SUNDAY 26 JULY TO THURSDAY 30 JULY     FORREST BEACH

SUNDAY  was a cloudy day.

After an early lunch, John went off to bowls.

I had a lovely, relaxed sort of day. Read, sewed, spent time on the computer, walked to the shops to get milk and some broccoli.

John returned, pleased with the way he’d played at bowls. The crocs had been christened!

Tea was steak and vegies.

MONDAY  we noted that it was five weeks until we had to be home. Our housesitters were flying out that day, to do an overseas house sit. The new pennant bowls season would be close, too, for John.

It was another cloudy day.

I was able to extend our stay here, effectively for as long as we wanted, just deciding week by week.

John had a fish from the beach this morning, but did not catch anything. He then drove across to Halifax to get some fishing gear from the shop there, but it was shut. He came back with three library books for me, having joined the Ingham Library at their Halifax branch. All free, too. I was really pleased – would be great to have access to books, since we would be here a while.

I sewed. We walked on the beach in the late afternoon.

Tea was eggs and bacon, fries and cob corn.

TUESDAY  was partly cloudy.

In the morning, before John got up. I walked on the beach. In the afternoon, we both walked as far as the little Cassady Beach settlement, to the south. It was an ocean-front row of maybe six or eight houses. A couple seemed to be currently occupied. They had superb views, but must feel awfully vulnerable in a big storm. This area does get cyclones too, with the  attendant storm surges, and they are not very high at all, above high tide level here. But perhaps, there is some protection from the very worst of the elements, from the close offshore Palm Islands?

Just across from us was a WA registered rig. The family – a young-ish couple and two children, maybe eight and six or thereabouts – have been on the road for two years. He was a cook, who picked up casual work wherever they stopped for any time. She was, supposedly, teaching the children. She said she did not believe in schools, or any sort of formal educational plan. Children would learn what they needed, from their general experiences, was her view. A cop-out, as far as I was concerned. But she did say that she tried to make sure they got in a bit of work, most days, on literacy and numeracy. As far as I had seen, to date, the kids mostly free ranged around the park and played on the beach, while she sat with her feet up, in the shade of the awning and read. I wondered how they were able to escape some sort of check on the children’s education?

I was not opposed to home schooling, as such, but believed there was a huge difference between educating children properly, at home, and her kind of laissez faire, do nothing attitude. Proper home schooling required clear planning, resources, and a lot of consistent effort by all concerned.

WEDNESDAY was less cloudy.

We drove into Ingham and did the full 3km circuit walk at the Tyto Wetlands. At last!

There was a surprising amount of bird activity, considering it was the middle of the day. A special bird here was the Eastern Grass Owl – for which the place was named. Barn owls – the ones with masked faces – are Tyto genus. Logic dictated that we wouldn’t see one in the middle of the day – and we didn’t, but the hope was there, as we walked. It took us two hours to do the walk, because of the amount of time spent looking at wildlife and the very pretty wetlands scenery. The area was really well set out.

In the Visitor Centre there, looked at an art exhibition, featuring Tyto birds. I was not particularly impressed with the quality of the works.

We had a Subway lunch. Went to the main library in Ingham, for more books. I had actually previously read two of the ones John had borrowed for me the other day. A quick supermarket visit, for groceries, and that was the day.

THURSDAY saw what I was starting to regard as the usual weather here at this time of year: some cloud, some sun.

I did a morning beach walk.

We left about 3pm to go into Ingham. Firstly, to the bank to sort out a credit card limit glitch.

Then we drove out towards the ranges and onto the Abergowrie road, for a way, through cane country along the really fertile Herbert River valley. It was an attractive short drive.

It was notable that the houses on the cane farms were two storeyed, with the ground level floor usually being mostly open breeze block. We worked out that there could be quite big floods in these parts, and that put the main part of the house above the water level – hopefully.

We returned to the Ingham bowls club, where John went in for a practice, while I sat in Truck and read.

We’d planned to buy and enjoy a pizza tea, but it was too late by the time John finished practicing, so we grabbed a quick Subway instead.

The sunset sky was really pretty as we lined up to start bowls.

Through the duration of the game, there was lots of passing cane train activity. The empty, clanking wagons were being taken out to be ready for tomorrow’s harvest work.

The night-time bowls were of a reasonable standard. I found it really hard to judge the pace, under the lights, and John did not play well, either. So the triples team we were in lost soundly.

We had the obligatory social drink and were back at the van by 9pm. Hopefully, that would end my bowls participation for a while!