Yamba 2014 - Days 8&9

St Judes Church, Brushgrove

For a break in the normal routine, Tuesday included a trip to Grafton.

After Sue had her obligatory visit to Main Beach, we made the 40 minute trip by car to the home of Jacaranda. Sue had shopping to do - presents for family and friends - and I caught up with Bill North. Bill and I met when he was playing for City United in Tamworth and this marked our second lunch since he returned from overseas and took up the position of Sports Editor at the Daily Examiner.

We spent time discussing the World Cup and cricket and the theatre and many other points in between and did so with the Clarence River as our backdrop at the Crown Hotel on the sad end of Prince Street.

Sue had lunch with her sister Rosemary, solving many of the world's major problems and several of the smaller ones as well. Some lunches out are like that.

Once we both had farewelled our lunch partners, Sue and I paid a return visit to the Grafton Regional Art Gallery. The special exhibition was artworks to do with horses: made topical by the proximity of the Grafton Cup. The other exhibition which caught our eye was a display of photographs of aboriginal people taken in the late 1800's. An attempt is being made to identify the people in the photographs and the public display is part of that process. Most interesting.

We finished our day in Grafton with a tea at the Purple Haze Cafe, who nomenclature was disappointingly originated in the purple flowers of the Jacaranda tree and not from a love of all things Hendrix. Had it been the latter, the pleasant ladies who served us would have been the most unassuming Fox Ladies of all time.

On the Pacific Highway for the return journey to Yamba, we detoured at Cowper and crossed the South Arm of the Clarence to Brushgrove. This is the southern most tip of Woodford Island and a just a few kilometres from Gibbens Lane and the site of the 86 hectare farm where Sue and family were raised. At Brushgrove, St Judes Church has been rebuilt, but the old church in which John Gibbens and Joy Thomas were married still stands. It a lovely story of courage and determination being finally bested by the economics of circumstance and even thought the farmhouse has migrated up the hill and the farm buildings are no more than memories and a few remaining pieces of rusty metal, standing there and retelling stories I know well, still enhances my wife's sense of place.

We drove back along the South Arm and crossed the McFarlan Bridge into Maclean and stayed by the river all the way to Yamba. A few beers at the Pacific Hotel, a dinner at home and then a rare DVD hire rounded out the day.

Today, it was beach again this morning for Sue and a game of beach cricket which I somehow managed to miss.

I spend the morning and some of the afternoon working on a presentation I am giving at Muswellbrook next week, on behalf of the Black Dog Institute. In between, we had lunch at Pippis Cafe.
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Sue was shopping again this afternoon, until the sun made for the horizon. We went for a walk along Pippi Beach - me all bare foot and splashing in the incoming tide and Sue with her joggers on and up in the soft sand. A Pacific Hotel finish before dinner and then off to watch the football with Joel and Jack.

Yamba 2014 - Day One

The road beckoned ... screamed, actually. After months of watching nervous energy and the decision making of my son and his now new bride, two days after the wedding of the century, we answered it's call.

We didn't answer it quickly though. There were suits to return, items to pick up from scattered locations about out town and the last of our guests to farewell and there was ... as Dylan once put it ... one more cup of coffee for the road. Somewhere after mid morning, that suggested a fast approaching lunch, we left the city limits for Yamba on the NSW North Coast.

Our track was the more convention one, given that we are now towing the Avan Cruiser on it first excursion longer than a few days. North to Armidale and Glen Innes and the eats to Gratfon and Yamba.

The external temperature which had only just been in double figures when we left Tamworth, dropped suddenly as we crested the Moonbi Hills and started out plot along the Northern Tablelands and by the time we reached. Guyra for a late lunch, it was sleeting and 2C. The Caltex Roadhouse on the northern outskirts of town served up a roast lamb lunch and a bottomless mug of tea that hit the spot nicely but sooner, rather than later, we had to make a break for the car and the weather was foul.

