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Bowlin’

As I disconcertingly approach twenty years in Australia I forget how many times I have been exposed to “the most highly anticipated Ashes series in history.” Only to be either irritated and / or bored senseless within the time it takes to make a dubious TV umpiring decision.

So, here we are again.

It’s funny how Australia (the cricket team) has irked me over the years, causing me to seek solace in Australia (the country). Give it thirty minutes or so among the gum trees and almost all is forgiven Warnie, Gillie, Mitcho, Smithy, Patty, Garry, and usually some guy slapping it about on “dayboo”. Even if the kookaburras knowingly cackle to rub salt in the wound (or sandpaper on the balls).

Meanwhile, the only time I get to wax lyrical about England is here on these pages, when I am focused on sharing the latest updates on pasties from Cornwall and vistas from a coast path. Indeed, there seems to be more English content for AI to regurgitate to the level of an eight-year-old than there is antipodean. Perhaps because England feels so exotic these days, what with its M&S biscuits and quirky place names and increasingly chaotic populist edginess.

Corners of Australia offer sanctuary from much of the nonsense, helped in part by third world internet and mobile blackspots. Purer, halcyonesque days of sandy toes and salty air, of flip flops floating on the incoming tide as whales flap within a deep blue sea. Places where some numpty on Facebook will film a short video montage to the title of ‘It kills me when people come to Australia and miss this pristine secret hideaway.’ If that’s what bloody well kills you then a) wait until you hear about the snakes and b) please, be my guest.

Since those sojourns in England we have been to the south coast of NSW at least three times by my reckoning. Twice in or around Tathra, where whales thrash their way down the Pacific Highway and prawns land upon the plate. There are friends to catch up with and walks through spotted gums to serpentine lagoons. And trips north or south to an array of small, unassuming coastal towns.

Eden made a change, a place I had not walked upon for several years but reassuringly familiar. There have been catastrophic fires and a pandemic and Trump x 2 and still the prospect over Twofold Bay is soothing to the soul. There is a lost paradise about this place, hidden within the rough edges.

Hidden too, the Bundian Way. An ancient 365km pathway from Turemulerrer (Twofold Bay) to the mountain ranges of Targangal (Mount Kosciuszko) that Aboriginal people from Yuin, Ngarigo, Jaitmathang, Bidawal Country have walked for thousands of years. Now rising in consciousness again following an impressive book and the development of an easy, accessible, beautiful couple of kilometres to start.

On the topic of hidden paradises, a golf course next to the sea would tick many boxes, especially for English cricketers busily training. Just north of Merimbula, Tura Beach has one, although the sea often remains hidden behind dunes and tea tree and banksia. These hazards are supplemented by protective plovers and swampy ponds and numerous retirees doddering along with their dogs. I never realised the entirety of Tura Beach was effectively a Goodwin retirement village.

Still, I might qualify soon. And being ‘of an age’, I have been trying to get into the swing of things again. This includes packing my golf clubs in the car and bringing them along for a coastal trip in the hope my darling wife will fancy a break from me and I’ll kill this time by hacking at a little white ball with a metal rod.

In hindsight perhaps I would have been better off with a siesta too. The recovery shots seem to be my forte, but then I get plenty of practice. Why don’t I just pretend I am smacking a low shot under some trees all of the time?

I could try fishing instead. Which takes me now to Mollymook and a tenuous link with Stein and his seafood cookery. Last time here we stayed above his restaurant overlooking the ocean eating noodles in a cup. This time, we stayed down in the Pavillion, eating at the golf club bistro. I guess, barring the noodles, this was a more downmarket affair.

This is possibly the most privileged paragraph ever written but I guess the problem with staying at Bannister’s Pavillion after previously staying at Bannister’s By The Sea is that you had previously stayed at Bannister’s By The Sea. The comedown is like being, say, 1/105 at lunch and then bowled out for 164. I mean the rooftop pool is pretty and that but what is with all the random gurgling and banging and knocking? Not to mention the parade of 5am Ford Rangers commuting back to the eastern suburbs of Sydney on a Monday morning just outside your room.

But, well, happy birthday me. The sun came out and the pool was inviting enough to dip in and we travelled a road well-travelled to get back home with familiar highlights along the way. Like Bendalong Bays and Kangaroo Valleys and Fitzroy Falls and Bundanoon Bakes. Familiarities becoming more familiar than scones and cream and Tesco and paying for air and countryside pubs. They, like test match wins, are the rarities. They the exotic.

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A lady walking along a coastal path
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Influential

There can’t be any more secret hideaways only the locals know about left. Someone calling themselves something like Travel_Insider100 has no doubt filmed a 10x speed video and overlayed it with circa 1998 fonts and shared it with their 22.8K followers who are all stunned at the location you would never believe is actually England and have since endeavoured to wild camp / swim / block the narrow lanes as soon as possible. Thus crumbles the likes of Pedn Vounder.

Now, if I had any influence whatsoever you would have known about the following secret hideaways more than fifteen years ago because they are places I go back to time and time again, usually to eat the same things, walk the same walks, take the same pictures, and espouse the same waffle. But you can’t blame me for any sudden influx of drones or sugar hit superficiality with a jingly soundtrack. I mean, you’d have to read my stuff for a start.

So off we go, again…

I believe I saw Kingsand and Cawsand recently pronounced as twin fishing villages like going back in time but without the crowds. Now in my earliest memories, there have always been some crowds, just not the crowds of St. Ives or Padstow. Unless it’s a stormy February, the ferry is always busy, the shorefront simmering away, the narrow lanes dotted with people gawping into tiny porthole windows. But there does linger a peaceful charm, even with Plymouth being just around the corner.

A calm cove with pink flowers in the foreground

A newer and arguably welcome development is a spot of half decent waterfront dining / snacking / drinking just as you scramble ashore from the ferry. There is an ice cream van also conveniently adjacent. In between eating savoury and sweet you can wander the lanes, bumble with the bees, cram into a tiny deli to suss out the local cheese, and just semi-seriously enquire as to the price of that vacant cottage. The ice cream is at least within reach.

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You’ll never believe what I have seen two or three times in the last few weeks. Someone has had a camera with them and had the ingenuity to discover one of the best half day walks on the South West Coast Path. It goes between Looe and Polperro, and, like many, I have discovered it before. It’s lovely and reasonably convenient and, yes, you can check out the top ten landmarks of Shipton Abbott if you wish. But for me the highlight is saving for a home deposit by skipping the car park fee at Polperro. There you go, a free travel hack.

A wonderful lady with a pasty and a seagull waiting with menace

Save your pennies instead for a Sarah’s pasty or two in Looe, only enjoyed on edge as murderous-eyed seagulls encircle. This provides more than enough nourishment for the undulations all the way to Talland Bay, where you can stock up again on cakes or ice cream or simply refresh with a cup of tea. Tea and tranquility the antidote to salty seagull frenzy.

I thought it was a short hop, skip and jump from here to Polperro but I underestimated the climbing which turns into a bit of a wheezy slog all the way up to a memorial cross. But it is the Polperro Parish memorial cross so that is something to commemorate, despite the village still out of sight.

A view of coastline and green hills through the trees

Walking along the coast path you’d have no idea Polperro is even nearby, such is the abrupt cleft in which the ocean creeps. It is only as you are almost upon it that an entire Cornish model village reveals itself in a glare of whitewashed cottage and kaleidoscope of bunting. The soundtrack is all gull and diesel trawler, the smells seaweedy pilchard with the odd waft of tidal mud. Lobster pots are as ubiquitous as postcards. Lanes are there for getting lost.

A picturesque harbour with cottages and boats

As we pottered about gradually inching towards the top of town and a bus stop, it was pleasing to see that some evil genius had propped open the toilets with a container of kerosene. No 60p fee today, times two. Maybe this is the best budget-saving half day adventure in Cornwall after all? Just make sure you use the toilets, free or not, because it sure is a long two pound bus ride back to Plymouth.

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Bus wankers. But check this out. People in 2025 actually being friendly and talking with one another on a bus! How quaint in white lettering with a black background. This amazing experience can happen on the 35 from Ham Green to Plymouth City Centre, where every stop is bustling with old dears and yet another hopeful pram. An old geezer in a flat cap is the latest addition, greeting the blue rinse set with a healthy morning ladies in dulcet Janner tones and a twinkle in his eye.

It almost seems a shame to pick up a car, but also not a shame at all because this is offering the chance to revisit places virtually out of reach of public transport. In cool late afternoon sunshine we head to the north coast of Cornwall, where I am keen to nudge speed limits in a quest for lush green pastures and sparkling blue sea and dream-like cake. Is Boscastle Farm Shop the best place for refreshments on the South West Coast Path?

Tea and cake and clotted cream and green hills with cows and blue sea below

The happiness of life at this point in time is amplified by free parking after 4pm and a walk out to the headlands of Boscastle Harbour. It is a tad blustery and the waves are reasonably wavy, a state of affairs garnishing the dramatic beauty of what may or may not be Dragonstone. Dark slabs of rock at angles forged in the earth’s furnace mighty enough to stand up to the swelling, pulsating ocean. Cosplay Targaryens blissfully absent.

A sinewy harbour in a narrow valley

Coastal plants with a bridge and rocks in the background

A dramatic island linked to the coastline by a suspension bridge

So another travel hack is to arrive at places like this late in the day, but not so late that the farm shop has closed. Tintagel is equally as quiet, the town sleepy with an air of desperation, the headlands peaceful with an air of salt and ozone. It’s late enough for the castle to be closed and free entry to a little part of it, the mainland part of it. Good value if you are walking the coast path penniless, fabricating encounters and manipulating illness to write a book or something.

It turns out all the characters are down at Trebarwith Strand, seemingly gathering for some kind of birthday or Friday night supper in the encroaching gloam. Bodies adorn and litter the rocks and I can only imagine slow shutter speed sunset seekers tut-tutting and rolling their eyes. The beach is disappearing as quickly as the light and even quicker than any remote hope of a majestic sky.

A rugged beach with late sun and reflections from a rock pool

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Hey, have you heard of this crazy type of rain? The locals call it mizzle and you should definitely not check it out. Despite looking innocuous it soaks you to the bone and lures you towards cliff edges. There is a sea down there somewhere but you can hardly hear it because this incredible precipitation phenomenon also absorbs sound. Wow, living my best life.

Yet for its very damp bleariness there is cocoon-like comfort associated with a walk in the mizzle. From far-reaching vistas the focus shifts to the immediate and mundane; your breath and your footsteps, the infinite shades of long grass below, the teardrop of water coagulating upon the tip of a leaf. The outline of a shady Hotel Camelot and a cat on a wall. It’s not clearing, so bugger it let’s go and get a hot drink.

A misty view of cliffs with a signpost and overlooking wild seas

If Tintagel was a little downbeat the evening before, early morning was positively ghostly. There is probably a tall tale of the spectre of a headless knight roaming the streets here seeking plastic swords and a genuine pasty. Today they are reincarnate in the bus load of German tourists that have found themselves in a branch of The Cornish Bakery, ordering pasties and bitter black coffee at ten in the morning. I feel both delighted and deflated at the realisation that their lasting impression of an iconic delicacy will be that thing there.

