I'll have a Sorrento and Portsea on Rye, hold the Blairgowrie
June 17, 2005Sorrento, Victoria, Australia
9:13 am.
There there. That’s better.
Yesterday was a great day. I guess I have come to realize that the roller coaster does not stop just cause you change tracks. Some days are great, some days are not. Some days you are at the front of the coaster, screaming, happy, wind making you cry, some days you are at the back, waiting for the ride to end, or at least go into a spiral or a loop.
Ok. Bad analogy over in five, four, three, two, now.
Yesterday we got in the car and drove to Arthurs Seat. Sure it sounds like a tourist trap to see a folding chair once housing the bum of a middle aged, brown polyester panted man, but its actually a whisper of a town that overlooks a number of small seaside communities. It also is the home of the Arthurs Seat Maze. Four acres of various hedge mazes and sculptures. Sure it’s not Sea World, sure it’s not an arduous hike along the hissing beach, but we were looking for something light and fluffy after the previous day’s histrionics.
Well it turned out to be great. The moment we entered the first hedge maze, Hud and I took off on Steph. Muh ha ha. Good times. We weaved and ran along the narrow paths, eight –foot hedges standing like sentries, blocking the sun. Three minutes later we hear the shaky voice of Steph, asking us where we are. We of course have no idea after randomly taking lefts and rights, a three-year old leading the way. So after a serious twenty minutes we finally reunited, nervous laughter our immediate tonic. This is of course where Steph and I tried to reenact the snowy scene from The Shining.
All work and no play make Steph and Jason go crazy.
There were a numerous mazes and flower gardens. Hud sat on a tractor.
We sat in the middle of the forest, surrounded by carvings of aboriginals in stumps and ate our lunch. A lunch of three different sandwiches and a nice fruit salad that Steph concocted prior to departure. We are getting better at not eating out.
It started to rain a little, so we said goodbye to the hedge reindeer and got back in the car. In Arthurs Seat there is a chairlift, which I had read about in one of the tourist magazines that the owners left for us. The article was an interview with the owner of the chairlift, who for two years, was mired in a liability lawsuit in regards to some accident on the lift. I understand this man is trying to work his tourist attraction back into the rotation, but reading this article did not want me to take my son and leap on the chair, no matter how he professed about the new safety guidelines. Sometimes the best PR is not to say anything at all. Just let the tourists find out after they take the ride in the café next door.
So, after high fiving about the lack of money we spent, we drove to Sorrento and spent a whack of money. Movies for Hud and us, fresh bread, garlic, basil, parmesan cheese, Italian sausages, shortbread cookies, chocolates, two bottles of wine, a six pack of beer, and of course, a cuppacino.
Hello line of credit? It’s me Jason. Get ready.
Back at home now, and Liz, the daughter-in-law of our hosts came by to collect the money and see if we had settled in okay. Of course the cottage looked like we had lived here for a couple of years, so Liz sat for a spot of tea (please read the past five words aloud in an over exaggerated British accent, its much more fun) and outlined some of the best and inexpensive things to do in and around the Mornington Peninsula. She was sweet, nature girl, wearing Ugs and speaking as she just finished off a big fat roach in her Range Rover. Get this. They are trying to sell there house. Been on the market for eight months. We told her ours sold in four days. She almost choked on her biscuit. That was the name of my first punk album. Choked on a biscuit. How odd.
She left, I made aglinotti stuffed with ricotta and spinach with fresh basil and parmesan and Italian sausage. We had a couple of glasses of red wine and put Hud to bed.
We watched Oceans 12 in bed and I thought it was stupid, accept for the Kashmir and Miller’s Crossing references.
Hud has gone a week with no diaper at night and no accidents.
This morning I woke up and went for an hour walk along the coast. Got some good pictures. Got some good heart rate. Walking in thick sand is challenging.
I came back and made Hud and I an egg on toast.
Strong Bodem coffee next to me. New rubber frog next to Hud.
