travelling allrite

Time to head back home to Sydney. Just a few jumps of the trampoline first, the along the other side of the Alpine Way to Jindabyne. The autumn lake scenery was beautiful, the gright yellow poplar leaves a different shade of gold to the grasslands around them. We stop at the Snowy Hydro Discovery Centre and learn about the massive hydroelectric and irrigation scheme, pedal our way to 2200W on the bikes and admire the displays. Then off again and up towards Canberra through the rolling Monaro Plains. The creperie at Bredbo is closed and with it our lunch plans. Anyway, Alex is eager to return to Canberra's National Arboretum to fly his kite. Canberra has many places to eat but you must leave the highways and parkways to find them. Unwilling to search them out along with the parking that must accompany it I divert us at the airport junction. There is a last minute choice: Pialligo, because where there are nurseries there are often cafes, or the developments near th...

Enough travel, we just stayed put. A walk down the stairs to book a tennis court and play a haphazard game of Alex's favourite sport. Then some bouncing on the trampolines followed by Alex and B riding the bobsled. There was an interruption for lunch, followed by more bobsled rides. If only we had brought the bikes we could have ridden the more gentle trails or Alex could have tried some stunts on the practice tracks. Alas we lack bike racks on the car and rental bikes were in short supply. Possibly the hardest exercise was walking back up the steep steps to the apartment to spend the remainder of the day there.

The valley is dark, the drifting clouds tinged salmon, our feet are sore and we are finished travelling anywhere today. We slept in longer than planned, but the valleys were still threaded with fog when we began our drive. In an amazing piece of synchrocity, as we pulled out of our Corryong motel my random music playlist began playing a track from The Return to Snowy River. After stopping at pretty Khancoban for fuel and our National Parks pass we continued on to the Alpine Way. This narrow winding road leads all the way across the ranges, an amazing, but hair raising construction. Also an amazing construction, one of the world's great engineering wonders, is the Snowy Mountains Hydroelectric Scheme. The Murray 1 Powerstation  sat at the bottom of a gorge fed by three big pipes, turbine heads visible through the windows of the long building. Undergoing maintenance, the visitors centre was closed so we continued onwards after stopping for a look from above. ...

The First World War had a huge effect on country Australia with so many young men volunteering for service in the Middle East and Europe. Large numbers never returned, but of those who many took up rural land grants. Today, on ANZAC Day, we had the opportunity to experience the pride in which Australia's soldiers are still held in the farming districts. As we pulled into Gundagai's town centre we were greeted by the unexpected sight of a small formation of flag bearing soldiers mounted on glossy brown horses, the last element of the town's ANZAC Day parade. To round out the school holidays we are spending time in the roof of Australia in the Snowy Mountains. Rather than head there via Cooma and Jindabyne, as we did last year, this time we go down the Hume Highway to the west. So often have we driven this route to Albury and Melbourne and I would always wonder what lay along the roads into the Snowies. After lunch at what claims to be Australia's old...