I just hope their cream tea experience proves more impressive. Mine certainly does. It’s a scene almost worth filming and sharing a smartarse clip where you break open the scones and zoom in on the jam and slather the cream all over a camera lens and then stroll beside the sunny cottages decorated with bright flowers hand in hand. But I don’t want to influence you or, frankly, encourage you. It is all mine to remember. Or mostly mine, for there is nothing finer than seeing your new wife embrace this experience with gusto. Totally under the influence.

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‘Twas four weeks before Christmas

Is December 25 any more than an arbitrary date? That one day where it was decided the shops would be shut and we should horde food as if the end of the world was nigh (possibly true). That one day when we all pretend to love Brussels sprouts and Christmas pudding. That one day when instead of miserable news on the radio in the morning, there is earnest preaching and high-pitched singing about miraculous events from afar. That one day when we are supposed to gather with loved ones. That one day to share things before the next lockdown.

I will happily oblige in the festivity and jolliness of December 25 and even tolerate a few Brussels sprouts as long as there is enough gravy to mask their evil. I shall do so again this year, perhaps taking in a prawn or two and a glass of chilled wine as I sweat profusely under a thirty degree sun. It should be pleasant enough, but in reality I feel like I have had my Christmas Day in 2021 already.

To be frank, by time it reaches November 28 in the UK it feels like you should all bloody well have had your Christmas Day by now! For weeks beforehand, the same five Christmas songs have been playing ad infinitum on Heart. Soft toy carrots have been flying out the doors of Aldi. Christmas lights from Poundland sparkle and shimmer outside every three or four houses as you drive down the street. Shopping is madness and the insanity of retail staff bombarded by Christmas music is plain to see.

Besides, the Christmas Day of November 28 2021 was one of the most magical in years. It was a day that dawned crisp and clear in the little town of Plymouth. All was calm. All was bright. While magical mother elves stayed at home to prepare a feast, I set off across the rolling green fields of South Devon. Follow the car. It stopped initially in some free parking alongside the river in Dartmouth. For a coffee before getting going, out onto the infinite gift that is the South West Coast Path.

It is here that I need to bring in a fictional character who wears bright clothes, often bellows with much jollity and possibly keeps a list of good and naughty children in a little red book. Naturally, I always thought of Michael Portillo as a bit of a posh tory twerp. But in his reinvention as doyen of trains and intrepid traveller who displays surprising warmth and rapport with the people he comes across, he is – well – incredibly likeable.

During the latter half of the year in Australia a show came on which was – for me at least – dream lockdown viewing (naturally it was on SBS). Michael Portillo going on a walk along the South West Coast Path. It was a bit of a departure from train japes Michael. A COVID-era Michael, who was wistful and introspective and possessing of fewer lime green jackets. It was simply a guy going for a walk along the most beautiful path in the world. On my country.

I remember an episode that commenced at Start Point and finished on the edge of Dartmouth, and the scenes on my walk today followed a small part of the same route. I set off from a car park at a spot called Little Dartmouth, quickly connecting to the coast path. There was an unmatched tranquillity about today, from the placid blue of the sea to the gentle undulations of the fields. Occasional sail boats emerged out of the Dart. Cows grazed contentedly. Robins flitted and chirped unseen among the browned hedges and trees.

After a delectable snack on a delectable bench overlooking serenity, the path soon led to Michael’s massive pole – a signpost at a junction ensuring everyone is kept on track. Only weirdoes like me would give this a second glance, but the signpost boasts a unique feature – installed by M.P. 2021. In locked down Canberra, taking comfort sharing in Michael’s frequent torment (somehow, a pleasant walk on a gorgeous coast path is way outside of his Kensington & Chelsea comfort zone), I thought there would be something fitting about making the pilgrimage to this spot. In many ways, it was still unbelievable that I could be here, just a few weeks on.

Anyway, no camera crews and gold-plated chauffeur driven cars for me, I must trudge on. Before long the path turns from the sea and follows the Dart estuary. Here, the other main motive for my walk today emerges – Dartmouth Castle and, more specifically, the presence of a café. I opt for the safety of a cup of tea and pick up some form of caramel and chocolate and biscuit. Many others are doing the same, sat outside overlooking the river from a generous array of benches. Attracted by my crumbs, a robin comes to offer company. And I am reminded how I shouldn’t eat too much and ruin my dinner.

Luckily, there is a fair chance to walk off some of the food with a steep climb up to Gallants Bower, an old hill fort offering lofty views back towards Dartmouth and, of course, out to sea. With this effort and the still sparkling afternoon sunshine I am actually starting to feel quite warm. For what I believe was the only time outdoors on this trip, I peel down to just a jumper.

I should get a move on for a date with another jumper though. Whenever the last time I was here during Christmas (maybe 2015?), I was lovingly gifted a Christmas jumper. It’s not the kind of thing that suits Australia and so it has sat gathering that musty smell in a drawer in a small room in Plymouth. In many ways I am surprised it is getting more than the one use, thankful that it is allowing me to fit in with the other elves who assemble for our Christmas dinner.

Roast pork and potatoes and parsnips. Veggies and stuffing and gravy. Pigs in blankets with crappy crackers and paper hats. That warm, rosy feeling of bodies crammed in a small space accompanying wine and noise and condensation on the windows. The lights, the very many sparkling lights. Secret Santa presents adding to the complexities of fitting everything in a suitcase. Funny quizzes and roaring, unstoppable, contagious laughter. Comfort and joy and belonging, providing culmination to a Most Perfect day which has been so long, too long, in coming. The gift of family and home. Merry November 28.

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Just out of town

In November 2021 I never expected I would be drier in southwest England than I would have been remaining in southeast Australia. And while it was certainly far short of wall-to-wall sunshine, most days provided conditions suitable enough for forays outdoors. Prepare for downpours, gales, and mud and most of the time expectations will be surpassed.

The more challenging aspect of the season was getting used to the rapidly shrinking presence of daylight and then – once any sun had disappeared – bracing for six hours or so to occupy yourself before bed. Often in life I will take a walk towards the end of day but here the prospect of outdoors before or after dinner is so unappealing that you find yourself more comforted by watching The Chase with Bradley Walsh. That’s not the greatest state of affairs so the best thing to do is make sure you get out at some point into the daylight before it gets cut short. Even if this is just down the road.

Take Wembury, which is essentially Plymouth’s premier beachside suburb. A place you go to retire or fund the National Trust through parking fees. It’s not the most sparkling beach in the world but possesses a raw enough quality to blow away the city cobwebs, with plenty of nooks and crannies and pools and items on a café menu for exploration.

During the Saturday of Storm Arwen, cobwebs were certainly braced to be blown away but there was also surprising shelter to be had in the lee of a gusty nor’wester. Accompanied by Mum and Brooke, conditions were apt for a spot of beachcombing and hide and seek and trying to escape the clutches of Brooke wanting to play yet more hide and seek. Café menu exploration was a little more disappointing, a reduced list of items and takeaway only evocative of a sombre this-is-living-with-COVID-(before-Omicron) air.

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Frolicking on a bright and breezy beach there is a good case to argue that storm force winds are preferable to the old classic enshrouding by drizzle. A Plymothian occurrence so regular that it feels like an innate part of your soul. The kind of day where going into town to pick up a jam donut from Sainsburys and a pack of free test kits seems appealing.

Still, it wasn’t torrential rain and I packed my waterproof in order to escape to the moors afterwards. You can marvel at this landscape for miles around on blue sky days but it feels more at peace with itself when hunkered down in the murk. The trees seep with moisture, their trunks wrapped in bright green moss while their withered roots thrust down into the crevices of a dry stone wall. Smoke rises from the dour, sturdy blocks of a farmhouse, looking out over swathes of browned bracken and the shattered granite piercings of a couple of tors. Crossing the land, lichen sprayed boulders prove a slippery adversary in between the boggy hollows where unkempt sheep stagger around on their spindly legs.

It’s a timeless, peaceful scene, captured not so far from Plymouth around Sheepstor. Sure, the arrival of two armoured troop carriers interrupted things for a time at Burrator, but other than that it was all pretty uneventful.

I love immersing myself in the landscape on a circular walk here, a walk I have revisited at different times of the year. Starting at the dam wall, the route takes in peaceful wooded paths, narrow country lanes, a small hamlet whose cottages cluster around an old church, countryside views, sounds and smells, and the final rocky ascent of Sheepstor. From this vantage, views south to the sea, west over Burrator, the Tamar Valley and Bodmin Moor, and north and east to the rugged, foreboding empty uplands of Dartmoor.

Today, by time I reached Sheepstor the murk had lifted a touch and the world below expanded. That was probably thanks to our old friend the wind, which offered a reminder atop the rocks of the need for more clothing. Forgetting my gloves, I would be pleased to return to the car, to Plymouth, and to a warm living room watching Bradley Everywhere Walsh.

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As the crow flies (in volatile winds), Whitsand Bay is but a few miles from downtown Dempourt / Devonport. Literally around the corner yet a place that feels another world away. This sense of exoticism is bolstered when traversing the Tamar aboard the Torpoint Ferry. Nothing like a water crossing to evoke those island vibes.

I suppose at the eastern end of the bay, Rame Head is almost an island. Just a narrow neck of land bridging across to a rocky outcrop rising volcano-like above the foaming ocean. A perfect destination to head off for alone as Storm Arwen approaches.

An earlier slip on a steep bank of mud boded well, and that was before a blustery shower deposited further grease along the South West Coast Path. If there was an upside, it was the presentation of drama and wildness and awe captured underneath a rainbow. The pot of gold being this is just around the corner from a large city, remember.

Other than that shower, I somehow managed to stay dry. And upright. The crossing to Rame Head wasn’t quite as scary as I expected; wider, drier, calmer, at least until the lee of the land subsided. The small stone ruin sitting upon Rame Head possessed nooks offering refuge and in other places a full on wind tunnel. Exiting the door proved the biggest challenge to remaining upright.

As I leaned into the wind to return to wider land, further rainbows came and went over delectable countryside and plunging coastline. The small shacks littering the sides of the cliffs flitted rapidly between sun and shade, beaming and fading. One of them somewhere over there might reward me with a cuppa.

Not just a cuppa, but also a scone with jam and cream. An outcome in this part of the world as inevitable as the swell of the sea releasing its force upon the land, or the onset of a good old-fashioned Plymouth drizzle. Or the likelihood that you’ll get back to a cosy indoor sanctuary and find Bradley Bloody Everywhere Walsh on the TV. Get out of town.

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Down on the south coast

Apparently, the Cornish pasty has been a feature of the British diet since the 14th century. Originally the preserve of rich inbred gentry it wasn’t until the 18th century that the pasty became a nourishing treat for the masses. Today, go to any coastal town or village in Cornwall and the pervasiveness of pasties for the people persists.

In some spots the choice can appear bewildering. This includes the chainstorisation of Britain making its presence felt at heavily branded outlets offering crafted goods from industrial Solihull. But at the other end of the scale, it’s possible you may stumble across bona fide nooks hidden down narrow passageways, replete with evocative odours and large steel trays of steaming hot goodness fresh from the oven.

Looe has such a place (along with the odd chain) and it’s become a site of regular pilgrimage, competing with a cream tea in the what-will-Neil-eat-first adventure. Today – a Monday at the end of November – Looe is unusually becalmed. Indeed, many shops and eateries are closed. But thankfully Sarah’s is trading and offering a few remaining pasties as the day nears half one. Despite tending towards lukewarm, a two and a half year gap in this experience generates immense delight with that first bite.

