A Day of Simple Pleasures

The day of simple pleasures started at 6:55 AM when my smartphone activated an alarm clock. One might wonder what can be pleasant about being woken up at 6:55 AM. The answer is: not having to get up; it was my time in lieu day and I simply forgot to switch off the alarm clock the night before. So, instead of bracing myself to enter the cold world of weekday mornings, I just muted the screaming phone and immediately fell asleep.

Another pleasure, when I finally got out of bed, was to take as much time as I wanted to finish breakfast. Arguably, this kind of indulgence is available on most weekends. That day, however, was special: on a Monday morning I was sitting on a backyard terrace, watching frolicking lorikeets and enjoying my morning tea, while my colleagues were attending scheduled meetings, driving company profits, doing other very important tasks...

It's remarkable how TIL days feel different from an annual leave. They are supposed to compensate an employee for overtime, when he is tired after weekend work and feels like having a day off, but usually, by the time one gets his TIL, that feeling passes, and it's not perceived as a compensation - it's more like a bonus.

It was a rare sunny day, I had no plans and just on a whim decided to go to Manly beach. The morning peak hour was over and I got there exactly in GPS-predicted 38 minutes. A stroll along the promenade to Shelly Beach was a kind of pastime that evoked vacation memories and made me feel like I had all the time in the world.

On the promenade a few things attracted my attention. One was a sign which threatened me with 6 months' imprisonment if I manhandled a water dragon. I suspiciously looked around and, to my relief, didn't notice any dragons in my epsilon-vicinity. I don't know if I could restrain myself from grabbing that cute and cuddly creature if I saw it on a cliff face.

I had also noticed a shop sign which initially enraged my inner grammar Nazi.

However, a closer inspection of the premises revealed solid legal grounds for such outrage, namely, an assorted range of T-shirts.

My next simple pleasure was a lunch in a cafe on a sea shore, with a sea view. Well, slightly obscured by araucarias, but still a sea view. The place was called MOO Gourmet Burgers. We came there 10 minutes before the kitchen opening, but were allowed to spend that time on a balcony, enjoying the view: powerful thundering surf, a lonely sail and distant surfers at Winki break wiggling their way between waves and rocks.

The burger I chose from the menu was pretty tall. Actually, I was never quite sure about how to approach such burgers. Holding it in a hand and biting alternatively the top, the bottom and the middle seemed fiddly and tiresome. Trying to squash the burger so that it could fit in the mouth was a sure way of squeezing the patty out and sending it across the cafe into someone's face. Using knife and fork... hmm, that didn't sound like the right way to treat a burger. Finally, I settled on splitting it into two halves - a healthy half with salad and tomato, and a man's half with beef and cheese - and nibbling at them in turns. That worked quite well and my peace of mind was restored.

I liked the cafe's moo-themed decor: kids' drawings of cows on the walls, logos on serviettes and cow spotted drinking straws. Moo was everywhere - they even had Moo beer from Moorilla Brewery in Tasmania. When I visited Moorilla last December, I was too preoccupied with wine tasting and didn't pay much attention to beer. That was a mistake since I discovered that one of the beer varieties produced there was my favourite Hefeweizen. Now I know the place where to taste it in Sydney, and I am going to visit that place when the ambient temperature calls for beer, not for whiskey.

When I returned home I felt like having afternoon tea, an intention which was immediately carried out to my complete satisfaction. Again, I was sitting on the terrace, drinking T2 Blue Mountain tea, burning an incense stick, watching plumes of smoke snaking in the wind, and squinting at the setting Sun, which ineffectually tried to blind me, but only succeeded in bathing my backyard in warm golden glow.

My last simple pleasure that day was making fire in the open fireplace, basking in its radiant heat and watching the dancing flames.

Central Coast's Hidden Liquor Treasures

Last year we spent a week in Terrigal, a nice little town in Central Coast. So little, in fact, that after staying for a couple of days there one starts looking for some variety, unless one is a die-hard beachgoer. We weren't; so we jumped into the car and went exploring. We looked for road signs pointing to places of interest, and it happened so that the first three directed us to liquor producers. Well, we were looking for entertainment - we'd got it.

2013 Trip to Tasmania - Tamar Valley Wineries

According to my notes, we visited 22 wineries in Tasmania, and 15 of them were in Tamar Valley. It is a big region and wineries are not as compactly grouped as in Mudgee or Yarra Valley, so it took us two days to visit all of them. It was still low season so in most wineries we were the only visitors - the way I like it as I get all the attention. I'll tell you about the wineries which left some impression regardless of the quality of their wine. 

2013 Trip to Tasmania - Flowers and The Last Retreat

It was the only time of the year, two weeks around the border between November and December, when we could see both of them. We specifically planned the trip for that time, half a year in advance telling our bosses that they had to adjust their business plans so that their companies would not collapse in our absence. If we arrived two weeks earlier or later we would see only one or another. It had to be the right time of the year, time when both poppies and lavender were in bloom. And you know what - it was a wrong year!

