White Lion Jungle Ride

DH's vintage Mongoose that he will NEVER part with!

Daintree River Ferry

Lookout at Thornton's Peak

DH looking comfortable!

Today, DH rode in the White Lion Jungle Ride from Port Douglas to Cape Tribulation, a distance of 90km. The cyclists can then do the return ride, if they so wish.  Not many decide to do the return as it is quite difficult riding Thorntons Peak, the third highest mountain in Queensland.  DH initially said that he would finish at Cape Tribulation but when he arrived there he was feeling so good that he decided to do the return as far as his legs would carry him.  I was his support so I followed along behind him....driving at a speed of 20-30 kph.  Can't say I'm not a dedicated wife!  Anyway, DH finished the ride at the 145km mark.  He rode the 145km in 5 hours and 49 minutes and I'm very proud of him.

Pack riding

The return ride home was much faster than the ride to Cape Tribulation.  On the way up to Cape Trib the riders were split into six "packs" according to there riding ability.  DH had elected to ride in the group 27-29 kph.  On the way back it was a "free for all" and a case of "keep up if you can".  The pack kept up a much faster pace, around the 30 kph.  DH did very well to keep the pace.

I spoke with a few of the riders, who had travelled from all over Australia, and everyone of them was impressed with the ride.  It is a very beautiful ride through the rainforest and I think that is why the ride has so many repeat riders.  There are plenty of water stops for the riders, one being on the Daintree River Ferry!

Pack coming in Wonga Beach stop

DH wants to do the ride again next year....the whole 180km.....and I'm sure that he will ride that with ease!

Pack riding through Mossman

Fish Fingers

We had fish fingers for dinner tonight.  This may not seem like a profound statement but to DH and I it was a walk down memory lane.  We have not eaten these little morsels of loveliness for many years, indeed not since the boys were little and my youngest son is now 31!
You see, we lived in a very remote area of Australia for the greater part of our married life.  When I first moved to our western property in 1977 the only frozen food we could buy, came in a Peters "shipper"  A shipper was a large cardboard box lined with plastic to hold the dry ice and the frozen goods.  It stood about a metre and a half high and was about a half meter wide.  It was bulky to handle.  These shippers came out by train in a "cold car" and we had to make sure we were there to meet the train at the station in our little local town as the dry ice would not stand the 40 plus degree heat.
The frozen goods that we ordered were real treats.  Things like meat pies, chiko rolls and fish fingers!   It's a shame that these days we are told that those foods are bad for us, because, my goodness, they sure were tasty!  Everyone looked forward to those shippers that were ordered two or three times a year.

Anyway, back to our dinner tonight. These little fish fingers were just as nice as we remembered.  We did eat them with salad and lemon juice squeezed liberally over them and did not include fries on the side, so it was a little bit healthy.  I don't want to read what these little morsels are made of.  I might be shocked into never eating them again!

Sunrise in the West

This is a sunrise!

I took this photo when we were at one of our North West Queensland properties.  I  never tired of this beautiful view in any of the thirty years that I lived there and I have to tell you that the sunsets are just as spectacular.
The north west is vast.  It is very flat and has very few native trees.  The native grasses are flinders and mitchell and after an exceptional wet season this year there is an abundance of grass.
Where we live now, in tropical North Queensland, it has it's own beauty but I never get to see the sun rising over the horizon nor the sun setting in the west.  We have rainforest mountains surrounding us so the sun rises and sets behind them.  I can of course drive to one of the nearby beaches to watch the sunrise and I have done just that many times, but nothing is the same as the sunrise in the west.

It's nice to smile

I follow a blog called Woogsworld and I advise you all to check it out.  Mrs Woog writes from the heart and is incredibly funny.  Yesterday she wrote about crashing her brand new Kluger (or as she calls it, Sonia) into her husbands surfboard that was hanging from the ceiling in the garage (you really should read this).  Anyway, I commented back to Mrs. Woog about the time that I backed into a parking meter in Mount Isa of all places.  It was quite funny and Mrs Woog emailed me that she went to bed with a smile on face after reading that comment.