Eating beside the seafront, the tide is low. Apart from the beach, this doesn’t exactly provide the most favourable impression of Looe. The river estuary empties to leave a patchwork of boats tilting high and dry. Salty seaweed spreads across oozing mud, offering a pungency almost as bad as the aroma of entrails swept from the fish market. And of course, everywhere, seagulls lurk desperate for winter pasties few and far between.

So, after a pause to collect further delicacies at Roly’s Fudge, Mum and I hot foot it out of town and head on to Polperro. This is – on paper – a more charming prospect though one you’d do well to steer clear of in the height of summer. That’s why I thought we could give it a shot today.

Indeed Polperro was quiet. Deathly quiet. Barely anything was open but this didn’t deter two very Polperro occurrences. First, we have the sight of a delivery van somehow trying to squeeze through a gap between whitewashed cottages as locals roll their eyes knowingly at one another. And secondly, there remains the rip-off parking on a cold grey day in November when jack all is open.

I expected non-summertime parking rates but forgot this was Polperro where the emphasis appears to be on doing everything possible to deter day trippers. As one of a handful, I felt a touch conspicuous trawling the streets with my camera and decided it was a good day to warm my head with a Plymouth Argyle beanie and thus parade – admittedly Devonian – credentials.

In low sun, the beanie was a handy addition as half of the village sat in perennial shade. While a series of cute cottages on the east side of the harbour beamed in fine, holiday-let whitewash, others faded into the dark and damp recesses of an impending winter. Striding out to the headland I could see Mum sat on a bench on the quay in the last receding corner of sun. And with a brief hello to the South West Coast Path, I set off back down through the shade to join her.

By now we were both thinking afternoon treat, or at least a coffee beside the tidal mud. But of course, nothing suitable was open. Being here in November was to prove both a blessing and a curse; cherishing the lack of bother and stress associated with thousands of tourists, taking advantage of quicker than usual drives and – sometimes – free parking, yet being more at mercy to the weather and missing out on some of the usual local treats and delicacies (I never did end up having an ice cream for instance).

A similar picture played out a little further along the south coast on a different jaunt to Fowey. At picturesque Readymoney Cove, where I parked nearby for free, the kiosk supposedly open year round was obviously shut. Yet I was able to drive through the town and park again by the water, a prospect unfathomable in summer. Here at least a few spots were open and a coffee carried through attractive streets to a riverside bench offered contentment.

Lunch was a different matter, in brief taking in the disavowal of cold pasties in Fowey, a fruitless search for something in Lostwithiel and dismissal of a covidy café at a hoity toity garden centre (seriously, why not let us sit outside?). As a result, lunchtime had been and gone and options were running out. The last real opportunity was to return to Looe.

If you’ve actually been reading any of this babble you would know a pasty was a possibility here. But I was concerned at what would be left on the tray and how warm it might be. And the clock was clearly ticking over towards afternoon cream tea territory. So, we took a punt off the main drag, up a small hill. A short deviation that I’m sure will be repeated again. Daisy’s Café added to the what-will-Neil-eat-first adventure list. Making Looe the place where a wicked dilemma can finally be resolved: is it possible to have a pasty and cream tea on the same day? Roll on 2022!

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A year of discovery

This morning I ploughed headlong towards frustration after being unable to discover where I had stored a series of empty jars. Receptacles for random concoctions of cream, fruit and sugar, hopeful Jars of Joy 2020. I reckon I shifted them somewhere back in March, clearing space for tins of tomatoes and dried lentils full of grit.

Fruitless, I gave up and went for a walk. Half an hour later I found myself in the comforting arms of countryside, reflecting on how this has actually been – astonishingly – a year of discovery. Fringing a paintball play area, rising up through pines giving off an essence of Christmas, straddling the divide between the Capital Territory and New South Wales.

Border Walks could become the 2021 sequel to 2020’s Centenary Trail. Just don’t hop over the border if you want to visit <insert as appropriate depending on the hour of the day>.

It really is quite astonishing how a year of restriction has somehow enforced greater discovery. A more immersive experience of place. Not just in the country roads and country towns, the trails and bike rides, the parks and reserves. I have also discovered exactly how long it takes to use a roll of toilet paper, how to use my phone to read QR codes and – earlier in the year – the threshold for hazardous air quality. It’s been quite the ride.    

It’s crazy to think this time last year we were enduring a ferocity of fire and fury. But not forgotten. The recent whistling of easterly wind changes bringing cool air around dusk prompts memories of orange skies and choking campfire smells. The scars linger not so far from home.

In the 2020 spirit of discovery, and with an eye to having a short break before mass holiday superspreading madness, I passed through several areas that were decimated a year ago on my way to the coast. The top of Clyde Mountain still astonishes in – today – a damp misty haze. Vivid ferns and tangled vines twist their way around solid black trunks. It is still too early to tell if some of these trees will ever make it back. 

Down the hill I stop briefly in Batemans Bay, where an impressive new bridge is spanning the Clyde. An altered horizon which – from a certain angle if you squint a bit – resembles the Brooklyn Bridge. Sun emerges from behind the showers that have been accompanying me all morning, continuing their work of recovery and subterfuge.

I’m heading for a couple of nights in Bermagui, some 125 kilometres further south. The extra distance worth it to escape the worst of the Canberra holiday set. And, of course, for the opportunity to discover, since I have only ever passed through this small town in the past.

What did I find? Well, it has one high street boasting the contrasting styles of Bazza’s Hot Bread and Boneless Vegetarian Café. It is fringed by a lovely headland area full of green space and convenient benches to gaze out to the ocean. And just yards from a vegan soy latte is the most perfect bay of white sand. From Horseshoe Bay, the dominant hulk of Gulaga lends the scene a tropical Queensland kind of air.

Either side of Bermi, the coastline is punctuated by largely pristine inlets and lakes, ideal for waterbirds and kayaks and the whole area is popular with fisherfolk. BCF buckets and ragged singlets are incongruent with the shiny, expensive boats parked outside Woolworths. A sizeable wharf provides anchorage, the fetid smell of stagnant salt water and fish guts detectable in the air. The promise of fish and chips and ice cream makes this a blight worth bearing.  

One of the annoying things I discovered about Bermagui was that the fish and chip shop closes at 7pm. I discovered this around 7:07pm. Even more unfathomable, the ice cream spot – while I was there at least – closes at 5. I suppose, true to form, 2020 wouldn’t be 2020 without a couple of disappointments; I’ll just have to pivot.

As it turned out, in my extensive, laborious investigation I came to the personal conclusion that the ice cream from Bodalla Dairy was superior to Bermagui’s Gelati Clinic anyway. It tastes creamier and the flavours are more interesting. Not to mention the cute setting, in the midst of what has returned to being lush, green countryside. You feel as though the cows are creating magic just out the back. In situ, it’s similar to how Beaufort cheese tastes better in Beaufort.

I am reminded of a show on TV this week in which Rick Stein worked his way through eight courses featuring local cheese in a rustic auberge in the Jura. If ever a moment had me longing for international travel again that was it. Not exactly equivalent but probably as good as it gets, Australia has Tilba Tilba. So good they named it twice.

I really adore Tilba and I’m pretty sure a big part of that is the presence of a creamery bringing the goodness of Jersey cows to fruit. I’ve never actually seen the Jersey cows, but you can sense it’s good pasture, even more so a year on from drought. In the foot of Gulaga, there is a bounteousness here that is unparalleled south of the Queensland border.

Gulaga is especially significant to the Yuin People, particularly women. Even for these Anglo, invader eyes of mine there is an inescapable presence to the mountain. It draws you in, looming up behind the decorative facades of colonial cottages, appearing between rocky boulders in the landscape, spilling down into rainforest gullies and thickets of long grass, teeming with a cacophony of cicadas and the flutter of giant butterflies. Host to hundreds of snakes.      

I was delighted to not encounter any snakes on a new walk that I just happened to stumble across, like so many great discoveries in this great southern land. One day I might just stumble across a massive gold nugget like one of those lucky bastards. Today, a loop walk through fields of green will do well enough. Finished off with a few golden purchases in the dairy.

South of Tilba, the Princes Highway skirts Gulaga and heads inland on its way to Bega. Before now I have always taken the alternative coastal route, via Bermagui and Tathra. And so, conveniently drawing on an overly-contrived theme, I found myself discovering a new piece of road. Destined for a date with a bevy of pretty ladies.

In fair Verona, where we lay our scene, I greet an old friend who used to help me undertake research with young people. I’m not sure it’s such a leap from this to keeping around a hundred alpacas in champion order. At Wedgetail Rise Alpacas, Annemarie takes me on a guided tour of a landscape that wouldn’t be too out of place in our native lands. Apart from some still too obvious discrepancies.

Verona is situated between Cobargo and Quaama, small villages that have become synonymous with our Black Summer. While the great green cover-up continues apace, it is not hard to see the brutal impact still lingering on the ridges and penetrating through the gullies. The comeback is patchy, the torment of weeds opportunistically filling the void to add a further challenge. The characteristic isolated brick chimney stack, that potent symbol of devastation, is never far away.

In Cobargo itself it is hard not to sense a community still in shock, still slowly rebounding. I can only imagine how the permanent presence of blackened hills plays on the psyche. While much of the main street stands, vacant plots tell of the randomness of fire.

If ever there was justification for my mission to support local communities through coffee and cake, then surely it was here. And – oh look – there’s a second-hand bookshop. Christmas presents from a community-run endeavour like this trump K Mart hands down. And, in a somewhat pleasing memory of life before 2020, they only accept cash.

My remaining time down on the coast was largely filled with discovering ways to fill time before it was acceptable to have lunch, when the fish and chip shop would actually be open. A final hurrah before making my way back home, a necessary item on the coast trip checklist. Another earnest sacrifice to contribute to the local economy.

The last morning was overcast but calm and within my car I had a little red rocket on two wheels. One of the big discoveries of 2020 is a) how beautiful my bike poses in random locations and b) how there is a freedom that comes with a ride which doesn’t quite happen on two feet or four wheels. The unimpressive pace of my cycling is just about perfect to gain some decent ground while never going too fast to make the surroundings whizz by in a blur.

Quite wonderfully a cycle path cut a swathe through Bermagui onto a quiet road leading up and down to Haywards Beach. Greeting me, a rugged, sweeping stretch of sand flanked by dunes and low shrubs. Where the road came to an end, a decent trail – part worn tarmac and fine gravel – followed the bay. Curls of crystal surf competed for attention with overhanging branches. Beyond, I found myself heading towards Wallaga Lake and yet more waterside attractions. The turnaround point came at a headland where a midden of shells proved testament to the abundance of this area. Abundance in which I could now quite justifiably indulge back in Bermagui.

And so, as the sun goes down on the year and the battering that is 2020 disappears in a pile of batter, we can only hope that the next year heralds something of an improvement. And while 2020 is a year we may well be super keen to forget, let us not easily disregard the many good things, the many discoveries that we have all made in our own little way. Among the ashes, among the difficulties, the resilience, the humanity, the nuggets of joy. Or jars of joy. If only I could find the bloody things.    

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Classic hits

Have you ever noticed how much airtime commercial radio stations use boasting about all of the epic hits they play? To the extent that jingles boasting about the epic hits they play outweigh the actual amount of epic hits they play. Many of which are not epic, incidentally. Maroon 5 here’s looking at you. 