Steph went off to Yoga. Hud and I are off to the beach to test out his new beach toys.
It feels like the rollercoaster has stopped, at least for a spell.
Love to all,
J.
June 16, 2005
Sorrento, Victoria, Australia
7:31 am.
Dust up between Steph and I yesterday. Our first real row. We were both tired and cranky and ended up arguing in front of Hud, who started crying. And when Hud went outside, I screamed and swore like a Kowalski version of myself. It left me sullen and meek for the rest of the day. We are fine now; both realizing what set it off, and how to prevent it in the future. We reassured Hud that it had nothing to do with him. He had forgotten it already. We went for a long drive and watched surfers surf. We ate homemade carrot cake and sunflower bread. Hud and I rolled in the sand. We’re good.
Yesterday began with a walk to the ocean. Through a winding path, trees overhanging, crowding us, until we came to a fork in the road.
An arrow was drawn into the ground, pointing to our right. We followed it, hoping it was a nice person before us, not a troll licking his lips and rubbing his palms. Up a hill, up some wooden steps, and then fwop!
The ocean, as powerful and majestic as I imagined, right in front of us.
The path had led us to a point, Spray Point to be accurate, about fifty feet overlooking the pounding surf. The rock cliffs were formed years of being slapped by the froth and the tremendous weight of rolling water. Thousands of years ago, the water level was as high as we stood, so the cliffs and banks were peppered with nooks and pockets where water once smacked. You could walk to the edge and look down, seeing the water hit the rock, spitting up the white.
It was low tide, so only the really big waves would make it over this one level, filling the small caves and pools, normally underwater during high tide. It was awesome; smelling the brackish air, watching ten foot breakers, in sets of three or four, topple into the banks. Down the coast a little you could see the dots of surfers, braving the chilly water, waiting for the next big one. It was exactly what we wanted to see coming to this section of Australia.
We continued up the coast a little to a deserted beach. All of the ocean side of the Mornington Peninsula is part of a national park, so there is no commercial aspect, or even evidence of anyone around.
I am sure it is different in the middle of their summer, but right now, as in Fiji, we only saw one other person the entire time on the beach.
A little later we had to leave, as Hud jumped into the water up to his knees, giggling while doing so. It was only about 13 or 14 degrees with a brisk wind, so we had to start our way home to avoid him getting cold.
We had lunch. We had our fight. We went for a drive.
Hud fell asleep in the car, as we knew he would, so we took in the scenery. We drove to Rye, a town a bit larger than Sorrento, to try to find yoga, a laundry mat and an Internet café respectively. We drove through Blairgowrie, a town smaller than Sorrento, and Steph was able to snag a cappuccino. We drove to the edge of the peninsula, to a town called Portsea, which has a number of old monster homes that were built in the 19th and early 20th century for the Melbourne elite to vacation. We drove to Sorrento, bought the fresh bread and ate it in the car. We drove back down towards Rye to another surf beach and got a much closer look at the surfers riding these fairly big waves in.
We watched a woman catch a fish. Hud and I rolled down a big sand path. We drove home.
Dinner was lemon pepper chicken, and a rice dish that Steph made with walnuts, broccoli, carrots and pineapple. I loved it.
I love her.
The fight was not portent of anything. It was environmental. It was inevitable.
Love to all,
J.
June 14, 2005
Sorrento, Victoria, Australia
7:34 pm.
Melbourne disappeared quicker than pipe smoke in a fan store. We are now comfortably settled in our 700 square foot, two bedroom cottage 90 minutes south of Melbourne on the Mornington Peninsula, the closest town being Sorrento.
