The Murphy Family
It will soon be three years now since we sold our house and shipped all our belongings over to Brisbane Australia. We enjoyed a fabulous trip through America, Japan, China, Hong Kong and northern Queensland on our way to our new life, an experience we will remember for always. The transition has not been completely smoothe and easy with many adjustments and compromises along the way. We rented a house for a year and have subsequently bought a one , now awaiting rennovation which has been fraught with delays and set backs, the Australian building regulations and proceedures are not quite the same as in the UK and we are learning about new clauses and applications daily. We have managed to visit Sydney, Canberra, Melbourne on short breaks, travelled to the Red Centre, south into NSW visiting many beautiful beaches and coastal walks along the way. The Sunshine Coast has shared with us many lovely beauty spots, drives into the mountain ranges around the city into semi tropical rainforests and we have spent many happy days on Stradbrooke Island. chaosathome
We have also managed to visit the UK on a number of visits to see family and friends and have also loved having visitors who have stayed with us whilst holidaying here and sharing with them some of the many lovely places we have discovered in and around Brisbane.
Our life style has changed, the pace here is much slower and more carefree sometimes too much so, we have more time to explore and spend time with the family, having bbqs on a Sunday evening along the Brisbane River or out at the coast, the boys have adapted their life style accordingly and enjoy the casual dress code and sporting activities and have settled into the Aussie way of life so well.
Everyone is happy and on a good day glad to be here although the distance between friends and family some days is too great as we miss everyone so much, there is something to be said about past history and the unspoken understanding between friends and family, establishing new friends is difficult at times and something we have to work hard on to increase our social circle. So a very good reason for all our lovely friends and family to book a holiday and come and see us, very soon! We hope you enjoy reading about our adventures in our blog and love to read your comments, please keep in touch.
Travel Blog Posts
November 15th 2011
So this time it was Sebs turn to celebrate his special coming of age with friends and family at home. We decked the garden with candles and lanterns and we all enjoyed a delicious bbq banquet and toasted Sebs birthday wishes under the stars. It was lovely to see so many of his friends and be part of such a hppy occasion, they all seem to enjoy their drink and they were all well tanked up when the taxis arrived to take them to the Vally for some serious clubbing! Needless to say we were quite happy to tidy up and have an early night! Seb was given a lovely watch from his brothers and money from family and friends to put towards a bungey jump which he planned to experience in New Zealand over the ... read more
October 3rd 2011
One advantage of school holidays gives us the opportunity for Kevin to take some time off work and extend a weekend break to explore some more of the surrounding countryside around Brisbane. So with recommendations from friends and a three day weekend booked we drove north west out past Ipswich and onto the Brisbane Valley Highway towards Ferndale, a town locked in a time warp and travelled back 50 years in time but it did have the "The Best Pie Shop in Queensland!". We drove over The Wivenhoe Dam and stopped for a coffee and pastry and wondered at the size of the lake and tried to imagine how the water levels must have looked back in January. The road took us further north to Esk and onto Yarraman and a drive through the Blackbutt Forest ... read more
Toowoomba is Blooming Again
Published: September 29th 2011Oceania » Australia » Queensland » Toowoomba
September 17th 2011
It is difficult to believe that the town of Toowoomba an hour and forty-five minutes drive west from Brisbane could have managed to turn around the devastating chaos and damage caused by the floods in January and open their homes and businesses to thousands of visitors keen to share in the Carnival of Flowers Festival recently. The traffic cue approaching the main road entering the town should have given us an idea as to the popularity of such an annual event and the fact that every hotel, motel, B and B accomodation was fully booked as far out as 50 kms from the town. The floods were certainly not going to douse the enthusiasm and dedication of thousands of people who had opened their gardens and public parks and welcomed everyone with open arms to enjoy ... read more
September 11th 2011
What better way than to celebrate Father' Day the night before watching the fireworks at River Fire along the banks of the Brisbane River followed by a bbq. The night sky was very clear and the crowds had gathered along the cliffs at Kangaroo Point so we decided to climb down the cliffs to the picnic space below and managed to find a fantastic spot offering views both sides of the river, looking up to the Story Bridge and then down to South Bank. Needless to say we were not disappointed and enjoyed 25 minutes of spectacular explosions of colour and noise that lit up the sky, silhouetting the skyscrapers along the CBD. The next morning we all drove down to Point Danger for coffee looking out across to Surfers Paradise and where Kevin opened gifts ... read more
