Yet another year has gone in a blur.
There have been big changes for us all this year with John and Jacky (and Amy some of the time) finally making the move to the bayside. We are now happily installed in Raby Bay, which is an area within the suburb of Cleveland out by beautiful Moreton Bay. It’s very different to the Western Suburbs of Brisbane where we were before. The new house is at the end of a small canal, so no passing boats, but it’s still a really quick get away to the bay on the boat. It’s a very friendly canal; our new neighbours organized a welcome party for us to meet everyone on the canal shortly after we moved in.
We’re very close to central Cleveland; 10 minutes walk to the shops and the train and just five minutes from the harbour with all its cafes and restaurants.
Cleveland is an old settlement, it was named by Captain Cook in 1770 after the then Duke of Cleveland. Although it wasn’t until December 1850 that Cleveland became a township. A recent claim to fame for Cleveland is that many of the sea scenes in the new Narnia film The Voyage of the Dawn Treader were filmed on Moreton Bay around Cleveland Point last year.
At the start of the year Amy moved down to Sydney to commence her Bachelor of Dramatic Art (Production) course at the National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA). It was all a bit frantic trying to find her somewhere to live and get her settled in before the course started in February. It has been a busy and challenging year for Amy, she has to be at NIDA Monday to Friday 9am to 6pm and then do productions and assignments on top of that! But she’s enjoying it and learning a huge amount. One of the highlights of the year for her was when she observed backstage at a performance of King Lear by Bell Shakespeare (the top Shakespearian company in Aus) and the stage manager actually let her call a few scenes.
As you can imagine we have been up and down to Sydney to see all Amy’s productions this year. Back in May David came along as well as it was NIDA’s Open Day, which is only held every other year. We all had the opportunity to see behind the scenes and watch Amy in action working on the set of ‘Accidental Death of an Anarchist’!
In January, after we had installed Amy in Sydney, we took a few days to drive back to Brisbane, stopping off at the Hunter Valley (wine growing area) and visiting some attractive towns and locations along the east coast on the way home.
In March we traveled down to Canberra, the capital city of Australia. Canberra only exists because Sydney and Melbourne could not agree on which one should be the capital, so they compromised by creating a brand new capital city halfway between the two – crazy but true! This was our first trip to Canberra and we went mainly to see the Masterpieces from Paris exhibition at the National Gallery. We were quite impressed with Canberra, despite it having been created for a specific purpose, it has been well designed with some lovely buildings. We were thoroughly impressed with the Parliament complex, a beautiful, light, modern building. You can take a lift to the roof of the building which is grassed and you get to walk above the politicians! That’s all part of the big Australian egalitarian thing, nobody is above the people – seriously, that’s what they had in mind when it was designed! Looking down from grassy Parliament rooftop your eye is drawn to the Australian War Memorial. This is also an outstanding building and a visit to the war memorial is very moving. There are large exhibition spaces telling the stories of many wars and battles that the ANZAC troops have been involved in. Also in Canberra it was great to meet more relatives from the Burkett side of the family.
In July Mark and his partner Emma headed over to the UK and they are currently settling into life in London. They are living in Putney – John is still in shock that they have moved to South London! Mark is working as an Audio Visual technician in the city. They plan to stay in Europe for up to 2 years and are just taking it as it comes.
David is working in Brisbane City for the Apple reseller Nextbyte, obviously the selling computers thing is in the genes. He joined the company back in February at their store at the University of Queensland and within a couple of months he was promoted to Assistant Store Manager in the city branch.
Talking of work, Jacky has just given up her job Queensland Art Council. She has been having some health issues this year and decided that it’s time to take a break and concentrate on trying to get back on track.
In June John finished his year as President of the Rotary Club of Fortitude Valley. It was a busy year but pretty successful with the club raising over $60,000 to support various charitable causes. One highlight was the Favours Auction John organised. The Australians didn’t at first quite grasp the concept of a Favours Auction, but once they got their heads around it, it all went very well . John persuaded the estate agent who sold our Chelmer house to act as auctioneer – it’s common to sell houses by auction over here, so many estate agents are also auctioneers! We bought as a ‘favour’ a weekend’s use of a Sydney harbourside apartment, which we naturally used one weekend to visit Amy – yet again!
In August we celebrated our 30th Wedding anniversary with a combined housewarming and anniversary party. It thoroughly warmed the house and fortunately the new kitchen was finished just days before the event. The new house is cleverly designed so that almost every room overlooks the canal. There is some grass for Buster to enjoy; he loves his walks along the Raby Bay foreshore park.
As a trip to celebrate the 30th milestone, we went up to the Whitsundays and stayed on Long Island. It was a very relaxing few days and we took a sea plane trip out to the reef. The first day we tried to do this trip, which started with a visit to the famous Whitehaven beach before the flight out to Hardy Reef, the weather was a bit blustery and rainy. But as we got out to the reef it cleared up and they were all set to land when the pilot got a call to return to base as the weather was closing in. So a couple of days later we tried again. Made a second stop off at Whitehaven again (and it rained) then this time headed out successfully to the reef where the weather was great. It was fabulous, just us, the pilot, and one other couple. The snorkeling was fantastic, some of the best we’ve experienced in Australia.
This got Jacky thinking that it would be really nice to get some more snorkeling in this season and so in November we headed off again. This time to Heron Island which is a coral cay at the Southern end of the Great Barrier Reef. It’s a 2 hour boat trip to get to the island but well worth it. The sea life was amazing. It took some getting used to that there were so many reef sharks around. Reef sharks are harmless, but Jacky was rather glad she didn’t get up close and personal with the 4m Hammerhead shark that turned up just a few minutes after we had left the water! But the odd shark did not deter us, there were fish galore as well as rays of all kinds and turtles, all to be seen just meters out from the shore. Heron Island is one place that is on the list for a return visit – sharks permitting of course!
Queensland has just had the coolest, wettest spring for many years so we’re expecting a wet and wild summer. But we’re hoping that we will get the opportunity to get out on the bay as often as possible. Amy and David will be home for Christmas so it will be great to spend some time together. Although Amy is rushing off after Christmas to do stage management at the Woodford Music Festival over New Year. This is a huge music, performance and visual arts festival but with the unpredictable weather at that time of the year it’s usually either cyclonic rain or searing heat, or of course both at the same time!
Later in January Amy is off to Thailand to stay with one of her NIDA classmates who has lived there for many years. Looking further ahead to next year, we have booked a cruise around the Kimberleys in May. The cruise will go from Darwin (in the Northern territory) to Broome (Western Australia) and on the way we get to visit the Bungle Bungles – suggest you Google it if you don’t know what or where they are! This is just one part of Jacky’s elaborate plans to celebrate John’s ‘significant’ birthday in 2011. As Jacky is organising it all there will no doubt be many fun things happening, so if you fancy a trip down under do try and make it at the end of July so you can join in the celebrations!
So that’s it for another year from the land down under, seasonal greetings and good wishes to you and yours from us all.