It was on the road between Cooma and Nimmitabel that such jingles disappeared into an annoying crackle. Luckily, I was still able to pick up the ABC, midway between the first innings of Tasmania v South Australia. The soporific summer tones of balls making their way through to the keeper settled me into a groove, on an undulating, barren expanse of the Monaro. Alas, even that became interrupted, crossing to the FRADULENT VICTORY SPEECH OF SLEEPY JOE AND <INSERT RACIST MYSOGINIST DOGWHISTLE> KAMALA. SAD.

Afterwards, a dose of Springsteen would have been perfect. Or the soon-to-be-famous You’re a Big Fat Lonely Loser by Echo Chamber and the Orangemen. But by time I reached Pipers Lookout any pretence at radio signal had vanished altogether. Instead, play had been pressed on track one on my own classic hits of the Far South Coast.

Because it’s such an easy stop there’s no reason not to stop, even if you have stopped here many times before. It’s just like one of those pull-outs along an American Highway, offering dazzling vistas without requiring any physical exertion. Upon the edge of the Great Divide, the landscape plunges down Brown Mountain through lush rainforest gullies into the Bega Valley. Beyond this rumpled green tablecloth, a sliver of sea.

The sea, I had not seen thee since mid-June. In that period, waves and whales have come and gone. But with our flipped around climate, the countryside has been as soothing as water lapping at a half moon bay. At the head of the Bega Valley, Bemboka again defying the reality of hell and fury that was ten months before. Only close attention picks up the charred matchsticks of trees atop the rugged wilderness to the north.  

Tathra marks the point at which the country meets the ocean and – at historic Tathra Wharf – another classic hit. Only this was one of those hits that you hear again many years later and feel slightly disappointed. It’s like a café in the perfect location that serves good coffee but decides to warm up a muffin and turn the delicious dollop of icing into a slimy gravy. Why do places do this without consent? The same with brownies. Frankly, warm brownies are glorified sponge cakes, a cold, dense, gooey pocket of rich chocolate ruined.

Of course I still ate warm muffin gloop and was starting to think I should work some of it off nearby. Somewhere new, somewhere different. For classics can also emerge in an instant. At Wajurda Point a viewing platform looked out over Nelson Beach, golden light emanating from the bush-clad hills and filtering through the ocean spray. On the beach, a lone silhouette provoked envy. Take me there.

Thirty minutes later I was accompanied by a choir of rainbow lorikeets, whip birds, and bellbirds as I made my way through a beautiful pocket of forest to the beach. I was now that lone silhouette heading north to an isthmus of sand melting into Nelson Creek. The topography of the creek, completing an entire 180 degree loop and widening into a lagoon is striking in its similarity to that of Merimbula. Only without the houses and cars and oyster beds and franked up boomers. 

As good as anywhere to whip out my airline blanket circa 2010 for a brief rest. Pause.

As tempting as it was, I couldn’t linger here forever. Time moves on and to tell the truth it was starting to feel a wee bit nippy in the sea breeze. Barely twenty degrees. I rounded the bend into the lagoon for more sheer serenity, interrupted by and interrupting a fretful mother and its baby. I read that the pied oystercatcher was listed as endangered in New South Wales and I felt a little bad inadvertently getting between the two. Not that the youngster seemed to care, such is the innocence of youth.

It is quite the juxtaposition to go from here to KFC Bega. Like Korn following Bach. Where the incompetence of youth rises to the fore like mashed potato in a plastic cup of gravy. It wasn’t all their fault; it seems half the population of Bega picks up Sunday dinner here. To the extent that COVID-capacity limits become dubious.

Quite astonishingly I was stopping in Bega for the night, hence such fine dining. Not only was this the first time I had stayed in Bega, it was also the first time I had stayed anywhere other than home since the very start of March. Six wicked wings and a takeaway salad from Woolworths in my motel room seemed an appropriate way to mark the occasion.

Bega is the kind of place you drive past or through on the way to Tathra or Merimbula or Eden or – even – the amazing COVID-free state of Victoria. Known for a mass-produced cheese, it’s not the most fashionable or affluent-looking town. But given I’ve been enamoured by understated country towns of late, it will do me just fine.

The next morning I decided I should give Bega a fair shake of the sauce bottle and wandered down towards the river. What I came across were weatherboard homes and verandas possessing a touch of ramshackle elegance. The town quickly gave way to generous green pasture, married with the chirpy sounds of spring. In a small portion of time I was in the country and not just any country. A country pretending at being Devon. It’ll be the closest I get this year.    

I would stay in Bega again but – crucially in the ‘I could live here’ assessment – I cannot yet testify to its quality of coffee. Keen to get back on the greatest hits tour, I determined my morning coffee should be at Bar Beach, Merimbula. A spot probably eclipsing that at Tathra Wharf and without the indignity of a melted muffin.

It was Monday – my day off – and surprising how many other people appeared to have time on their hands. Not just the usual array of wealthy retirees but paddle-boarding mums and surfing bums, living their best #vanlife. I fancy the odd person, like myself, was a wily Canberran lingering into a long weekend. Victorians seemingly absent.

Next on the tour was Pambula Beach or, to be precise, the Pambula River. Probably the standout track, the one that you revisit time and time again. When the sun is out here the clarity of colours defies belief, dazzling through the shadow of trees as you emerge from your car. The white sands leading you further into the heart of the river, ever-changing and reforming into crystal pools and sapphire swirls. One thing lacking – this time at least – was the backing track of bellbirds, quietened by the fresh wind funnelling through the valley.

The triumvirate of this hit parade is Eden and – specifically – fish and chips (or fish cocktails and potato scallops) down by the wharf. The crunchiest, most golden potato cakes this side of the border. My last memory of them was just before the end of 2019, a day or two before Mallacoota happened and when, a few days subsequently, this wharf became a shelter of last resort. Thankfully, the core of Eden remained intact and I was keen to do my usual diligent duty of supporting the local economy by eating its food.  

Much like The Rolling Stones, Eden Wharf had seen better days. Horror hit me when I discovered a ‘closed for good’ sign in my favourite scallop shop. Not only this, but every other outlet on the wharf looked abandoned. As if a pandemic had rolled in and wait… I wondered if business had been decimated by the double whammy of bushfires and COVID COVID COVID. Only later did I learn that the wharf building had been closed down because it was deemed unsafe.

Eden could do without 2020 I reckon. Paradise Lost. My only hope is that talk of food trucks becomes reality so that the town can benefit from Victoria reopening and a steady stream of summer visitors. For me, I would have to seek solace in potato scallops elsewhere.

It was back up the road in Pambula that I discovered Wheelers, famed for its oysters, also had a fish and chip takeaway. The fish was great (if a little on the small side) and the chips – strictly fries – were also surprisingly good. Only the two potato scallops, pale and insipid, left me deflated.

The good news was that I could take the takeaway back to the Pambula River, on a perfect stone seat sheltered from the wind. In cream tea terms, this was like Fingle Bridge – perfect setting, decent food. Is it a classic worthy of repeat? Well, only time will tell. For now, I have to press rewind, back over that mountain, once again to the overwhelming familiarity of home, radio signals and all.

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Another Day Out!

Stretching even further afield for a day trip down to the South Coast of New South Wales…

Clyde Mountain

Around the top of Clyde Mountain, vivid green growth flourishes almost six months following the devastating bushfires of summer. Away from the road, it’s a serene, mesmerising world filled with gentle birdsong. Heading down the mountain, different stages of recovery are discernible: from vibrant thickets to some very barren, charred terrain with little new growth in sight – clearly subject to fire of such intensity that it may never fully recover.

Broulee

At Broulee there is an island that isn’t really an island but is almost an island attached to the Australian mainland by a narrow neck between Broulee Beach and Shark Bay. No sharks spotted today but best to keep out of the water!
Shark Bay
Approaching something close to 18 degrees with only light winds, sheltered spots at least prompt consideration of short sleeves. While a little cloud bubbles up from time to time, the views out to sea and back to the coastal ranges are striking.

Burrewarra Point

A rugged headland offers a maze of rambles through coastal heath dotted with flowing Banksia. At one point a couple of seals are pointed out to me by a man wistfully seeking whales. However, the largest lump sighted on the distance horizon proves to be the spiritual peak of Gulaga.

Guerilla Bay

Guerilla Bay seems a little off the beaten track. Grand homes and shacks hide in the bush. No shops or cafes to tempt the tourists. And a cove reachable only with a little instinct and good fortune.
Golden winter afternoons
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Green boggy

Humans, like the weather, are nothing if not contrary. Can it really be the same species that were so recently sharing in collective despair with heartfelt empathy, ceaselessly giving anything from money to clothes to fence posts to time to hope, who now go about pulling each other’s hair out for another six pack of three ply?

It may well be, much like the weather, that in the Venn diagram of the good and bad, the heart-warming and the head-banging, there is only a little intersection between the two. Or perhaps we are all a little conflicted. Like a leaden cloud threatening to burst or simply waiting to be dispelled by the sun. Depending which way the wind blows. A phenomenon that might also explain the contents of certain supermarket trolleys.

What seems incontrovertible is that 2020 continues to produce a hell of a lot of crap, evidently more so in those double garages stocked with 2,000 rolls of toilet paper. And while the bare aisles of toilet tissue land make me feel bemused, I quietly sneak an extra jar of pasta sauce into my basket.

There could be fewer worthy places to stockpile a years’ worth of bog roll than on the South Coast of NSW. A beautiful corner of the world both pallid and sick and overflowing with life and love. A place whose interior is savaged but whose heart and soul are still beating. A place that could use a little helping (washed) hand to thrive once again. Mother nature has applied some balm through its cloud and rain and now we – the good we – can try to offer a little gentle sunshine.

The landscape of the South Coast region right now is simply astonishing in so many ways. The crest of Clyde Mountain confronts with brutal savagery, an unending parade of blackened trees and blackened earth yielding views down to the coast that were not previously available. Yet the vibrant tree ferns and epicormic shoots sprouting from trunks seem to defy death. On the fringes of Mogo, that all too familiar sight of summer – of twisted metal and crumpled fireplace – sits within a vivid, bounteous green. The village too a bustle of people purchasing pendants, peculiarities and pies.

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The beaches of the region are as good as ever, which is to say, pretty damn perfect. At Broulee, a small patch of charred dune prompts memories of a video from the beach on New Year’s Eve, a small spot fire exploding and causing understandable angst amongst those who had fled to the water’s edge. Today, the sands are peppered with people bathing, fun and laughter filling the air. Much of the lush coastal fringe of spotted gums and fern trees along the road to Moruya seems unscarred.

sc02From Tuross Head you can see the ranges of Deua National Park to the west. No doubt a regular sight of alarm at night, illuminated by flame that flickered and flared to its own shape and will. Constantly on edge, unknowing as to where and how far it would come, the fires never did reach Tuross, at least in physical form.

This is home for a few nights and what a fine home: close to the rugged beaches and barely open shops, in proximity to numerous opportunities to spend money and eat food and lose golf balls. A home coming with the bonus of a billiard table for evening entertainment; my knowledge on the placement of snooker balls stemming from lyrics recalled of Snooker Loopy featuring Chas and Dave. Pot the red and screw back, for the yellow green brown blue pink and black… Yeah, in your dreams.

