Sunday 27 August 2006 - Brisbane

It has been an interesting week - just after I posted the last message I discovered that I had 2 scrub ticks as souvenirs of our camping trip. Darryl quickly assisted me to dispose of them, but a week later I can still feel pain under my arm where the poison was injected.

We are both still getting over our 'flu - every day is a bit better. Shane stopped over on Tuesday night and he and Marc flew to New Zealand on Wednesday morning to go snow-boarding at Queenstown. I haven't heard from them, but have been keeping an eye on the web-cam where I think they are, and the weather seems to have been good. Apparently, it has been some of the best snow falls in years, so I guess that the reason I haven't heard is that they are having a really great time. They fly back on this Wednesday, so we will catch up with Shane then.

Vision just rising off the ground

Yesterday I didn't do very much, as I wanted a quiet recovery sort of day, and I tried to go to bed early, but I was so excited as I had to get up at 4am this morning to go BALLOONING!!!!!! I went with the company Balloons Over Brisbane in the white Vision balloon - and it was just fantastic. Luckily the recent fires seem to have died down, so the view was spectacular as we floated above the city.

Our pilot, Ken, me and one of the other passengers

We left from a park in Coorparoo, east past the city and landed in an industrial park at Bald Hills, a distance of approx 25km which took about an hour. There were 4 couples and the pilot in our balloon, but another company also had the Remax balloon leaving from the same park. When we were up high we were travelling at about 30km/hour, and about 7km/hr when lower. When you are low the dogs below just go crazy with the sound of the burner. I was amazed to see how green Brisbane actually is, despite the drought and water restrictions currently in place. Landing was quite a surprise as we ended up with the basket on its side on the ground - it helped to explain the divider in the basket which kept the other people from being right on top of us.

Me with the city in the background

Sunday 20 August 2006 - Brisbane

I had a short working week this week. The Ekka Show Holiday was on Wednesday and I took Thursday and Friday off. Darryl and I were planning to go camping for 5 days, but on the Wednesday he was sick with a viral infection and basically slept all day. I took the opportunity to work on data cleansing on my family history file.

On Thursday Darryl was feeling a bit better, so we headed off towards Mt Barney National Park. With Darryl being sick, and me with my sore knee we really had no intentions of doing much walking, but it was nice to be out in the country, and after lunch at a small roadside park, we got to the 'Lower Portals' car park.

It had recently been burnt (at least one log was still smouldering), but the walk would have been too far, so we decided to drive to a camping ground called 'Flanagan's Reserve', which seems to be run by the council. The reserve is beside the upper reaches of the Logan River, which means there is a decent waterhole, and the whole camping area is a large flat area which is lightly wooded with large eucalypts. Unfortunately, due to the drought, it was very dry and dusty. There were only a couple of other campers, and we were able to choose a nice site far from everyone. We pottered around and set up camp, then watched a lovely sunset behind Mt Maroon.

While we were still sitting relaxing, the only other couple near us came over to invite us to their campsite for Mulled wine. Lionel and Debbie made this very tasty drop by putting red wine in a kettle along with a whole orange, some cinnamon stick and some sugar. As I was starting to feel the effects of the sickness this hot spicy mix made me feel great! The night was very cold, but I was toasty! Darryl woke up with cold feet, but I had to go to the 'loo' so found his army socks to fix the problem.

In the morning we took our time packing up. I took photos of the lone grave beside the campsite and asked about the history of it - apparently in the late 1890's the reserve was part of the stock route and a drover's wife died in childbirth, but no-one knows her name. Eventually we hit the road and headed for the 'Upper Portals' of Mt Barney along a road which was supposed to be 4x4 only. bad, and ran along the ridges between mountains. When we got to the top there were lovely views of Lake Koogarah and Mt Barney. We took a bit of a stroll along the track, but my virus was starting to kick in so I couldn't go far. We had some lunch, and then decided that we would have a look at Spicer's Gap National Park. Darryl said he was pleased that I had the GPS and maps on my iPAQ as some of the back roads we took certainly didn't look like through-roads! It certainly made a big difference to the trip.

It wasn't all that

We arrived at Spicer's Gap and decided to firstly go and have a look at 'Governor's Chair'. This is a spectacular lookout (only a few 100 metres in, so easy enough to cope with in our fatigued state!).

Heading back towards the campsite we also called in to see Moss's Well. This campsite was also quiet, with only two other lots of campers. We had a fairly early night, due to the cold (and not feeling well), but this place strangely had excellent tv reception, so we were able to watch 'Collectors' on ABC! Darryl fell asleep watching the movie, and I read until I was too tired and called it a night. Actually, I had a terrible night, with the aches hitting all my joints (especially my hands and shoulders), and the fever coming and going.

In the morning I told Darryl that I was too sick to take another night out in the cold, so I had breakfast while he went on the short heritage walk. I also checked out the pioneer grave-site near the camp, then we packed up and headed home. I slept all afternoon, and all Saturday and quite a bit of Sunday. Darryl is starting to feel better, but my nose has started running and I am coughing and sneezing lots.

The photos are:
Mt Maroon from Flanagan's Reserve
Mt Barney from the Upper Portals car park
Darryl filming from 'Governor's Chair' Lookout

Sunday 13 August 2006 - Brisbane

I hurt my knee while walking to work on Monday morning. I am not sure what happened, but I ended up hobbling around for 3 days, and am still having pain (although it is much better than earlier in the week). On Tuesday I will see a doctor to find out what is going on.

Darryl went to the Ekka (the annual Royal Agricultural Show) on Friday, and seemed to enjoy himself. He took some interesting photos of a water-wise plant display which won an award. He didn't get home until late and I took photos of the fireworks from our balcony. Shane called in - he had been in Brisbane all week at training, and stopped by on his way to the airport on Friday evening. Darryl missed seeing him, but he will be back in a couple of weeks.

Yesterday, I spent a lovely day at the State Archives, and found to my amazement that Mathilde Weibler had died on a property not far from Rockhampton in 1890. I had always presumed that she died in Maryborough, but had never found her. There was an inquest into her death which included 2 letters, written by her son Christian, on letterhead from his workplace, the Northern Miner in Charters Towers. Notations on the side of the documents also confirmed that his sister married a Gorman - every little bit of information leads on to another....!

Sunday 6 August 2006 - Brisbane

This week included another trip back to Rocky - from Wed to Friday - to do more training. It seems to be colder there than in Brisbane - although I will admit I am comparing it to the centre of town, and where I am working. The weather was beautiful, though, and it was nice to see Marc and Shane once more. I surprised those at the CQ Family History Association by rocking up to the general meeting on the Wednesday evening. They had a very good speaker, talking about the CQ special collection out at the University Library. I made some notes on things that I will have to follow up next time I am in town!

Yesterday was my monthly User Group meeting for 'The Master Genealogist' which is the family tree program I use. It is very interesting to find out new ways to do things in this very powerful program. Today I headed out to Gaythorne to the Qld Family History Society to try and sort out where William Melchert actually lived in Arthur Terrace. I was still not able to get an actual house number, but I was certainly able to narrow down the search. I checked Post Office directories (I had consulted these years ago, but had not recorded enough information) and was able to determine neighbours and also surrounding streets. The trouble was that two streets mentioned were not in the Gregory's Street Directory! I was able to find some old maps at the society and was able to see that those two streets had changed names. I now have at least one block in which to search - and I know which side of the street!

I will finish off with a couple of photos from last weekend - Graham and Diane Smith and I, and some of the sculptures down at New Farm Park.