King Island

With John working on KI, and Seth keen for a visit, we needed an excuse to go. The 16th King Island Imperial 20 was just such an excuse.

In the days leading up to that main event, Seth and I travelled the length of the island, going from the lighthouse in the south to the lighthouse in the north - where I also went for a dive. And to my dismay, the diving was crap. Poor visibility. A few abalone - but I only ended up with one size one. And I was getting absolutely hammered by the sea. I do better in the Derwent, I thought to myself.

But I didn't give up. A couple of days later we found another spot near Currie - where we were staying. The blokes were our with their weathered trucks, stringing up kelp to take it to the kelp factory. And so we found a nice cove, and in I went. I found nothing at first, but I kept swimming. There were small ab about. Then I spotted it. A monster greenlip! And another one... they were everywhere. Abalone heaven. I picked up my ten ab in about half an hour. Notably, the water was quite warm compared to the traditional Hobart climes. So we cleaned and cooked ab all day, the day before the main event. Not sure of the wisdom of diving the day before.

For the record, the abalone recipe consisted of a layer of King Island Pork under a layer of King Island Abalone, under a layer of King Island smoked cheddar or King Island blue. That was then baked at 150degC for half an hour. Then consumed! These ab were thick and about 17 or 18cm long. Very big. Very tasty.

Then... the main event. The foot race from Naracoopa to Currie. 20 miles. 32km. To hell. The race didn't include the way back from hell. So many times did I just want to say "No, I don't want to do this. I just want to stop. And eat those sublime desserts that were at the KI cheese factory..." But I didn't. I made it in 2h34min51s. (roughly 30th out of about 70, though my handicap put me right at the back - maybe 60th of 70.) And my goodnes, it hurt! I now have only 7 toe nails - or maybe 10 - but I don't know where 3 of them are anymore.

Other highlights of King Island were the carcass competition and the cheese factory - not being a cheese eater, I just stuck to the tubs of dessert and was extremely impressed - and annoyed that I didn't get more. Belgian chocolate and Toffee caramel flavours.

The carcass competition related to the King Island Show that we missed - which was on the day before we arrived. All the animals were hooked up, and you could examine them all - the quality of the meat, etc. Some useful insights were gained into the food that I enjoy so much... kind of - it's still easier to just eat the stuff and not worry too much.

Perth Shenania

I got to Perth at the end of the month of February. It is indeed a place of gorgeous weather, tasty food and wine, and family. It was the family reunion/cousin wedding, and I managed to get 4 days there.

So, on the Saturday we went to the Swan Valley for a wine tour and a pretty tasty sort of lunch. Saturday night we ended up playing 500 till about 1am.

Sunday morning began with lawn bowls at the local bowls club. I scored 22 points in I forget how many ends. I am assured that it wasn't too bad for a first timer... It was a very relaxed morning that one. It was a 4pm wedding - so the early afternoon was spent beautifying myself. I wore a suit and a collared shirt. The wisdom of this was questionable as it was about 40degC and very muggy. It was a lovely wedding - albeit rather warm. We were a bit worried that there might have been some fainting action - the bride was well dressed and the bride and groomsman had three-piece suits. But all survived. There was a lovely bit of choking up during the vows... it made it that bit more real, I suppose - having said that, I can't recommend people intentionally choking up just to make it look a little bit more real. It'd be a bit silly really.

There was roughly half an hour break between the wedding and the reception - they were both at the winery in the Swan Valley. All the guests were needing water. Because the bar tab hadn't commenced the staff came around offering bottles of water for three bucks each. I received a death stare from one of them when I suggested to my brother that rather than get water, he should get beer, because "it'd probably be cheaper..." The reception was lovely. The speeches were quite tame - which was surprising considering some of the people involved (c'mon, they're related to me.) And then the dance floor! Nothing ventured nothing gained... but in the end, I probalby lost weight - it was a solid couple of hours of random girations. Having said that I did well off my aunt, a cousin and my sister-in-law, in terms of scoring another couple of half mains and the majority of an extra dessert... Weight probably held its own.

The next day I caught up with John from primary school and we went for a kayak on the Swan River. We cruised through the Perth Yacht Club, past boats that wouldn't have looked small next to Greg Norman's Aussie Rules. That was followed by a trip to a festival - it was a public holiday and so we weaved and dodged through the masses and eventually bought a fedora... or I did. I do like my fedora. It is very cool. It will feature in future blog posts. Major problem though: if I get a hair cut, my fedora won't fit.

Tuesday involved random wandering about Perth. I even ventured out to Claremont to the big music store there, feigning buying a clarinet so that I could have a play. No woodwind for four days would have been too much. Then the midnight plane to Melbourne, en route to King Island.