It made me think about things that make me smile.  I have a quirky sense of humour and I really hate it at times because the things that make me smile are things that cause another person discomfit. 
I love Funniest Home Videos.  I don't just smile I really laugh.  So is this a bad thing and am I a bad person?  I almost wet myself when I saw our PM trip over her heels in India and go down to the ground.  Poor woman.  But, I empathise because it has also happened to me in front of a lot of people.

Sometimes I get the giggles at the most inappropriate times, like for example, at a meeting when you have a guest speaker who trips on his way to the dais.  I try to hide the giggles with coughs but that just comes out sounding ridiculous.
So, my mother says that laughter is the best medicine but should I laugh at another persons discomfit?

Vegetarian

I'm not a vegetarian.  Never have been and never will be.  I love a good piece of meat - preferably beef - and we eat it at least once a day.  I don't knock vegetarians because I believe that everyone should be able to make choices without prejudice.  Personally I think that it is not a healthy diet to take out meat.  I have three friends (all vegetarian) who have been quite ill in the last few months.  All have been told the same thing, bad bacteria in the stomach?  To me there is a pattern forming but I'm not a GP.

What I do object to however is the vegetarian lady that told me that the reason she gave up eating meat was because of the way animals are treated.  I was truly gobsmacked when this woman made this statement.  We LOVE our animals and would never intentionally harm a single one of them.  We even go as far as naming them and if you follow my posts you would have read about Delila, the twins, etc etc.  Even on the station where we are running thousands of cattle our weaners are almost pat quiet.  This is because at weaning we hand feed them for  a long time so that they become used to humans and they know that they do not need to be afraid of us.

This is REALLY bad treatment of animals (ha! ha! Actually its DH having a chat to one of the wearers!

Now, I'm not naive enough to think that all people treat their animals with the same amount of respect that we extend to our animals but these people are most certainly the minority and it is very unfair to base allegations about animal mistreatment on the majority of us.

Yep, here he is again mistreating the animals!

And why are some (not all) vegetarians taking on a "holier than thou" attitude towards us meat-loving folks and making us feel guilty that we enjoy it!  This minority group of vegetarians are becoming more and more vocal and we are targets........ easy targets, with our easy going country natures that really don't like confrontation.

That same woman that made the comment about animal treatment was carrying a leather handbag and was also wearing leather shoes.  Undoubtably she drove off in her car with leather car seats.  But hey, it's not for me to point out where the source or her leather came from.  So much for loving your animals!

October Sketch Challenge

Here is my take on the October sketch challenge over at the Scraptherapy website.  I love this sketch as  I have always enjoyed using paint on my layouts.  I was also trying to think of a way to scrap our twin calves, Tweedle-Dee and Tweedle-Dum.  I am happy with this layout.

It seems like yesterday.....

Today it has been twelve years since we lost our eldest son, Kurt.  Twelve years! And every anniversary brings the same feelings of loss and sadness.  We love you so much Kurt and cannot wait until the day until we will all be reunited.  Watch over us my son, until that day comes.
xx Mum

Jade Vine

A VERY rampant Flame of the Forest

When we started our garden a few year ago, we planted a vine called Flame of the Forest.

The flower

 The nursery that sold it to us said that it grew very fast but little did we know how rampant it would be.  Within a year it had taken over our pergola and it was a never ending job to keep it pruned.  We kept it for two years and then we dug it out.  It got too much for us.

Jade Vine Flower

The Flame of the Forest had a cousin/brother called Jade Vine.
 We had first seen this beautiful vine at an open garden in Port Douglas and fell in love with beautiful jade flower that it produced.  We wanted it but finding it proved to be difficult.

 We eventually stumbled upon a nursery that only sold it to us if we took great care of it!  A big ask!  Anyway we planted it last year and this year we have the first flower.  It is as beautiful as I remembered.  The vine is quite slow growing so it is perfect for our pergola.

A closeup of the Jade and Purple Flower