Stannum House, Tenterfield

We left Lismore last Thursday afternoon to attend the funeral of our dear friend Terry Mateer, aka Bubbles Le Gaye, in Newcastle on Friday afternoon. Malte came down as well and we left early Saturday, after catching up for dinner with Geoff and Graham on the Friday night, and drove home via the New England highway and overnighted at Tenterfield, at Stannum House. I hadn't told Steve or Malte where we would be staying so they both got a surprise when I told Steve to stop the car out the front of this mansion, because this is where we were staying.

 The mansion was finished in 1888 and it is stunning.

 There are four bedrooms andI had booked us into the Julius Caesar Room, which was vast and included a queen bed (for Malte) and a king for Steve and I.  Malte couldn't stop giggling when we were shown into our room.  It was incredibly decorated and vast.

 After we had driven up to a nearby lookout at Mt McKenzie, seeing grey kangaroo, swamp wallaby and wallaroo in a five minute section of the road up to the lookout, and watching a brilliant sunset, we came back and got ready to go out to the Royal Hotel for a few drinks before coming back to the Thai restaurant in Stannum House for dinner. Here is Malte looking his best for a Big Night Out in Tenterfield: suitably charming.

 The grand staircase

Malte and one of the staff of Tenterfield Thai which was again, astonishingly decorated - very lush (Bubbles would have loved it), and the food was easily some of the best Thai we had ever eaten. In the words of our friend, Cal, after a couple of bottles of wine following a few beers at the pub earlier, we got a little bit silly.

Malte and his bonfire

 So, here are a couple more pics (see post below) of Malte and the bonfire he lit. You can get a sense of how high the flames were shooting skywards (and tree-wards) in this pic.

Safely out of the searing heat, Malte watches as the bonfire eats itself into oblivion.  Note the safety precaution of the garden hose. Hmmm yes that would have helped a great deal.

After 5.5 years: our first bonfire

 We had been building this bonfire heap for about 5.5 years and we decided that the weekend of Eurovision was to be when we lit it. Here's Steve looking happy with himself after getting it into a good bonfire shape.

 Steve then Rogered around it to clear a nice buffer between it and the surrounding pasture. Memo to self: it is always preferable not to form a bonfire under a large eucalypt.

 We gave the honour of lighting the bonfire to Malte who had proven his incendiary abilities by lighting our wood fire in the lounge room most nights of the previous week.  He refused to use newspaper to get the thing going.

 Liam was very keen to get some marshmallows toasted so began the process of confectionary melting quite early in the piece.  Some might say a tad too early.

 Because the fire soon erupted into a rather impressive inferno,

 the flames of which exceeded Steve and my reckoning, but not Liam's who correctly predicted that they would burn some of the leaves of the flooded gum standing above it.  Indeed, we were quite concerned for a few minutes that we were going to set the tree on fire. Memo to self: Do not ever build a bonfire under a tree.  Lucky for us, however, and for the tree, no more damage than some burnt branches and leaves occurred.

 The fire's heat was too intense for us to get near the fire, but I managed to grab a few pics like this before retreating.

And this is what the great big pile of stuff looked like in the morning. Note the flooded gum still standing.

Channon Market

 Liam came down last weekend (10 and 11 May) and we took advantage of the amazingly beautiful Eurovision Sunday to spend much of the day at the Channon Market.  We had taken Malte to this fabulous event back in January but he was eager to go again and Liam had not been at all. The day began well with the samba blisstas, a fantastic carnival drumming band which is based in the north coast.

 Malte, Liam and Steve having drunk too much sugar cane juice with ginger.

 Such a beautiful day, and such a beautiful location for this market.

Lots of vibrant colour everywhere. And so much to buy. Liam bought a self-watering African violet pot while Malte busied himself buying presents for his family (and a few for himself).  Steve bought soap. He loves the soap from a particular soap lady who sells at The Channon markets.

Malte returns

 After nearly four months adventurising around Australia, Malte returned to Larnook in early May. In preparation, Steve and I stocked up on macadamia butter, one of Malte's staples. He and I the ascended Wollumbin. Well not straight away, of course.

 It was a perfect day for the climb which took us about 2 hours.

 The view from the summit is spectacular, with the clear conditions allowing us to see all the way up to Brisbane (although you won't see Brisbane in this pic, it is taken looking east).  And it's not at the summit.

Malte told me that the ecological knowledge he had picked up from his first stay at Larnook enabled him to tell his various travelling companions about aspects of Australian nature. He had told the story of the strangler fig many times apparently. So it's only fitting he should pose next to this one on Wollumbin. 'You are witnessing the slow death of a fine tree....'