Footprints for Peace: June and Cassie are walking from Brisbane to Canberra!Slept overnight at Ourimbah rest stop and met up this morning with June and Cassie from Footprints for Peace, who are walking from Brisbane to Canberra! Was able to provide green tea and a fruit platter, meet some of their lovely Central Coast supporters, and join them to receive a moving Welcome to Country from Peta, standing in for her Aunty Betty. Might join them for part of a day's walk a bit further down the track. Check out their website at http://footprints.footprintsforpeace.net/australia_walk/walk_for_peace.htm . And please share this if you think your FB contacts might be interested.

Slept overnight at Ourimbah rest stop and met up this morning with June and Cassie from Footprints for Peace, who are walking from Brisbane to Canberra! 

Was able to provide green tea and a fruit platter, meet some of their lovely Central Coast supporters, and join them to receive a moving Welcome to Country from Peta, standing in for her Aunty Betty. 

Might join them for part of a day's walk a bit further down the track. 

Check out their website at http://footprints.footprintsforpeace.net/australia_walk/walk_for_peace.htm to see when they are nearby and find out how you can support them or just join in for a bit of the walk.

 And please share this if you think your contacts might be interested.

Also some more info here.

Go Go Geocaching! fun in the bush for the whole family (and dogs too)

Was involved in my first geocache hunt today, while staying with Paul and Sam at Chiltern.

The idea is that someone hides a small cache - eg a jar or box - somewhere in the bush and then posts the GPS co-ordinates on the geocaching website.

Anyone who wants to join in can take their GPS or iphone and head out to look for it.

We chose one near Chiltern and piled in the car with the dogs (Daisy and Trevor, furfriends of Noreen who was visiting also), and our Team Leader Sam guided us to a Highway Rest Stop. Here we parked the car and headed out on foot... up a hill , over an old rusty barbed wire fence, and off into the scrubby bush. After about ten minutes (of excited) walk we came to the spot indicated by the GPS, and then had to hunt around until someone found it - in this case, hidden in a hollow log.

(Here's a pic of Daisy examining the hiding spot.)

Then you sign your name in the log book and leave a trinket. And if you want you can take one left by those before you. Sam left a flower stamp, and I scored a plastic ring (which surprisingly, no one else wanted. -- Thanks to whoever left that one.) Then put it all back as you found it for the next finders.

Be warned, it can be very addictive. One of my neighbours felt that she'd become a grass widow to Geocaching mania, as her husband refused to go anywhere on the weekend that there wasn't a cache planted. Fortunately, especially with the advent of iphones, it's no longer a subculture for orienteerers but is becoming more and more popular.

You can download an app for your iphone, ipod or Blackberry - the official one is called Geocaching, which also has a trial version called Geocaching Intro, which is what we used. Or various others (11 other apps described here).

But what a great way to get the kids out from in front of their tvs and computer screens and into the bush, or to add a little extra zing to a day out visiting a winery for lunch (which was what we were up to... lovely pizza at WatchBox in Indigo Valley - yum... except I had a chicken salad they kindly made for me, as I'm pizza-challenged.)

Geocaching sounds nerdy but was actually good clean fun, and a great sense of adventure and accomplishment as you can see here as we proudly examine our find.

Websites are http://geocaching.com (which has a little video about it), or http://geocaching.com.au if you want it specifically for Australia.

And ps if you are interested in wine and winemaking, don't forget to check out my brother Brian's website http://www.shirazrepublic.com.au.

Have fun!

and please click and share if you found this useful.

Covering all the bases... Paul and Sam's household gods shrine

My friends Paul and Sam in Chiltern are covering all the bases just in case in their household shrine.

Hard to see them all in this photo but there's Sacred Heart of Jesus, Buddha, Ganesh, Egyptian Cats, a Chinese Dragon, Jewish Menorah, Tibetan Prayer Wheel, Hanuman the Monkey God, Masonic Regalia,  Vietnamese Shrine, Maneki Neko cats, Crucifex, Angels, Baby Jesus and Mary, Russian Orthodox Christian Saint, a marble chess set (signifying the game of life), a metronome, an Emu egg, a Samurai, and an Australian Aboriginal Bullroarer.

ps Paul has a website that shows that where the sun, moon and planets are in the zodiac each day at www.astroplot.com.

Delicious poetry chapbooks free to download, from AhaDada Books

I love poetry chapbooks. Perfect size for a bedtime read.

AhaDada Books (great name) has a selection of free chapbooks by wonderful poets that you can download and read from their website

I just read (and recommend) "the meh of z z z z" by Pam Brown

download it and others here

Bush architecture: corregated tree house cubby

This great cubby was designed and built by my nephew Paul in country Victoria.

It was originally a tank, then became a home for geese,

was transformed into a tree house for William..

Later occupied by Kaitlyn..

And now, complete with (rusty) satellite dish, it belongs to Sally.

In Praise and Honour of Chooks: Rooster and Hen paintings by Jennifer Kremmer

I love these chook paintings by Jennifer Kremmer...

In a world of battery hen farming, these finely wrought tributes to individual chooks are really special.


Jennie is selling the paintings thru her website at http://www.jenniferkremmer.com/chickenart/


I hope lots of people buy them to honour the birds who give up their lives by the millions each day to feed us. (Hanging them in among the family portraits perhaps.) I'd buy one, if I had a wall to hang one on.


She also does commissioned paintings of pets (any kind).


If you live in the central coast, she might even be able to supply you with free range eggs. 


....Or if you're thinking of writing, or mired down in the midst of a book or story and think it might be time to get some professional help and coaching... check out her manuscript services at http://www.jenniferkremmer.com/whitecow/

Who says permaculture has to be messy?

Ian Wansbrough's gorgeous garden in Fremantle, WA.





Permaculture meets Home Beautiful.



Formal garden beds, impeccably neat...



... With tomatoes, herbs, zuchinnis, silverbeet, salad greens, snowpeas, corn picked and straight into the pot or onto the barbie, and fresh eggs from the chooks for brekky.