We were done with the big city. Melbourne is spectacular though, the exact kind of city I would want to live in. The people are beautiful and friendly. The pockets of cool places are numerous and spread out. The ocean is twenty minutes from anywhere. The two hip streets we perused were riddled with restaurants, bars and cafes, or bars that turn into cafes in the morning, or cafes that turn into restaurants in the evening that turn into bars at night. They mostly are narrow, with chalkboard menus, and lots of wine by the glass and numerous pints or pots of beer. The waitresses are the cute Goth girls with so much indifference in their eyes I am sure you could chop off a toe and they would just sigh, wishing they were somewhere else. But the food we had everywhere was pretty awesome. Including the Mongolian beef noodle stir-fry take away I had last night. Hud had the bbq pork. I can’t remember what Steph had.
So that was that. Walking the streets that looked like home, picking up camera cords and new DVD’s for the little man. Eating our boxed take out in the hotel room, and falling asleep listening to each other’s snores.
This morning I slipped out to and got my head shaved by a Russian barber with a butchy, lesbian sidekick. I debated getting the straight razor shave, watching the Russian delicately slice the gravelly beard from the man in front of me in line. Then the gruff dyke burst in and I watched her sheer her first customer like a frightened sheep. I thought, stick to the head and move on. The Russian and I compared winter stories and he did a great quick head shave for 13 bucks. I picked up a cappuccino for Steph and two croissants from one of the 421 cafés in the three blocks back to the hotel.
We packed and walked to the bank to draw money to pay for the cottage rental where I am writing from right now. We had lunch and I secretly longed for and hated our indifferent waitress. She was about 15 pounds overweight, mostly in the hips, but still she wore the midriff baring shirt. She wore low rider black sweat pants and a black t-shirt. She looked like she was hungover from the previous night and the edge of her day two pink panties made an appearance as she leaned over to wipe away drink sweat. She was bored and bothered that her dark dive, her Nick Cave haven, was now serving lunch to Canadian tourists with their rambunctious three-year-old son. Man did I hate her. And want her. And probably want to be her somewhere.
Moving on. We decided to ship our Ipod back to Canada to see if Dad could work the warranty angle for us. What a pain. Bought in April, broken by June. It was a luxury, so it was not something we could rush out and repurchase. Like we did with the computer. Another Apple product. Thanks Steve “hand” Jobs.
David, our quirky and blinky redheaded concierge was nice enough to assist in the shipping of the Ipod back home. He raced and rushed around getting the appropriate paperwork together, fucking it up a couple of times, while we waited in the lobby entertaining Hud with free apples and candies. Davey boy eventually came through, so I slipped him a fin, and he bowed like a thankful Asian.
We were off, on the road, using our rental car for the first time since we arrived, meaning we spent $84 for two days rental and another $20 for two days of parking for our beige beast. And with Steph finding a new knack for navigation we arrived at our destination surviving the left hand side driving and four roundabouts.
The Mornington Peninsula begins about 45 kilometres south of Melbourne, curving around the bottom of Port Phillip Bay, and ending about 120 kilometres in total very close to Sorrento, where we are now. Our small cottage is about a seven-minute walk from the beach and about a seven-minute drive from Sorrento. We made the drive to Sorrento after unpacking to stock up on supplies, which included some great fresh produce, two porterhouse steaks, lemon pepper chicken and some ground beef amongst other sundries.
The town itself is really cute. Old fashioned stores lining the streets, parking separating the two sides, and an old movie house right in the centre. There is as mentioned a fresh produce store, a butcher, two bakeries, and get this, four bottle shops or liquor stores. It is like the town of Lakefield, Ontario having four liquor stores. Reedickerus. But hey, as I sip my bottle of James Squire Pilsner, a deliciously cold microbrew, I can’t complain.
So here we are. Daisy Cottage
We have self-prescribed this portion of our trip to be more active. There is a huge National Park with a number of marked out circuit trails, all under 5 kms very close to our cottage. We know with Hud it will be difficult, but as long as we are not under any time constraints, we can conquer these supposed scenically orgasmic tramps with red-faced passion.
So we have to stop every five minutes to watch Hud hover a piece of leaf and tell us it’s a bug.
“Hey guys, lookitthisbug!!”
So what.
Love to all,
J.
posted by Jason @ 9:25 PM
<< Home