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It would be fair to say that despite limitations I was a far better snooker and pool player than golfer on this trip. Which says more about my golfing doom than my snooker prowess. Still, it was good to make a hefty contribution to the community of Narooma by zig-zagging around its golf course. A perfectly sliced and skied lay up on its famous third hole almost yielded a par, and I managed a par four somewhere else in between much larger figures. The added challenge of a series of greens being perforated, sanded and watered provided further good excuses for inadequacy.

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With Narooma receiving an economic injection, the next place on the spending list was Bodalla, specifically its dairy and cheese factory. In times like these you’ve got to do your utmost to support these local businesses and so it was with considerable reluctance that I forced down a toastie oozing with cheese followed up with an ice cream. You do what you can do.

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The following day endured cool and grey, reminiscent of typical coastal awaydays of the past. This might have previously induced disappointment and grumbling and a roll of the eyes with a sigh. But it seems crass to complain this year. This weather is perfect. And there is still plenty of consumption of local community produce to be savoured.

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I don’t know if supporting the South Coast economy has ever been so tasty. The one exception was – alas – fish and chips, a result of many of the better venues being closed on a Monday in March. But there was the Mexican brunch bowl at Mossy Point, the caramel fudge and coffee in Moruya and – probably the piece de resistance of feeling worthy and eating well – home-cooked wholesomeness and other takeaway from the farmers markets also in Moruya.

The markets were small but popular, a place very much for locals to gather and update one another on the latest news and gossip. They were also attuned to market protocols, forming orderly queues with wicker baskets as they awaited the 3pm opening bell. Twenty minutes later and most of the fresh stuff had sold out, but we managed to retrieve a medley of locally grown seasonal vegetables, some swordfish, crusty bread and a dairy product or two for me to bring home to go on a scone or three.

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I can’t say our market-supplied barbecue that night was a traditional Aussie bloke-themed methane-heavy slimy snag and slab of steak celebration. But it felt good and tasted even better. Refined even. Setting up another classy evening of exemplary three-way snooker (Tuross Rules).

Which was again better than the golf that day. Looking for something to do we came across a whole nine holes to ourselves. It quickly became clear why, the course pretty basic and unkempt in places, plagued by an infestation of mosquitoes. These had apparently emerged post fire and rain, proof that not all of nature’s recovery is especially welcome. At the course boundary, fire had penetrated the forest and the relatively low fee to have a course and a million mozzies to ourselves didn’t seem such an injustice after all.

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You see, it’s quite a divergent experience down on the South Coast. Like chalk and cheese. Sunshine and rain. Go Fund Me and bog-roll violence. So much of it looks and feels as good as ever. Life seems normal. Better even given the incredible swathe of green pasture now smothering the fields. And then your mind comes back to that saying I heard before: the great green cover up.

And you drive, under bucketloads of rain, through Mogo once more with its scattering of crumpled buildings. Towards and into the edges of Batemans Bay, where the forest has scorched down to its very edge and looks like it is struggling to recover. You get a sense of where the fire was most ferocious; green shoots are harder to come by. One side of the road up Clyde Mountain looks normal, the other decimated.

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You enter Braidwood to support that economy, knowing that it would be near impossible to convince an overseas visitor that this was in the grip of drought, primed to borrow water from Canberra while being shrouded in smoke for months on end. You shelter with hot coffee and sense BlazeAid nomads taking a well-earned day off. You espy a generous supply of toilet paper in the café bathroom; and briefly a wicked thought enters your mind. But the sunshine wins out, the goodness, the heart. Much like it is doing, much like it will do again, down on the South Coast.

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Another bubble

As 2020 dawned without a sunrise in many parts of Australia, what chance that optimism associated with a new year? When the predominance is on the very present disappearing into a sickly haze ten metres in front of you, grating at your throat and chiselling at your eyes. When you know this is far from the worst of it and the days to come portend further peril. When a centre of power is cloaked in the symbolism of failure and irrelevance, an absurdity as potent as the sight of fireworks trivialising a harbour city.

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The good news is that things have quietened down a touch. There have been drops of rain. In places, there simply isn’t that much fuel left to burn.  For regions where recovery has commenced there is an uplifting wholesomeness on display in the generosity of the human spirit. Some roads have re-opened and goodwill is flooding in. With any luck, we may look upon January 4th as the culmination of this elongated calamity. Though it is far too early to rest and relax.

The hideousness of the outdoors on January 5th proved enough to cancel a trip away to Wollongong, a small inconvenience compared to the carnage faced by so many. It seems flippant to bemoan absent holidays and ruined plans. Subsequently needing supplies for dinner that day, I cannot say for sure if the watering of my eyes in the supermarket was from the smoke infiltrating the shopping centre, the heaviness in my heart, or the absence of discounted Christmas crumbly fudge from Yorkshire.

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In that supermarket I resolved to get away, to breathe, to experience life without the preoccupation of fire and smoke. In this I am one of the lucky ones, one of the climate refugees who has the resources to adapt and mitigate. As with everything it seems it is those who suffer the most who will suffer the most and I feel guilt at my relative luck and privilege. It is with a similar sentiment that I approach the task of writing about frolics in the sun, in the clear air, with friends and other animals. Getaways in the state of Queensland, earlier touched by fire but by now in its own detached bubble.

I never thought the obvious place you’d go to escape the apocalypse would be Brisbane, especially Brisbane in summer. It just goes to show the terrible state of affairs we are in. I don’t mind Brisbane, but it’s not in my top ten, unless it’s my top ten list of places to escape the apocalypse, naturally. A little extra humidity is a small price to pay for clean air.

Indeed, there was a pleasantness about the place, still fairly quiet as people loll through their summer holidays, zooming up to the coast in their Hiluxes packed with fishing rods and eskies, often trailed by flashy boats. It’s a conspicuous consumption of Australiana that begins to tire in context, a dissonance that exacerbates the sense of that Queensland bubble. People show concern, but empathy is harder to summon.

seq03I did Brisbane things in Brisbane, such as pretending to be sophisticated at a few of the galleries, crashing down to earth with sugary iced drinks for a dollar, cycling on one of those godawful city bikes along death trap rush hour cycleways, and bobbing upon the water aboard trashy ferries championing local sporting sides.

One of the joys of my rambling was an early morning potter around Roma Street Parklands, where what seemed like a revelation materialised: an abundance of green interspersed with the vibrant, exotic colours of nature bursting into bloom. Throughout the park – and across the city – the late withering of purple jacarandas was eclipsed by the bright red bursts emanating from the ubiquitous Poinciana trees. Pockets of wonder among the humdrum. Life going on.

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Another minor revelation within the city came from stumbling across new development under and around the Story Bridge. As much as it tries, this will never be that other Australian bridge, but they have done a splendid job of transforming the area beneath it into an enclave of approachable eateries, beery pit stops and picnic points. It seems every reputable town these days needs its own brewery and burgers, mimicking – once again – the pioneering zeitgeist of – yes really – Canberra.

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Tiring a little of the city and its newfound zeitgeist I escaped one morning to the coast. Well, Moreton Bay at least, which is far from a windswept ocean of pummelling surf and fine white sand. Accessible by train, the bayside suburbs of Sandgate and Shorncliffe possess a certain gentility, a more relaxed atmosphere akin to a seaside town of the 1950s. Esplanades and jetties fringe the tidal flats, children construct sandcastles in between a hotchpotch of dogs mingling on the beach, and old codgers creep down to the water’s edge to stare out into the infinity of life.

Capping this off would have been traditional fish and chips, but it seems Queensland (from my random sample of three) is very fond of crumbed fish and – of course – thinner fries over chunky chips. Malt vinegar proved a salvation to at least conjure up an essence of other times and places.

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Better beaches line the Sunshine Coast, and it was pleasing to have a brief interlude further north courtesy of old friend Jason and his gas-guzzling ute. It only seemed fair recompense for making me do an early morning Parkrun – my first – along Southbank and the Botanic Gardens in Brisbane. I’m not convinced the short but steep climb up to Wild Horse Mountain was the best warm down, but the panorama peppered with Glass House Mountains was worth it.

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This was a new perspective; inexplicably a lookout I had passed many times on the G’day Bruce Highway but one I had never actually paused to explore. Looking down upon masses of plantation forest intermingled with clutches of natural bush, perspectives had also altered: yes, this is welcome, this is beautiful but there lingers a nagging question mark, a sense of inevitability that one day this will be eaten by flames as well. Such is the preoccupation.

A stop at Beefy’s pie shop did little to dampen such thoughts for, as I devoured a giant wagon wheel with an iced coffee, all I could picture was our esteemed leader chomping down on a pie sporting a Beefy’s cap on one of his vacuous How Good Is tours. What a fucking moron.

The Sunshine Coast seems to be becoming more and more emblematic of the rampant quest for growth and consumption, perhaps to the detriment of everything else. More habitats cleared, more congestion-busting infrastructure necessary, more polluted waterways, more How Good is Beefy’s at more shopping malls that you need to drive to. Change happens and people need to live somewhere, but do they really need to live in a six bedroom home with a cinema, a rumpus room and a three-car garage? Among cleared bushland that resembles tinder waiting to explode? There has to be a better way.

It was a relief to come across one spot that – as of yet – did not seem over-developed. Testament that Australia still has a lot of space, which is both its blessing and its curse. Mudjimba Beach wildly stretching up towards Coolum and beyond. Under cool and cloudy skies. The Lucky Country still riding its luck.

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Back in Brisbane I extended my stay a little while longer in the hope that when it came time to go home the air would be clearer. Why leave the bubble when you didn’t really need to? And I reckon Millie the dog was grateful for my company.

seq09Together, we explored the land of the Quiet Australian, treading newly built pavements, discovering plots of land awaiting a six bedroom home, lounging in the garden questioning how the Quiet Australians next door can be so goddam noisy. Some of us sniffed butts and peed on lampposts. Others caught buses and sought coffee at the mall. There was a lot of cloud and a little rain. And hope on the grapevine that this would extend south.

My final evening on this Queensland trip took Millie and I down the road, past yappy dogs behind six foot fences, to the suburban fringe. A landscape penetrated by channels and creeks infiltrating from Moreton Bay. Puddles forming into larger areas of wetland feasted upon by cattle egrets and masked lapwings. Signs promoting new land releases. And the most incredible, alien swathe of green.

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Imagine such abundance, such feast. Imagine rain for days and weeks. If you’re reading this in the UK imagination is probably not necessary. But imagine creeks flowing after years and dust turning to mud. Picture dead brown and yellow earth transforming to green. Imagine the life, the rejuvenation, the hope. Those first drops of rain may not immediately solve all the woes, heal all the scars, quell all the flames. But they offer hope. Hope that didn’t come as usual with the turning of the year but may now, finally, hopefully, offer a future.

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A postscript

My previous blog post involving a trip to East Gippsland and Far South East NSW took place immediately before much of this area was decimated by fire. It seems a bit surreal now to think I went here for relief and probably experienced places that may never be the same again or – at the very least – will take decades to recover. I probably chatted to people who evacuated in panic, bought coffee from shops now cut off, and feasted on fish and chips on a wharf where people were braced to jump into water as last resort survival.

Mallacoota has naturally received much attention. Though I didn’t go there on this last trip, I can, from past experiences, testify to its warm-hearted community and beautiful spirit. Usually a place of escape and happiness set within a wilderness, thousands sheltered by the water as flames approached on New Year’s Eve. Around 100 homes were lost. Many animals were killed, although the efforts of one man to rescue koalas melts the heart.

