promised Land, across the way from Paradise, down the road from No-Where-Else, via the Devil's Gate."

These really are names of towns in this area.  Devil's Gate is a hydro-electric dam.

 

 There is one big maze that has many smaller mazes within it.  There are other mazes scattered all over the property.

 

Here are some of the things that you can find in the maze -

The Three Bear's Cottage

The Secret Passageway

The Crackpot Correction Centre

Memorial to Posts & Poles

The Tower

Spook House

Plumber's Memorial

Nancy the Witch

Three Little Pig's Ville

Treasure Chest

Humpty Dumpty's Wall

Fork in the Road

Kitchen Sink

Staverton Cricket Pitch

Largest Bonsai

Three Ladder

Pot of Gold

The House that isn't There

Jack & Jill's Hill

Garden Path

Bandit's Hideout

House in the West

Hobbit's Hole

Robert's Memorial

Signs with Sayings (over a dozen)

The Village of Lower Crackpot - Built to one-fifth scale of normal buildings in brick and concrete. Please show respect for our little town and DO NOT DEFACE OR CLIMB ON THE BUILDINGS!.

Fountain of Youth

World's Smallest World Heritage

Rapunzul's Tower

Sword in the Stone

The Distillery

GST House

After many false turns, gasps of frustration, happy dances and maybe a tiny bit of cheating......I think we managed to find all the items on the list.

 

 This is one of Jessica's favorite signs

 

 Samuel loved Cubby Town.  In Australia, play houses are called cubbies.

 

 The fire station was a big hit.

 Balancing Maze

 

 How to control unruly teenagers

 

 Yep, I definately need to get one of these for the backyard.

 

Tourists in the shot at no added cost.  I didn't edit out Jim's thumb so he could also be included in the shot.

A view of Lower Crackpot from an observation tower.  This maze was probably the most frustrating for me.

The Village of Lower Crackpot.

The kids thought it was hilarious that I kept saying "Crappot."  Of course, that is something that Samuel picked up on very quickly.

Jessica and I resting after following the yellow brick road'

Yep, still resting......letting Jim chase Sam around and around and around the village.

The Purdy family didn't agree with the tourism book.  The Village of Lower Crappot Crackpot was not tacky, just fun.

They had a pancake palour there, we had already planned this as our place to eatout.  It was so extremely expensive to do take-away or restaurants, we definately had to plan ahead.

The servings were HUGE and very yummy!!

We drove back to Ulverstone, taking the scenic route.  I mentioned before that it seems that every town has a theme.  We drove through Sheffield - town of murals.  We didn't stop, but below is one of the murals that can be seen as you drive down the main street.

 

We spent the rest of the day stopping off and looking at other things, but will blog about that another day!  This was a fun day, something that all the family enjoyed.

 

Sally-Ann

There seems to be some craziness going on with the sidebar of my blog - all the information is at the bottom of the page.  I have been trying to fix it, following directions from the help page, hasn't helped.  So, read on and enjoy.  Hopefully I will be able to fix it soon!!

Update......
Finally figured out what was wrong, without any help from the stinkin' help section of blogger I might add!
I am now signing off to go do the happy dance