2013 Trip to Tasmania - Laurel Cottage and Frogmore Creek Winery

Port Arthur was our last destination in South-East of Tasmania after which we moved inland. That day we didn't have any more time for sightseeing, so we went straight to our next one-night accommodation, Laurel Cottage in Richmond. We came there ten minutes before the declared arrival time and were gently chastised by the cottage owner for not warning her by phone. Having been overwhelmed by such welcome, we silently grabbed the keys, dropped our bags, and rushed to take a sunset photo of the historical Richmond Bridge, which was found only 50 metres away.

2013 Trip to Tasmania - Day 5 - Port Arthur

Port Arthur... Port Arthur... The name rang a bell but, as it turned out, a wrong one. Port Arthur that I had in mind was a place of the most violent battle of the Russo-Japanese War. Obviously, it's not a good name for a town since Tasmanian Port Arthur also became known around the world for all the wrong reasons. Initially, it was a prison for British convicts popularised in Marcus Clarke's novel For the Term of His Natural Life. However, the locals did not want any stake in such kind of fame and even renamed the town to Carnarvon to disassociate themselves from the penal history of the site. Still, the gruesome past of one of the most brutal convict settlements proved to be a strong tourist attraction, and Carnarvonians were smart enough to realise that they would earn more money as Port-Arthurians, so the original name was restored in 1927. Sixty nine years later Port Arthur earned another grisly badge as a place of the deadliest massacre in the recent Australian history. After such introduction you will understand that we just couldn't miss it.

I can't say that the site itself was beautiful or impressive unless you are impressed by ruins. Come to think of it, what with 20 million tourists coming to see the remnants of Colosseum every year, I probably represent minority in this matter. Nevertheless, even I found a few ways to pleasantly pass the time in Port Arthur.

There were a few scheduled activities which were included into the price of an entry ticket, such as Harbour Cruise. Normally, I would eagerly board a boat, but having survived Tasman Island Cruise earlier that day, I found the phrase "water attractions" oxymoronic and kept my distance from the shore. Nevertheless, I quite enjoyed a guided walking tour during which I visited all notable places and learned a lot about the history of Port Arthur, including why there were so many convicts in Britain at that time. It appeared that there were three main factors which simultaneously caused a high level of unemployment, and consequently, crime. Firstly, a lot of soldiers returned home after the end of Napoleonic Wars. Secondly, industrialisation started to pick up and many factory workers were made redundant. Finally, it was the time when landlords found it more profitable to develop the land themselves than to rent it to farmers. All this combined with tough laws, which allowed sentences up to 21 years for petty theft, provided a steady flow of convicts to overcrowded British gaols until the government decided to offshore correctional services.

After the tour I spent an hour in a museum learning curious facts about life in the penal colony and gazing at things made or used by convicts and officers. In that museum I found a particoloured "magpie convict suit" which I remembered seeing before, possibly in some movie, and thinking it was just a regular prisoner's uniform. It turned out that such uniform was reserved only for recidivists and was considered humiliating.

The last place I visited in Port Arthur was Convict Gallery, or as I called it, Card House. At the entrance every visitor was given a playing card which had a convict's name on it and they could find a story of that convict in the Gallery. Of course, I was curious to check why my miscreant was transported to Terra Australis and how he fared here. His story was not remarkable, but what I found interesting was that the harshness of British laws was offset by rather liberal parole rules in Australia. Prisoners were released on parole after serving less than half their sentence even though they committed misdemeanors in gaol. They also underwent training in trades while serving their sentence which gave them good prospects of finding a job upon release.

I found the visit to Port Arthur quite entertaining despite my general dislike of the museums; for me it was more of an educational experience than sightseeing. The convict history in Australia was unusual enough to keep me interested for at least a couple of hours and I would spend more time there had we come earlier. However, I won't go there again any time soon. That place is like a book: once you've read it, it will take some time before you feel like reading it again.

By the way, I've told you a lie. The last place I visited in Port Arthur was actually a gift shop where I was supplied with a piece of clothing. As you can see it's not a magpie suit; I wasn't that bad.

2013 Trip to Tasmania - Day 4 - Convict Station

When my wife told me she booked a room in Norfolk Bay Convict Station I expected to spend the night in a refurbished prison offering to experience the 19th century life of a British convict transported to Van Diemen's Land for the term of his natural life. In fact, it was built by convicts as a warehouse and the Australia's first railway station near the place where ships from Hobart unloaded. Later it was converted to a guesthouse where the owners tried to preserve the period atmosphere. Not being an expert on the convict era I can't tell how successful they were in their endeavour but the place did look anachronic.