Nearby Cann River provided me with a lovely campsite by the dwindling waterway, as well as a bustling little high street for thousands of tourists passing through on the Princes Highway. The town has struggled with fires all around and has been cut off, though the local community are pulling together.

Cape Conran, Marlo and Orbost were threatened and at times cut off. Some outlying areas around Orbost experienced fire and some homes in rural localities were lost.

In NSW, Eden was threatened in major flare ups and expansion of fire grounds on January 4th. The fires that had burnt through Mallacoota spread north and east into Ben Boyd National Park and reached Twofold Bay. Residents of Eden were told to evacuate to Merimbula or Bega, though some sheltered by the wharf where I enjoyed amazing fish and chips around a week earlier. The fire destroyed outlying properties and ignited a fire at a woodchip mill but – thus far – has not breached the main township.

Fires from Victoria also have spread north towards Bombala and into South East Forests National Park. Presently they have not reached the Waratah Gully campground and its resident kookaburras nor have they spilled down Myanba Gorge. The fire ground presently appears around 2kms south of the walking track for Pheasants Peak and around 4km from the campground.

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A brief breather

What started as an unfortunate spectacle – that we thought would probably go away as soon as it came upon us – has settled in Canberra for the summer. There is little anyone can do to not talk about the pervasive smoke that hovers above Christmas prawns and glazed hams. Occasionally it lifts a little, dispelled by a hot northwesterly which only serves to deliver arid desert air from the only direction in which major fires are not burning. Yet. It feels only a matter of time before we are encircled.

This is not a happy Christmas really. The weather outside is indeed frightful. People are growing downbeat and sullen; infuriated and furious. We gather and share and eat fine food and go and watch the Star Wars movie in beautiful air conditioning, and these are necessary distractions. But even in the midst of a lightsabre battle, a smoky essence infiltrates the movie theatre. The ultimate 4D experience. Just give us the Lord Vader breathing masks please.

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Making plans is hard to do – what road is closed, which national park on fire, which stretch of tarmac melting? Christmas gatherings cancelled; long circuitous journeys made. Holiday towns on the coast dying under a barrage of emergency warnings and absent visitors.

Even doing simple things like laundry takes strategic planning. Today I got it wrong, and now it is being washed again, content that the hot, dangerous northwesterly has now well and truly kicked in to sizzle it sans woodsmoke flavouring.

Escape is an appealing option, as long as there are still options. Three days before Christmas I looked at flights to the UK. I looked at flights to New Zealand. I looked at flights to Tasmania (where even today it is nudging forty degrees). Cost was extortionate, but then it might reach a point where even that is a burden worth bearing.

Dissuaded for the time being, I tried to make pastry in forty degree heat. I went for walks in the mall. Just because. In between I monitored the weather forecasts and wind directions and air quality readings and areas of land not on fire. I looked at campgrounds that might not be full and which might be safe. And I finally glimpsed a small window of opportunity to escape, to clear the air…

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Boxing Day and the atmosphere at the MCG was bubbling up nicely, accompanying me on the radio as I drove south towards Cooma. With the Kings Highway to the coast closed this is proving a major alternative route. As a consequence, the main sights of Cooma – McDonalds and KFC – were overflowing. Around the corner, ALDI was quieter, and I picked up an obligatory half price Christmas pudding. Probably for winter if such a thing still exists.

Between Cooma and Bombala the drive is spectacularly bleak as it traverses the Monaro Plains. It is for all intents and purposes, desert at the moment. Not exactly pretty to look at, but with the smoke haze thinning a touch, at least it was something to look at.

gip01And then, through Bombala and into South East Forests National Park, there was something resembling freshness. Blue sky. Green. Giant trees untainted by fire. A campground almost deserted, the camp guardian a spirited Kookaburra feeding its young. A sense of wonder and relief that this is all still actually possible. Breathe.

It remained quite hot to be sure, and on a walk around nearby Myanba Gorge there were plenty of flies as usual just to remind you that summer in Australia is actually a bit shit. The riverbed shaping the gorge was bone dry and surely it was only a matter of time before I would turn a corner and step on a deadly snake or something. But no, a dog and its two owners were the only things to greet me, in between the flies in my eyes.

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What I did find turning that final corner was a sight the likes of which I have seen a thousand times before in Australia, but which appears all the more precious today. A deep valley of eucalyptus sweeping down towards the coast. The cries of a couple of black cockatoos surveying their terrain. And a clear blue sky – perhaps more pastel than is normal – but true blue nonetheless.

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The night passed with another rarity – feeling cold. Even a few days later it seems surreal to think I was shivering a little until I finally succumbed to using a sleeping bag in the correct manner.

The freshness of morning was greeted by a 5am cacophony of hundreds of birds, which was a marked improvement on the 2am hoonage taking place on some of the nearby forest roads. Sleep was a luxury and I was reminded how the concept of camping may be more appealing than the reality. But then it was on the journey to the long drop that I felt at one with the world, enamoured by its natural grace and beauty, a feeling you never get in a Best Western.

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With the promise of another smoky scorcher back in Canberra I was in no hurry to rush back. I carried on south, across the border into Victoria on what was a beautiful drive towards Cann River. This is a corner of the land boasting tremendous old growth forests cloaking rugged, untrammelled peaks. Driving along sweeping curves under a dappled canopy, it’s all shafts of sunlight falling upon giant ferns. Keep eyes on road.

gip06bThis region – East Gippsland – is sparsely populated and only has a few access points to the coast, through the gorgeously pristine Croajingalong National Park. Camping in the park is popular over Christmas and I had no chance. But at Cann River itself, a free campground was available in which to set up at ten in the morning. And it came alongside a short walk through woodland that in places reminded me of somewhere in England, such were the treasured patches of greenery.

With plenty of time up my sleeve and following a bit of a mid-morning doze under a tree, I explored the coastal area down around Cape Conran and Marlo. Both were fairly busy, with Cape Conran again bursting with campers who had – at that time – won the holiday lottery. It was so good to be beside the seaside, especially as a cool southeasterly was emanating off the water to offer joyous relief. This was probably the freshest air I had experienced in weeks, if not months.

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Marlo is famous as the place where the Snowy River meets the sea. It’s probably the main thing it has going for it, but they certainly do well with what they have. Several lookouts and a sensibly plotted estuary trail allow you to follow the waters as they congregate into a series of shallows and lagoons before inching out into the ocean. It’s definitely worth a nosey, followed by possibly one other thing Marlo has going for it: ice cream. Thank you very much.

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Memories of ice cream lingered as I drove inland slightly towards Orbost, where several dairies were testament to what is generally a verdant, rain-blessed corner of Australia (the cream and yogurt from Gippsland Dairy is to be recommended!). But even here it looks dry, a burnished beige more than a pea green. In the distance, beyond Orbost, inevitably, the bushfires burn uncontained and out of control.

gip07I remember Orbost quite fondly from the only other time I was here in 2013, mainly because I found a bakery that served something akin to a Paris-Brest. It’s not really what you expect but my memory of this raised expectations beyond what I should have expected. I was looking to pick up some supplies for dinner, which I managed but not to the standard I had expected. The result was a very Christmas meze of leftover ham, sausage rolls, cheese and a couple of salads. How I craved a hot meal! Oh well, there is always tomorrow.

Tomorrow was the time to pack up and head back to Canberra, partly because I wanted to sleep in my own bed but also because the heat was due to spread its ferocious finger down into Gippsland. As if on cue, there was a hint of smoke in the air on an early stop to amble along a rainforest walk with a coffee and mince pie in hand. And then, crossing the border again towards Eden, visibility was once more replaced by viscosity.

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This had thrown my good intentions to do a decent walk in Ben Boyd National Park as a means of justifying fish and chips for lunch. But, heck, it’s Christmas, what else am I supposed to do? And I was very good and didn’t have chips. Just three of the best potato scallops instead, oops.

The other plan I had was to hopefully laze and have a nap alongside the Pambula River before the three hour drive home. Fortunately, given the long wait for lunch as I battled a billion bogans, a stiff sea breeze had kicked in and the smoke was clearing pretty quickly. On the downside, thunderstorms were brewing slightly to the north. The relaxation necessary to nap wasn’t really possible, and my decision to quit the beach at just about the right time was sound. Not before getting a little wet.

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Rain! It all felt a bit peculiar. A strange sensation to be fleeing and sheltering from something that is so essential, so welcome, so life-giving. Yet such are the nature of storms that they proved random and fleeting. And any lightning falling on the tinder dry is far from welcome. The window was definitely closing.

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Back home the next day, I became alerted that the authorities were urging around 30,000 holidaymakers and residents to evacuate an area of East Gippsland half the size of Belgium. As I write this, 12 Emergency fire warnings are in place in the region, including the stretch of coast between Cann River and Mallacoota, and a swathe of land taking in Orbost, Cape Conran and Marlo. Highways are closed. Inland from Pambula, not a million miles from the South East Forests, another emergency warning has appeared. Multiple fires are springing up in the wilderness between Cooma and the coast. Another window doesn’t merely close but shatters.

And for all that we try to do our best, to care and share, to catch a breather, this is not a very merry Christmas at all. It is a catastrophe.

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Mission possible

I think a general principle of Australian exploration is the further north you go, the quirkier things get. For quirkier you could substitute odder, weirder, crazier, madder than a dozen cuts snakes lurking in the stinging trees waiting for a cassowary. It may be a result of the liberty that comes with increasing distance from the tyranny of inner city elites developing their secret mind-controlling pharmaceuticals to add to our underground water reserves. Or it could just be the balmy weather and barmy environment. Where pretty much everything wants to eat you.

I wouldn’t say Townsville is the capital of Crazytown, but there are certain idiosyncrasies to observe. Perhaps most obviously in the calibre of politicians representing the region, generally observed wearing big hats and force-feeding coal to their grandchildren, insistent that it is the future, it is it is. It is very easy to imagine Friday night here Cold War Steve style, all hi-vis hypermasculinity and gutter-strewn carnage at the foot of the concrete sugar shaker. My taxi driver confirmed as much as he took me to the airport, to pick up a hire car.

I had never been on the strip of land between Townsville and Cairns, and with a few days tagged on to a work trip I was heading up the coast towards Mission Beach. It’s an interesting enough drive with a decent selection of diversions along the way. It’s also a journey of transition from the golden dry tropics to the verdant abundance of the wet.

A little north of Townsville up the Strewth Highway, the blend of dry grassland and tropical rainforest manifests in Paluma Range National Park, with each climbing, narrow turn up the mountain road darkening as undergrowth thickens. Little Crystal Creek is on the cusp of a landscape in change, and a pretty place to pause. Higher up around Paluma, rainforest walks promise at views and deliver in sweatiness, though it’s still a long way from being as bad as it gets in high summer.

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It seems a bit ridiculous to talk of a summer in a place that is almost consistently between 26 and 30 degrees year round. Seasons are more marked by a change in humidity, from clear, arid winter days to muggy, stormy summer oppression. You can also throw in the odd cyclone, with the last big, big one – Yasi – hitting the coast around Mission Beach in 2011.

Continuing north up the highway approaching Cardwell, it is hard to picture today. But an enduring image from that storm is the pile of fancy yachts stacked upon one another at Hinchinbrook Marina. Three-quarters of buildings in Cardwell were damaged and the banana crop so tied to this part of the world was devastated. The rugged, pristine environment of Hinchinbrook Island tantalises today. But you wouldn’t have wanted to camp there back then.