September 2nd 2011
Where has the past eighteen years gone? It appears to have flown by and here we find ourselves celebrating Dominic's birthday in a restaurant in Brisbane, the last of the Murphy boys to come of age! We all had a lovely evening eating our favourite Tibetan food, opening cards and presents and enjoying a delicious homemade chocolate cake. Later on that evening his brothers took out for his first legal drink and a dance or two in a Club in the city. It has been amazing, watching Dominic grow up into a confident, charismatic, thoughtful and caring young man. He has overcome many difficult hurdles in his life, developing coping strategies to manage what was a very confusing world to him when he was younger. He has become very disciplined and has worked extremely hard especially ... read more
Planet Earth meets Stradbroke Island
Published: August 23rd 2011Oceania » Australia » Queensland » North Stradbroke Island
August 17th 2011
Some choose to spend the Queensland public Ekka holiday at the show grounds and others choose to travel over to Straddie and experience the golden sands and deserted beaches instead. Guess what we decided to do? We were fortunate enough to have a complimentary two night stay at our favourite residential accommodation at Home Beach so left work early and caught the 5pm ferry and enjoyed watching the sunset over Moreton Bay as we travelled the 45 minute crossing and went into instant relax mode. We had recently changed our car and bought a Toyota Landcruiser 4WD so that we could experience off road driving and explore more of the Australian outback on future holidays. So with a permit to drive on the beach and a tide timetable we planned to explore Main and Flinders Beach ... read more
July 15th 2011
There are not many people who can say they share their birthday with the Sultan of Brunei but some special people do and that was me! They must have known I was coming as the streets were lined with flags and the day had been made a public holiday so everyone was enjoying themselves walking the streets and eating out at the local food markets. So what better than to join in the fun and mingle with the locals. The stop over was a welcome breather between a fifteen hour flight and a further seven hours before arriving back in Brisbane and starting back at work the following day. We were able to find a hotel very central to the city centre and managed to crash for a couple of hours and enjoy a few hours ... read more
July 9th 2011
How quickly the past six months have flown by since Alex and Anne announced their engagement and returned from Byron Bay to tell us that the wedding will be in the summer months in England and we would need to book six return flights to the UK. As in usual Alex and Anne style the wedding was planned and recorded on gnat sheets and emails flew back and forth confirming dates, ideas for venues, guest lists and catering suggestions were all discussed and explored over on conversations Skype with virtual interaction and links to possible websites, all very technical. We were certainly very aware of the huge distance that separated us from the physical support in the initial stages of the plans but with an earlier flight booked Hilary arrived as the advanced party to assist ... read more
Family and Friends, UK Visit.
Published: August 7th 2011Europe » United Kingdom » England » Berkshire » Newbury
June 25th 2011
Although the wedding was the main reason for us all flying over to the UK recently we were very fortunate to see many of our friends and family. With a detailed itinerary and a reliable hired car, infect we had two at one point, we were able to travel a fair few miles, up and down the M4 and the B400! HIlary managed to reunite with colleagues from Priors Court School and enjoyed an evening catching up all the news and changes at the school. She also managed a visit to the school with two colleagues from her school in Brisbane who were eager to see why she went into shock mode when she started to work at Red Hill Special School after experiencing all the facilities and space at Priors Court. Hilary managed to meet ... read more
May 15th 2011
What better than to take the water taxi to Stradbroke Island on a sunny Sunday morning. The day promised blue skies and temperatures of 24', not bad for an autumnal day! The water taxi is just like the City Cat Taxis on the river and with their powerful engines we crossed the waters to Dunwich in 25 minutes and found the bus to Point Look Out waiting to take us the 20 minute drive to the north of the island. Since staying at Domain we discovered we can walk along Home Beach with their beautiful silver gum trees creating a speckled back drop to the beach. Then on to Cylinder Beach around the rocky headland and onto Deadmans Beach, a smaller sandy beach surrounded by mangroves and gum trees. Ahead of us the red rugged cliffs ... read more
Tot: 0.093s; Tpl: 0.004s; cc: 14; qc: 94; dbt: 0.0599s; 1; s:notus w:www (50.28.60.10); sld: 1; ; mem: 1.9mb
