Moruya Markets - July 11th and 18th - Saturday

Alf and Jane make and sell homemade icecream for a living, mostly through local weekend markets. After lazing around for a few days, I offered to help Alf do the Saturday markets in Moruya. What I hadn't realised was that this meant getting up at 4.30 in the morning, getting ready and heading off in the dark and freezing cold. Having never been an early riser this actually wasn't as bad as I had imagined. And the sunrise as we reached the market site was quite spectacular. I realised I hadn't seen a sunset since the early 90s when I had got up and gone in early to see a dawn service in Brisbane. The sombre mood was completely ruined by roving gangs of arsehole TV crews with their halogen lights waving like lightsabers destroying the aforementioned sombre mood they were there to report on.

The first Saturday was pretty good, partly because of the novelty but partly because once you've set up the canopy, the tables and the WAECO, the rest of the day involves sitting around, serving customers and doing the cryptic crosswords in the Herald and The Australian. The second Saturday, however was much, much colder and a fog covered the market site keeping the temperature quite low and covering the ground in a thick dew. In helping t

o set up, I got the toes of my blundstones wet which soaked through to my socks and toes. Given that the air temperature was just over one degrees, I hate to think what it was on the ground. As a result, my toes became so cold I literally could not feel them. I tried walking around but that just seemed to hurt. In desperation I bought three pairs of woolen sock from the sock stall, whipped off my supposedly merino wool socks and put two dry pairs over my frozen toesies. Now dry, my feet were still no better off temperature-wise. When the fog eventually cleared and the sun came through, I pulled off my boots and newly acquired socks and stuck them in the sunlight, massaging what life I could back into them. It was about 3 hours after our arrival that I finally regained feeling in the last little toe. I had been imagining frostbite and black toenails dropping off but I think the unfamiliar pain had made me hysterical.

The now-non-cold toes cheered me up immensely and the rest of the market was again spent sitting around and doing the cryptics. Well, attempting to do the cryptics. While Alf and I are pretty good at the weekly ones, the Saturday puzzles are a lot more obscure and frustrating. We packed up about 1.30 and headed back to Cobargo. I crashed out and slept right through to dinnertime - beetroot and strawberry risotto cooked by Yvette.

Thursday The Ninth - Day One

Even though we'd left Sydney on the Wednesday, today was really day one of the trip. We woke up late (9.30) and pottered about before finally leaving at 11. We didn't have to be anywhere at any particular time, so took it slowly down the Pacific Highway, stopping in to have a look at Jervis Bay and to have some lunch at Milton. Almost all of the uncertainty of the previous day had vanished and I felt relaxed, if still a little physically achy from the lifting and cleaning earlier in the week. One tiny grocery stop in Bateman's Bay later, we were on the final stretch to Cobargo and our friends, Alf and Jane. After a slow and comfortable drive, we arrived about 4 o'clock. Quite a few beers later and our bellies full of Alf's homemade minestrone soup, we crashed out in what was to be our bed for the next two weeks. Time to take a break and like a course of detox, get the Sydney out of our system.

Leaving Sin City

Wednesday morning I woke up early quite stressed. The real estate were coming at 11.30 to inspect the house and we still had to pack the car and clean one of the rooms. Somehow we managed to get it all done by 10.30 which was just as well, as the prick from the real estate turned up early for no reason and with no apology. Like a disapproving mother-in-law, he looked over the house, pointing out the most miniscule and petty areas we had somehow missed. Suppressing my urge to beat his body to a bloody pulp and leave it in the back alley for the crows and minor birds, we diligently cleaned the areas he found. We passed the inspection although have still yet to get our bond back.

Yvette's parents drove down to have lunch and say goodbye and Mick had turned up to take away the mattress we had been using. With Mr Real Estate Knobski Man gone, we headed down to Stanmore for the last time to have some lunch. Yvette's brother Warwick also managed to come along and the six of us had coffee and pies at La Chocereve.

After a tearful goodbye to Yvette's family, we got into the car and left Sydney for good.

After two weeks of non-stop stress with almost every hour of the waking day filled with something to do, the sudden stop was a little jarring. Both of us were very, very tired and emotionally exhausted. The mixed emotions of leaving and being free, of adventure and the uncertainty of what we'd just done had us both on the edge of tears for the three hour drive to Greenwell Point. We'd done it. It was all over. Had we done the right thing? God, we're tired.

Greenwell point is a lovely, mostly unspoiled fishing village east of Nowra. It is a real fishing village in that trawlers still leave from the jetty which hasn't been converted into a Marina for rich Sydneysiders to park their ridiculously enormous penis-substitute boats in. Apart from the Motel we were staying in and one Wanker McMansion, the town has had very little development. I hope it stays that way for a long time. The drive from the highway to the point is all dairy farms and old buildings including a barn-like structure which had a curious sign on it - "The Literary Institute".