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Cardwell seems a quiet kind of place, a pit top where the Bruce Highway finally meets the sea. Post-Yasi, a medium sized big crab has been resurrected on the top of a café. As you do. It’s competition along the highway with the Frosty Mango where I have already stopped and the Big Golden Gumboot of Tully in which I am destined to head.

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Finally, a turn off at Tully leads towards Mission Beach, which somewhat confusingly is a cluster of villages and bays along a stretch of coast twenty kilometres or so. We’re in a region known as the Cassowary Coast and they sure do emphasise the cassowary part of that nomenclature. Official and unofficial road signs alert you to the presence of this giant flightless bird, warnings that seem worthy given they are dwindling in numbers and most susceptible to road accidents. Some people might fear the cassowary for its strong hook-like claw, but you’ll generally find the ubiquitous Toyota Hilux is more lethal in so many ways.

Of course, being in cassowary country makes you – as they say – naturally cass-o-wary. Walking in dense rainforest at Lacey Creek it’s all a bit like encountering snakes…part of you would be thrilled to see one and to try to take a blurry picture, but part of you would be pooping your pants. Every rustle and fleeting shadow pricks the senses, only for it to be caused by an unseen gecko or another bush turkey.

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Down by the sea at Bingil Bay, there is always the chance of a crocodile or a lethal jellyfish to spot instead. Though the hosts at my B&B warned me the crocs are only in the creeks, I’m not so sure about stepping too far into that ocean. I mean, the creeks enter the sea, right. What goes in must come out. And with plenty of mangroves in which to lurk, I can just picture myself sunbaking right there if I was a saltwater crocodile. So, I move briskly on, along a fine, shady boardwalk towards the hub that is North Mission Beach. Where a cold beer with a view is the better means of cooling down, I reckon.

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Refreshed and now feeling in holiday mood, there was definitely justification in an afternoon siesta, before working up a sweat again climbing Bicton Hill in Clump Mountain National Park.  If cassowaries and crocs weren’t enough, the start of this trail warned of stinging trees, which boast attractive heart shaped leaves and plump purple fruit. The cunning bastards.

The sign at the bottom of the track also warns that this isn’t a walk for everyone, indicating heart-attack potential. But it’s not that bad, just a leafier, slightly deadlier version of Mount Ainslie with views out toward a far-less manicured landscape.

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With all this adventure and threat, one of the nice, homely touches of my B&B was the opportunity for drinks on the veranda at six o’clock. With only a few rooms it was cosy and relaxing, a chance to share the escapades of the day with those from further afield. Of course, being a naturalised Australian I was quickly assigned an authority on matters such as swooping birds, the diet of the cassowary, drought and bushfires, the hiding places of redback spiders, the pros and cons of Townsville, and…well…Brexit. I do suppose the Netherlands and Switzerland – especially Switzerland – seem very genteel by comparison.

At the B&B I was also frequently lobbied to try out the Kennedy Walking Track commencing at South Mission Beach. And so, on Sunday morning I decided to give it a go before the drive back to Townsville. And what a great recommendation to take up before eventually returning to the landlocked eucalypt land of four seasons back south. Yay for palm trees and golden sands, mangroves and croccy creeks, and that milky aquamarine sea. Another world in the same country.

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I have to say I do think the beaches of the south coast of New South Wales are in many ways better. They are typically finer and sandier and, well, you can generally paddle without as great a fear of being lunch and / or lacerated to death. But then there is just that air to the tropics, a mood and a light and colours so vivid. And palm trees and ferns and – up here – rainforest tumbling down to the sea. Like I say, another world in the same country.

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Talking of other worlds, I eventually made it back to Townsville via the largest potato scallops and smallest bites of fish in Ingham. A little early for my flight back, I remembered spotting a huge TV tower on top of a peak just to the west of town when I came to land at the same airport, and duly discovered there was a road to the top. From the summit of Mount Stuart, this possible Crazytown doesn’t seem too mad, distant as I am from its Sunday hangover.

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Perhaps madder is the scene inland, where the maddest of mad dogs can flourish. A scene dry and dusty and rugged and foreboding. A world devoid of much, exposed to a harsh, searing heat and unforgiving glare; perhaps you can see why many are happy enough to dig it up. The maddest thing though is that this world can suck you in, can draw you to it, can make you want to step one more foot into its fringe. It might even tempt you to buy a wide brimmed hat and some sturdy RM Williams boots. If only you didn’t have a flight to catch back to sanity.

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Marvellous

Late Friday afternoon on the road between Braidwood and Bungendore and the wind is buffeting my car as it trundles into the sleety clouds of winter. I’m returning from the coast, where two hours before I was eating lunch on a sheltered cove saturated in warm sunshine. It’s a slightly weary drive and, for some reason, I decide to play The Lightning Seeds for probably the first time in twenty years.

After several jaunty, scousish ditties that sound identical, the sage words of Alan Hansen and Jimmy Hill emerge as the infectious, glorious, deprecating anthem that is Three Lions blares out. I cannot listen to this without bobbing my head a little, chanting, smiling like a Cheshire Cat. As much as you might try. It’s Coming Home! At least I hope so, in light of the possible blizzard up ahead.

It’s Coming Home. Euro 96. An era that now feels halcyon, days when the Donald and BJ were still complete dicks but at least not complete dicks inexplicably leading disunited states and precarious kingdoms. Back in 1996, John Major was trundling his way towards the end of years of Tory rule, a regime which now somehow seems sane and reasonable. The Spice Girls were zig-a-zag-ahing and both Mitchells were polishing their heads behind the bar of the Queen Vic. I was completing my first year of university, undistracted by a phone, immune from the ranting coalescence of conspiracy lunatics on the internet.

I don’t remember that much about my university course (who does?), but in a convoluted way which coincidentally brings us back to the present I suppose it led me to be in the South Coast NSW town of Narooma on a mild, golden evening in August 2019. I studied, I got a job, I travelled, I went back to that job, I transferred to Australia with that job and I ended up on a boardwalk meandering past calm and clear waters toward the ocean.

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nar02Did I ever imagine back in 1996 that I would be gazing out to the Pacific hoping to sight a whale? Meandering downhill alongside gardens strewn with exotic plants and colourful birds? Wandering past parks dotted with electric barbecues and sinks for dealing with the entrails of fish? Who would have thought I would have previously parred the treacherous Bogey Hole of that golf course wedged between the town and the plunging cliffs of the coastline? Certainly not me, or anyone else, which is why I bring it up again.

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Even with its ageing hackers, Narooma is a pretty quiet kind of place, especially in a midweek in winter when the temperature has dipped to something around nineteen degrees. It’s tough going, having to put a light jumper on as the sun disappears behind Gulaga, pondering whether to have fish and chips for dinner or wait until tomorrow.

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While I know Narooma pretty well, the first night in a strange place always seems to lead to a fitful sleep, even when you’ve opted to forego fish and chips. Waking too early the next day, the murmurings of RN Breakfast do little to inspire or send me back to doze, so I head out into the dark. I love this time of day, especially beside the ocean; facing east as the black fades to blue and grey and red and yellow, and shafts of sunlight glitter off the sea. The sun kisses the layers of morning cloud, spreading to the tops of trees, and illuminating the coffee shop on the hill. A beacon which makes the reward of an early start in Australia all the better.

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With plenty of the day still ahead I took the car for a little explore south of Narooma, stopping first in the so-good-they-named-it-twice hamlet of Tilba Tilba before heading on to the relative bustle of Central Tilba. This is a corner of the county oozing genuine charm, with plenty of tin roofs and lacework awnings, flower-filled yards and rustic leftovers. By Australian standards it’s usually a green and lush place as well, which is great for local dairy products; but even here the drought looked to be taking its yellowing toll.

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Given my early start it was probably pushing it to head to the bakery in Central Tilba for local produce straight away, so I took a gentle amble along the track which eventually leads to the top of Gulaga, the dominant, forest-clad peak of the area, spiritually significant to the local Yuin people. You can walk to the top, but I wasn’t really in the mood and I heard that summit views were lacking. The valley was perfectly happy enough.

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Did I mention dairy products? One of my favourite topics which, back in 1996, probably didn’t come with any moral distaste from ethically sourced eco-vegan leftists typing away on their not-so-pure iPhones. I guess at a philosophical level, there is valid debate as to whether we can still have our cake and eat it? At an individual level, the answer was a resounding yes. Not only in Tilba, home to Jersey Cows and related outputs. But also in Bodalla, a pitstop on my journey into and out of Narooma and for all journeys this way in the future. Wednesday, Thursday, Friday.

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South of Tilba, the main highway veers off towards Bermagui, along a splendid road of eucalyptus forest and the shores of Wallaga Lake. The maps indicate a few coastal rock formations here, names suggesting a likeness to horses and camels which enticed me to explore with the hope of discovering an Australian Durdle Door or Bedruthan Step. While there was not quite the same grandeur, the coastal scenery, now bathed in warm sunshine, proved a tonic after that massive apple turnover.

It was pleasing to discover I was on part of the ‘Great South Coast Walk’ according to a few signposts. This doesn’t appear to be an official trail but may yet develop into something more formal. One of my bugbears with Australia is that it doesn’t seem to have the same right to roam philosophy as the UK. Huge tracts of land are locked up in private hands or just downright inaccessible unless you have Ray Mears on hand with a machete and / or a big gas guzzling ute. Being able to just rock up anywhere on the coast and walk has an appeal unmatched. See, for example, South West Coast Path.

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It was along this walk, overlooking the expanse of Wallaga Lake, that I learnt of another resemblance in the landscape around here. Gulaga is a pregnant woman, partly explaining its significance to the Yuin people who were here well, well before 1996. Today, its fertility abounds as a cluster of whales drift down the coast, mother and calf distant white caps sporadically splashing in the rich waters.

I probably wouldn’t have spotted the whales if it wasn’t for a couple of retired locals staked out on a headland near Horse Head Rock. For me, this is usually the most successful method of spotting wildlife. If you’re driving in country Australia and a cluster of people have pulled over to look up at a tree, there’s a fair chance you’ll get to see a koala. The other way you tend to discover local wildlife is when you nearly run it over. Beware Wombats.

nar11Spurred on by earlier whale sightings I ended the day back up near Narooma, taking a scenic coastal drive alongside Dalmeny and Kianga which boasts several panoramic viewing platforms along the way. The platforms are sited in between yet more pristine bays that you can have all to yourself. It was at the last of these points that I glanced a surfing dolphin, followed by a few more and a few more still. Passing below, there must have been around twenty dolphins, tracking north on a feeding mission. A whole two football teams.

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I doubt I would have seen dolphins in 1996. Nor would I be questioning the prospect of snow in August, even counting for British weather. Today, this was a possibility heading back to Canberra thanks to a vigorous succession of cold fronts coming from the Antarctic. My solution was to linger down on the coast for as long as possible.

It was undoubtedly windy, but the skies were blue and with a little shelter you could sit comfortably in a light sweater or even T-shirt. Neither of which were really possible in the blustery settings of Cullendulla Creek and the nearby Eurobodalla Botanic Gardens, but these were attractive diversions nonetheless. At the gardens, the stronger gusts were a tad alarming and it felt only a matter of time before a branch would fall on my head. Mercifully it didn’t, and the march towards Spring carried on.