After our turn to the east at Glen Innes through scenery which is always at its starkest on days like these, we had settled into the rhythm of the drive and I was noticing a sway in the trailer which hadn't been present on our shorter trips. It didn't take long to realise that mounting of the push bikes on the van's trailing bumper and the extra weight of a full pack of clothes and food, had changed the weight distribution and towing characteristics. Anti-sway bars will be necessary after this trip.

We had a brief stop at Gibraltar Range NP information kiosk and picnic area so Sue could stretch her back. It wasn't sleeting but it was still cold.

Down the mountain and onto the coastal plain under very light traffic conditions and on to Yamba. Arriving an hour after dark - something I am quick to criticise in others - we quickly and quietly set up like a well drilled team.

No traditional first night seafood as everything was shut!

The weather promises warmth and clear skies and we intend to hold it to its promise. Better still, we'll be meeting up with old friends, Markus and Virginia Richardson from Melbourne who are on their way home after completing the Big Loop. Rich stories to share.

Yamba 2013 - Day 1

Fish & chips for dinner

At times, Sue's incapacity can be awkward. Walking around with a time bomb ready to detonate between L4 and L5 is no easy task. Once carefree and willing to try anything, she lives with the danger of picking up shoes. Not a person easily given to limitation, any constriction is an irritant. Add a heavy cold and rain and her favourite place - yes, even more favoured than a certain European destination - and you have a frustrated wild child, fighting pointlessly with valour toward no end.

Then there's the little piece-picker-upper that is me.

Journeys represent significant workloads when your partner in time can't do much but sit there and look cute. You pack it all up, turn it all off, lock it all down ... drive for six hours with long breaks to allow for rest and recovery ... and then you do the reverse at the other end ... only to discover its raining and you have now caught the edges of the cold she has been snotting, coughing and wheezing up all week ...

... but it's not home, the ocean is out there through the fog somewhere and if you have a second, runaway home, this is it.

We were later than desired leaving Tamworth for a variety of technical reasons and weren't disappearing up the Cockburn River Valley towards Moonbi until most of the morning was spent. The rain which had arrived during the previous evening latched a towing rope to the Forester and tagged along with us for most the journey. A long stop at the roadhouse at Guyra for lunch and frivolous chatting was our first stop. We left well fed and laughing.

Everywhere on the tablelands was wet and cold and miserable. Sue had talked about work for most of the moments of the first leg of the journey to Guyra, so I set the iPod to classic rock and drowned out the background hum, eventually beating difficult personalities, inadequacies in the funding system and the heartbreak of children no one cares for ... etc ... into submission under a 4/4 beat. Deep Purple and Grand Funk Railroad finally put our holiday on the road.

The fog thickened as we headed north west and a departure point from the tablelands at Gibraltar Range NP. In late afternoon light muted by constant rain and fog, the giant ferns took on a deep green glow as the most obvious vanguards of might have been an advancing nature. The road seemed narrower today. Over the leap and down the mountain pass, the road sides closed in dramatically, with two landslides reducing us to a single lane and turn-taking with approaching mountain climbers. On the eastern side of the range, the cloud thinned to sunshine and the fog was frightened away by the warmer coastal air.

Our pace quickened as we met and travelled with the Mann River. Its odd topography makes it appear to be flowing uphill. Its other unusual trait, is being the same river you drive beside when you make the descent of the tablelands along the Old Grafton Road.

The rest of the trip was quick but we sill arrived after sunset. Having rented the same flat for nine years, there's always a comfort in opening the door.

The evening was spent in the company of family in the unit owned by Sue's brother Lance. It's always good to catch up by being in the same room. Despite smart phone, emails and social media keeping us "closer" than in the dark ages of my early adulthood, sitting across the table from an anecdote still rates as the superior experience. For Sue and I, spending some time with nephew John and niece Flick, was the most treasured of these few hours. Strong and independent and both studying law, their sharp minds and courageous spirit is a recommendation for the mother they lost in brutal suddenness only two months ago. As the crazy uncle, I play no favourites but I really enjoy their company. A light shines from both of them.

Bed ... rain ... the sound of an ocean angry that it's not permitted to sparkle ... and a warm doona.