We checked in and while Yvette had a lie down, I went for a long walk around the jetty and along the foreshore. I was physically and emotionally wrecked and trying to think to much about anything. It was good to finally be out.

After an early dinner at the local pub which we wolfed down - we went back to the motel room, turned up the heater and watched Spicks and Specks , The Chaser and The Movie Show before finally going to sleep to sleep the sleep of the just and the just plain tuckered out.

The Sheer and Utter Hell of Moving

It has been said that the three most stressful things in life are: the death of someone close, divorce and moving house. Having not experienced the first two in my adult life, I definitely concur with the third. Moving was hell. Although we'd known what we had to do for a while now, and had started packing and culling, the last two weeks in Sydney were crazy.

The night of Sunday the 21st, Yvette started feeling unwell. Monday we had to rush down to the emergency room at the RPA as she had been throwing up blood. After 5 hours we were sent home after being told that her stomach lining had come away a little and she needed to cut down on booze, cigarettes, coffee and spicy food. I swear the doctor looked about 16. We called him Bambi.

That week, Yvette was out of commission and spent most of the time sleeping and trying to recover surviving on a diet of Mylanta, licorice and slippery elm powder. I was still working and had to go in everyday and start the handover to my replacement and try and clean up 7 years of emails, files and other ephemera I had accumulated. Those who know how I accumulate will appreciate the enormity of this task.

We had also organised the 27th as Yvette's 40th birthday party and after looking 'round a few venues had decided to have it in our house. Saturday was therefore spent trying to make a house in the throes of packing presentable for 30+ people. Yvette was slightly better by this stage and we managed to get everything sorted. It turned out to be a fantastic party with the little house bursting at the seams with people all wanting to wish Yvette a happy birthday and possibly farewell to the two of us. Highlights were a very drunk TK who needed to use everyone he came close to as a leaning post, an amazing caterer/cook who supplied a seemingly endless amount of food and the cake from La Chocereve which was chocolate and gran marnier.

Sunday of course was a write-off and I spent most of it in bed. No packing and no cleaning was done that day although Mick and I did manage to do a dump run in his ute and get rid of a few things.

Monday and Tuesday we both had to work, the party seemingly curing Yvette's stomach problems. Tuesday was my last day of gainful employment and as of Wednesday I was a free man albeit a free man with no income. It was a liberating feeling. The rest of the week was spent preparing for, and thinking about packing and cleaning. Yvette had her last day on Friday. We celebrated with beers at the local with Jess and Jason.

Saturday the 4th was Packing Party day. We still had a lot of booze left over from the party, and invited some friends to come around and help us pack and drink. We had a wonderful group of people all turn up and without them we would have been well and truly screwed. Pete, Vera, Stefan, Dave and Mick - thank you so much. I think we would still be there if it wasn't for you. We stopped packing about 9pm and had some pizza and a few more drinks. I went to bed at 1.30am but Yvette and Mick continued on 'til 6 in the morning. Needless to say, Sunday was not very productive...

Monday Yvette's brother Gareth and his wife, Ros hired a 3-tonne truck and came to take away our furniture and all the other stuff we weren't taking with us. Another very busy day with much lifting, I managed to start cleaning and Yvette continued packing. She got to bed at 1.30 in the morning in order to get everything ready for...

Tuesday the removalists came and took away all the stuff we are taking with us. They were fantastic. I only wish we'd had the money to get one of those services where they come and pack everything for you AND take it away. After they left, it was down to the serious business of cleaning. The removal of our furniture and our boxes left nothing in the house except what was going in the car. We had one fold-up chair to sit on and a mattress on the floor to sleep on. Cleaning took all day. We went out that night for a final farewell with friends in Ashfield and after a few beers at the Crocodile, we had some of the best dumplings in Sydney at Shanghai Night. The day was still not over as we had to dump some rubbish in the skip at my old work and drop back my (now ex) boss's brazier and work keys. We ended up staying for a couple of ports and he said some very nice things about me.

Great Ocean D'oh!

One of the main reasons for doing the long drive south before heading north was to see the Great Ocean Road. For those who don't know, it's the road running along the coast from Melbourne to Adelaide. It has some spectacular scenery, the most famous being the 12 apostles.
However, I've just read today that one of the rock formations has collapsed! It couldn't wait two months?! Oy!

Leaving Sydney II

There are a few things I'll miss about Sydney. Most of them in the inner west. Richard Ackland has written a great article on exactly what is wrong with Sydney and I tend to agree. "Sydney's what you get when the developers run the place." Read the whole thing here.

Leaving Sydney

It's going to be 9 and a half years since I arrived in Sydney. In the process of packing I found these photos of the first house I lived in in Hopetoun Street Camperdown and my room. Of course it's a complete mess.
(Click for embiggeration)