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Just north of Batemans Bay – and the road junction back to Canberra – the graceful, tall spotted eucalypts of Murramarang National Park were probably less appealing to walk through today. Especially when picking a walk that follows a ridgeline facing the bay, directly exposed to the strong southwesterlies. The crashing chaos, the constant buffeting, the noise and fury do not entice a pause to look up and marvel. Impulsion instead for a brisk pace and the hope of respite on the other side. And what gentle and idyllic contrast this proves.

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A bay with no-one and nothing. Nothing but calm clear waters, untouched sand and the backing of a gently whispering bush. A driftwood log, downed in some other storm and also finding its way to this paradise, is now a perfect setting for a late lunch. The breathlessness is not only in the air, the warmth not only on the outside. Perhaps even in 2019, these are still the days, this is still the life.

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Warming

It is a fact truer than anything to have ever come out of the British Prime Minister’s mouth that I will always take up an opportunity to work in Brisbane in July. While the locals may gripe about the icy depths of winter where overnight it might just slip below double digits and require a good for humanity coal fire, I’ve packed two pairs of shorts. And just the one jumper.

brs01And a raincoat. For it is even truer that Queensland is far from beautiful one day, perfect the next; a dubious marketing slogan dreamt up by mediocrities that continues apace in the supposed Sunshine Coast, a place frequently sodden by epic downpours and possessing a clammy mildew befitting the swampy subtropics. Saturday here was so damp that the highlight was a doughnut, and even that wasn’t much of a highlight, more a triumph of social marketing style over substance.

brs02Queensland: pissing down one day, sweaty the next. The sweatiness emerging on Sunday as the sun makes an appearance, triggering rising heat and rampant moisture. Liquid particles are lifted by ocean gusts, filtered ineffectually through the thrum of air conditioning to congregate in damp surf club carpets. Puddles among snake-infested flood plain linger, waiting for passing birds and passing property developers to drain. The ubiquitous HiLux secretes fluids while idling outside Red Rooster, as a leftover billboard of some redneck running for parliament gazes down approvingly. Just thank the lord or some other unelected deity that it is not yet high summer.

Indeed, the sweatiness is relatively tolerable this time of year and is alleviated by the pleasure of wearing shorts in midwinter.  As dark clouds sweep north to reveal a sky of blue, there is an hour of pleasant sunshine on the coast, a welcome companion on a bare-legged walk along the beach and promenade to Mooloolaba. I rest at Alex Heads watching sandcastles being built and surfers being demolished, and sharks being hidden just out of site. Probably. It’s not even a whole day let alone an entirety of existence, but for a few moments it seems that things are beautiful, tending towards perfect.

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Somewhat annoyingly the sunshine was a sign of an improving pattern of weather as I returned to Brisbane and the prospect of work. On the plus side, there was a bit of downtime and a later flight back to Canberra on the warmest day of the week, giving me the opportunity to don shorts once again, while all around me wore coats. And then there was the hotel I was staying in, which was rather fine with its rooftop pool and terrace overlooking the ever rising city and the ever flowing brown of the Brisbane River.

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Actually, the hotel was somewhat funky and felt more like a spot for special treat bogan holidays and shadowy foreign gambling syndicates fast-tracked by Border Force than a place where weary businesspeople rest their weary heads. In my room there was a wine fridge, the TV was in the mirror (what?!), and there were a series of illuminated switches that operated a configuration of lights that I never was able to master. Switches that glow in the dark and give a sense of Chernobyl as you try to sleep. Only the lift was more luminescent, alternating between being in a Daft Punk video and a fish tank of the Barrier Reef before it got bleached.

Walking out of the lift and onto the street was a sure way to ease a headache, especially as outside it was warm and sunny and just oozing that relaxed vibe that comes with a level of warmth and sunniness. Think how England feels when the misery of flooding rain and gloom dissipates for a freakish sunny day, golden and mild after months of despair and before the impending furnace of yet another unseasonal heat plume from the African colonies. A bit like that.

The Brisbane River acts as something of a waymarker wandering the city, guiding you along South Bank and its gardens and galleries, channelling you across to the north with angular bridges and sweeping curves. Disappearing as you cut across the CBD with its blocks of one-way-street and chirruping pedestrian crossings, before emerging again in an amalgam of mangroves at the terminus of the Botanic Gardens.

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Back across the river, the cliffs of Kangaroo Point provide fine city views as well as clichéd place name delight for international visitors to post. Some people abseil down the cliffs, others look up from the riverside path below. All try to avoid getting run over by yet another dork on one of the city’s electric scooters. Most sit and wait and contemplate what it would be like to be on a scooter, as the sun goes down on another day in Queensland.

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And for me, as darkness descends, it is back to the light. The florid light of that lift going up to the many lights that I cannot figure out how to arrange in my hotel room, the switches for which will light up at night as a constant reminder that they have won. Along the way, the lights of the city flicker on, as the temperature drops below twenty.

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After a few days here I rummage in my bag for that one jumper. It’s starting to get a tad cool, just a little off being perfectly comfortable. I could survive without it, but I did pack it after all, and it would be a shame to carry it all this way and not put it to use. For the first time in Brisbane, I seem to fit in. Now all I need is a scooter to carry me off into the night, towards the light.

Australia Food & Drink Green Bogey Photography Walking
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Clotted cream is not the only fruit

On holiday, and at home, food is such a focal point to the activities of the day, whether that be a walk over hills to forage in supermarkets or an outing for coffee and cake for something to do in the rain. There are days where food gives me a sense of structure, particularly given my slavish devotion to the coffee (and biscuit or cake) gods midway through the morning.

Holidaying in Cornwall, the cream tea is often the main agenda item of the day, especially if it’s a bit gloomy, a tad tepid, a little dull. A cream tea is a little taste of solace no matter what the weather. But it turns out there are other foodstuffs which can dial up the sunshine to eleven, whether that be by design or not quite accident.

The St. Agnes Sausage Roll

After several days of dogged white cloud promising both sun and rain but delivering neither, a Sunday suddenly arrived under skies true blue. After a quick check of the Internet to see if certain places were open, I lead-footed it in good time to the North Cornwall coast, parking beside the remnants of Wheal Coates Mine. It was a bit early for lunch, so there was treasure to be discovered traversing the clifftops to Chapel Porth and working up an appetite back up past the mine buildings to the car. Sun out, tide out, T-shirt out, this is what I came for.

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But in nearby St. Agnes there is an enhancement to be had among the narrow yesteryear parade of shops and cottages. Past the pub adorned by people sheltering with a shandy, the bakery in the corner is indeed open. And the big dilemma is whether to have one sausage roll or two. I mean, they are hefty affairs so one would be ample, but when would I be here again? And if I have just the one that means there’s only the single flavour to sample. Valid concerns, after the event. Much to my subsequent regret I opted for one, cognisant of leaving room for any other opportunities that should present themselves later in the day.

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Thus, the quest for a very particular sausage roll had delivered me to one of the most beautiful corners of the country on one of the most beautiful days of the year so far. And it had barely reached lunchtime. It was time to walk it off.

And walk it off I did, on a pleasing circular loop taking in three of the sandiest, sunniest beaches in Britain. Setting off from West Pentire, the route immediately dipped into a sheltered valley of fluttering birdsong, before rising again to the forlorn cries of hacks criss-crossing the mini links of Holywell. One of the trails disappearing into the maze of dunes should eventually lead to the beach, but it would be easy to lose your bearings, like a couple of droids you are not looking for in a galaxy far, far away.

The beach at Holywell Bay was surprisingly underpopulated in light of this being a Bank Holiday weekend and all. The cause: a brisk nor’wester coming directly off the ocean. Even Poldork was in hiding. The dunes were clearly the place to be, strategically sheltered in a hollow hoping some berk with a backpack won’t come traipsing past to ruin the ambience of your romantic picnic.

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Onward and upward the berk heads, overlooking the massive expanse of the bay and the beach now seemingly stretching to America on the low tide. Rounding the next corner, the sands of Poly Joke Beach cluster in the nooks and crevices of the land, as if gold has run off from the verdant pasture above. Mostly a tidal beach, people here create castles and clobber balls for six, reading papers in the sand and letting their dogs do whatever their dogs please, as per usual.

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Walking up from Jolly Poke or whatever it’s called, I continue on the coast path rather than heading directly back to the car park. There is no rush to head home, on a day such as this. And surely I can find some sustenance as reward at the end to keep me going until Plymouth. It’s afternoon tea time after all.

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Well, this is where sausage roll regrets return, for there is no happy ending, despite the blissful site of Crantock Beach sparkling at full reveal. There is a pub overlooking this vista, but I don’t fancy a beer. It. Must. Be. Tea. And. Cake. A nearby hotel offers something, but the last slice of Victoria Sponge looks a bit dry and sad.  I should’ve bought one of the sweet treats from St. Agnes bakery. As well as another sausage roll.

The Bedruthan Spud

Despite the lack of a treat at the end, I was delighted to have done a North Cornwall day in such wonderful conditions. If that was that for this year, then so be it. But, then, my very last day in the southwest heralded a decent dollop of sunshine. And I wasn’t going to let a sore throat, bad back and overindulgence in clotted cream stop me.

These are the days that can simultaneously warm your soul and break your heart. The days when it would be difficult to fathom why you would be anywhere else. Sure, it was cool and blustery but that only made it all the more rewarding. Even the coffee at Mawgan Porth was bearable, which is pretty good going if I’m being honest.

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Whereas I had a sausage roll in St. Agnes all to myself, today was a shared affair with Mum. Not that we were planning on sharing any food of course. No, we are related after all. But we were content to share the sands of Mawgan Porth together, with hardly anyone else in sight, determining to walk to the shoreline even though it never seemed to get any closer. Rockpools will do.

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Now, the Bedruthan Spud – not to be confused with the Australian Minister for Home Affairs – has been a fixture of previous holidays but I wouldn’t call it a requisite. Cream tea: tick. Decent pasty: tick. Mum’s lasagne: tick. Une tartiflette: oui. The Bedruthan Spud today was more a consequence of convenience rather than a destination of desire.

We ventured on a walk just past Bedruthan, out towards Park Head. Accustomed to the postcard views near Spud Café I was keen to get a different perspective, a different angle. And the walk seemed reasonable enough, for both of us. A way to savour the sights and build some hunger before lunch. Wherever that may be.

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Returning from the headland, I outlined the lunch options on offer: somewhere vague and probably owned by Rick in Padstow or even more vaguely anywhere opportune in between. Uncertainty is a risk (see Neil Misses Out on Tea and Cake) and so it took us about half a second to turn back to the National Trust café at Carnewas.

There is, of course, comfort in the familiar, safety in the known. And if you know it is going to be good, going to please, going to make your day and someone else’s, then why not just go ahead and do it. Whether that’s a baked potato with a slab of ham and a bowl of Cheddar or not.

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Go back to the things that bring a smile to your face and warmth to your heart, again and again and again. Like that first sip of good coffee, that view of the ocean, that first family gathering over a trayful of roast potatoes, secretly seething that someone else took the crispiest one but contented with everything that this cacophonous moment brings. Go back to foods that delight, places that charm and people that love. And never ever tire of the same old picture postcard views along the way.

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P.S. A sausage roll in the foreground would just about make this picture perfect.

Food & Drink Great Britain Green Bogey Photography Walking