Mary & Geoff in Beruga

Mary & Steve (me), photo Christine

Geoff in the orange groves

Christine, Mary, Geoff, photo Mary

Knitting Machine, full view

Knitting Machine, the dial at the back is a stitch counter

Knitting Machine

Working the machine

Hi

My Aunt Mary is my Dad's uncle's daughter and lives near Beruga in NSW.  Mary's married to Geoff Backhouse, whose family pioneered the Beruga area.  While we were in Echuca, we rang them up and travelled the 110k or so from Echuca up to Beruga the next day.  We had a great lunch with them and Mary showed us her late father's Eddie's knitting machine, made from bits of Meccano and found or adapted household items like a shoe polish tin.  Here is the video.  There is a water clock of Eddie's in the Museaum Victoria Collection.

Thanks very much for lunch, Mary & Geoff, see you soon.

Romet Wigrey bike in Echuca

Lots of flowers like these on the roadside

Moama town centre

Free bike hire in the old part of Echuca (St Annes Winery)

A couple of birds scurry out of the way in Moama

Hi

For a few days my wife Christine and I have been staying in Moama, up near Echuca on the Murray River.  I chucked my Polish Romet Wigrey (try saying it without smiling) in the car for a bit of pootling around town and managed to visit almost every op shop in Echuca and Moama during the week.  Managed to pick up a few interesting things and it was quite good fun if a little quiet.  Cadells where we stayed is right on the Murray and its possible to sit on a lounge chair, watch a lazy boat drift by, drink a beer, feed the local very varied bird life, and cook a barbecue meal all at the same time.  Most of the patrons were a bit older and very harmless. 

One day was quite hot, the wind blowing the trees and branches around and making everyone talk about bushfires.  My Georgette Heyer novel blew off the table and about 10 pages escaped into the breeze.  Found a few of them right away and another one was handed in by a neighbour, but with several pages remaining missing it was a bit of a write off.

We visited my Dad's cousin Mary during my stay, more on that next post.

Regards

Steve Nurse

Back from Sydney now.

Bike Storage in Sydney Rocks Youth Hostel

A seal and a few fellow tourists at the Sydney Opera House

Getting around Sydney loaded up.  The large bag on the handlebars is the "normal" way to get around with luggage on a Bickerton, see the photos on this blog post for more

Hi

I'm back from Sydney now, the overnight train delivering me to another train, which delivered me home by 8am.  Melbourne was pretty sleepy, early in the middle of a football final long weekend.

In the last 2 days in Sydney I worked out how to carry stuff on the Bickerton better and went for a few touristy jaunts around the Opera House which was a bit of fun.

Regards

Steve Nurse