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1 January 2008

2008 Highlights

Showing Sydney to Jo, Mum & Mike, buying a house, getting Mack, and trips to New Zealand, Tasmania and the Northern Territories



Priceless Moments


2008 in more detail


Well, 2008 is nearly over. It's been a great year for family and trips away and house hunting.


Tasmania

The first highlight of the year was exploring Tasmania.  Our best experiences were spending New Year on Bruny Island, walking around the gorgeous Dove Lake, eating till we dropped at the Hobart Food Festival and downing dozens of oysters at a local oyster farm depot.


Mum and Mike's visit
The second highlight was meeting Mum and Mike in New Zealand (in early March) and spending two weeks with them exploring New Zealand's North Island.  Our best experiences were lazing in hot puddles (which we dug ourselves) at the Hot Water Beach and hiking the Tongariro Crossing with Mike.  Not bad for someone close to 70!

Then Mum and Mike returned to Sydney with us where we proudly showed them our apartment with it's views of the Opera House and Bridge.  We also had great fun showing them Sydney, especially Palm Beach, Wattamolla Lagoon in the Royal National Park and Manly.  They particularly loved Manly which they visited three times.


Andreas and Ingrid Arrive
The next highlight was Andreas, Ingrid and Sebastian arriving in Sydney.   Andreas is a really good friend from Volvo days and we are so excited to have them here. We look forward to creating many happy memories together in Sydney.


Our new home
The third highlight was finding our beautiful new home at 43B Kings Street.  It's perfect for us, just two minutes downhill to the station and right on a gorgeous, green park.  We had spent over a year searching for a  suitable house within our budget and this included the heartbreak of getting gazumped on a previous property, so it was a great relief and joy finally finding the right place.

Our most exciting moments were setting up all our furniture and unpacking our boxes, buying new plants, buying our bed, getting our guest bed ready for Jo, putting up out Peruvian Art,  our first dinner party with our new dining room table and our housewarming party, followed by a Xmas party.


Uluru and The Northern Territories
The next highlight was flying to Alice Springs in July and exploring Uluru, followed by a drive to The Northern Territories  where we visited Kakadu and the beautiful Litchfield National Park.  Kakadu has been on my life list for a while but was a little disappointing.   Litchfield, on the other hand, blew us away.  What a hidden treasure.  The best moments were swimming in the beautiful rock pools with surprisingly warm water and playing in the waterfalls.


Woof!
Having a house right on a park with a dog flap already in place made Ally hungry to get a dog.  I wasn't so sure because I was worried it would get in the way of travel and weekend trips.  But when Kerri's colleague suddenly needed to get rid of their little Jack Russell, I agreed to have him over on a trial basis for a weekend.  What a mistake!  It was love at first sight and by the end of the weekend, we were totally under adorable Mack's spell.


Jo comes to visit
The final highlight was Jo's visit to Sydney.  We proudly showed off out new home and Mack.  She loved the independence of finding her way around and we spent a great weekend at Jervis Bay and visited places like Bondi beach and Watson's Bay.  It was wonderful that Jo was also able to be part of our house warming party.


Weekend Excursions
Ally and I also did some fun weekend excursions.  This included a camping weekend away at Jervis Bay with Katarin and Charles, a wonderful canooing trip down Kangaroo Valley and spring flowers at the Muogamarra Nature Reserve.  Then I also went on a two day hike in the Royal National Park with Bruce.


Photography
I went on many photographic excursions this year, many with very early pre-dawn get ups.  The most memorable and rewarding were Bobbin Head, Royal National Park, Circular Quay, Luna Park, Narrabeen, Long Reef, Opera House sunrise, Harbour Bridge, Opera House and Luna Park, Monavale and Sculptures by the Sea at Bondi.

The photographic highlight, though, was doing arial photography of Sydney with the North Sydney Camera Club.  I also did a landscape photography course with an outing to the Royal National Park.


Family
On the family front this year, there were some important mile stones.  Mike had his 70th birthday and Trish celebrated her 60th birthday.  Jo and Anthony and the kids had a wonderful family holiday to Mauritius in April.   They also had a good time at Blanco Farm in July.


Favourite Books


Favourite Movies


2008 Index of Links


Our New Home


.Family
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Friends


Trips and Travel

Photographic Outings


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    3 comments:

    Trish said...

    As I sit here in our record setting cold and snow with news reports of our homeless population freezing to death, I read your list. It reinforces that the truly important things in life are a warm home with loving family and good friends to fill it with. May we all have those for many years to come. Merry Christmas. Love Trish

    18:27
    Graeme said...

    Thanks Trish - merry Xmas to you too

    18:27
    Hamish said...

    Merry Christmas guys. A great list to summarise another great year in your life - you are a real inspiriation to us!

    All the best for 2009.

    18:27

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