I have always visited Australia in the summer, which means that I equate this country with having a parched landscape with yellow grass. And it is the driest inhabited continent on earth, a fact that many Aussies seem to be proud of. My Country, written by Australian written Dorothea MacKellar while she was homesick and living in England, is a beloved poem thanks to this stanza: “I love a sunburnt country, a land of sweeping plains, Of ragged mountain ranges, of droughts and flooding rains.”
Water shortages and rationing is common and I have passed countless creeks, rivers and lakes with no water in them. But in traveling from Canberra to country New South Wales yesterday, I saw the rolling hills of this region colored in shades of green for the first time as it has been raining. With all that green, it looked more like Ireland than Australia to me. Rivers and ponds are even overflowing. The dry image has been completely shattered on this trip.
Driving to Robert’s Uncle Peter’s farm in Tubbul – population 150 – we saw lots of kangaroos, cockatoos, parrots and other colorful birds of all sorts. It’s exotic stuff for most of us in the world, but just everyday life here. And that’s fair dinkum, Aussie speak for true.
By my own accounting, every town has a Commercial Hotel, including Young, the town I am in now. But I am I am sitting in the Criterion as it is my father-in-law’s favorite pub, it’s friendly and also the the only place around where I can find internet access.
{ 12 comments }
Nice to hear from the south.
It got up over zero toaday and the glaciers were receding from the sidewalks in Söder.
I had one of the best ski tours of my life on the lakes in the Nacka reserve yesterday. As I glided down a ice covered stream there was a marshallar advertising a little torp where a small crew were serving Svensk wafflor. Kan man bo bättre?
No kangaroos were seen. Tyvärr.
But I had a 7.5% tinny when I got back to Bastugatan.
TOM
Nice to have a change!
Hi Sandy, just to add to your vocabulary, another term for ‘ pub’ is ‘watering hole’.
It’s good to hear that you arrived. We look forward to checking in and seeing what you’re up to.
Cheers mate,
Maria & Alessandro 🙂
When do we resume our parralel lives again?
And here I am in Melbourne, dreaming of Sweden 🙂
Thanks for all the Stockholm details Tom. I almost want to be there. But not quite as all is sunny and warm here. But to get internet, I have to come into town to the pub!
That it is. Thanks Antropologa. Have you started packing yet?
Thanks Kylie. That is always a good one!
Thanks Maria & Alessandro!
HI James, All is well here. But out in the country as I am, getting on the internet is a problem!
Hi David,
Thanks for the comment. It’s funny how life works, isn’t it?
Comments on this entry are closed.