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Hi All
We have had just the perfect time in Agnes Water. We arrived here on Wednesday. This is our 4th home exchange and it is lovely. It is a 3 bedroom condo about a 3 minutes walk to a long pristine white sand deserted beach. Our condo overlooks the lap pool and then just across the street is a wonderful hot tub. This is like Resort living. Agnes Water is very small. A small shopping area etc but not much else. The next little town is the Town of 1770. I think they are 2 separate towns but hard to tell where one starts and the other one stops. This is 1770 festival weekend so we have participated in some interesting events. On Thursday night we went to a big field, ate a great lamb dinner and watched about 8 short (15 minute) movies. It was called a Film Festival. All the films were entertaining, the stars were in full shine and just a little breeze. It was quite perfect!!
Our Home exchange owners arrived Friday night to spend the weekend. On Friday night, the 4 of us went to a local hotel and looked at the Art
Exhibit that was part of the 1770 Festival. One of their good friends won for one of her entries so there was great excitement. Saturday, we attended the Parade, then Larry and I went on a ride on the LARC (lighter amphibious resupply cargo vessel). It was quite cool. This ocean has so many sand bar this is the perfect machine for the trip. Sometimes we were motoring in the water and the next thing we new we were crawling up onto the sand bar. We have seen this type of machine in many cities in the US. I think they have been called Ducks sometimes. We saw them in New York, Boston etc. We arrived back to the Condo in time to greet guests attending John's 60th Birthday party. It was fun to meet lots of Aussies.
John and Julie left for their home in Bundberg on Sunday and we stayed on. We golfed in the afternoon. (Again!!) It actually was fun. It was just a small course but lots of Par 3, 4's and a couple of 5's. No wonder I have hated golfing in the past. Who needs the driving range just let me get out
there and do it. Who needs a practice swing!! I get lots of practice swings without planning one!!
We met up with J & J's friends for dinner on Sunday night along with their friends visiting from Benowa, which is south of Brisbane by 50 kms or so. They extended an invitation to spend some time at their place and see the sites around their area which is the Gold Coast. It is wonderful meeting these amazing Auzzies that just seem to open their doors and say "Come on in". This couple, Trevor and Paula then emailed to tell us their good friends that live in Brisbane had just come back from Canada and would be very happy if we would spend the night with them in Brisbane when we are seeing that area. It is a little funny but we now know from experience that they too, will open their front door and say "We are so happy you are here". I know this wouldn't be for everyone but for us it is wonderful!!
We just spent 2 night with John and Julie at thier home in Bundaberg. Just 2 hours South of Agnes Water. Yesterday was
John's 60th BD so we went to the beach and BBQ'd breakfast in the park, then Larry and I toured the Bundaberg Distillery, the Bundaberg Ginger Beer plant and the sugar Museum. We have seen so many sites that we really are picking and choosing now. Just trying to see things that are a little novel, that we have not seen in the past. Larry cooked dinner last night for John's BD and it was a 5 bottle night.
It rained quite hard last night and we were trying to decide the last time we had seen rain. It rained for a 5 minute time a couple of weeks ago but certainly no rain for a day or anything close to that.
My computer seems to be feeling much better. No blue screens for about a week now. I don't know if these things repair themselves but I think it has. I did a full Virus scan and there was 29 items needing resolving and of the 29, 28 were resoved by MicroTrend and 1 (a trojan horse) was put in quarantine!! I did get a few pix from Hayman from an aquaintance which I will include today.
Hayman was in the news recently because a dive tour company left a couple of divers out in the ocean for 19 hours. I don't actually think they left them, not knowing they left them but left because they did not return to the boat. Anyway, they were rescued 8 kms or so down the coast, 19 hours later. They should do OK. I heard that they were not talking because they had sold their story to a tabloid and the very first day they had a spokesperson outside the hospital making a statement!! They had lashed themselves together for the duration so I guess they are very good friends by now and had lots of time to formulate a profitable plan.
Evan and Hiroko are in Japan right now. Hiroko had 2 business class tix to fly anywhere so they winged off to Osaka where they did Universal Studios, then, as Evan says, they took the bullet train and the slow train to Hiroko's small town to visit with her mom and dad. This is the first time, that Evan has actually gone to her mom and dad's house so that was nice for him. I think
this is Evan's 4th time to Japan with Hiroko. There are still many prejudices in Japan and a mental disability is one of them. The fact that Evan is able to visit Hiroko's home and be welcomed by her mom and dad is amazing. He is such a lucky guy to have Hiroko for a friend.
Off to Hervey Bay today and then Fraser Island tomorrow. I am looking forward to it. Mark and Clayton both have fond memories of Fraser Island so it will be nice to see. Their memories were trying to fit all the beer into their 4WD ute they had rented, ours might be a little different!!
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