Steam engines!

We were staying in a motel opposite Queens Park in Toowoomba. As we walked through one day I noticed a steam engine parked up in a local sandpit. Apparently this used to be pretty common - old steam engines were cleaned up, painted in bright colours and used to amuse children. It still works today

 The park was also the source of much reminiscence because of this....

Spot the excitement? Trees that shed their leaves. Brisbane is so tropical that the trees don't shed their leaves and so the seasons pass unnoticed. Seeing a nearly bare tree clothed in only a few auburn leaves makes you think fondly of the old country. Although that blue sky again gives the game away.

Toowoomba has an escarpment called 'Picnic Point', which has one of the biggest flags I've ever seen to remind me that I'm not in England any more (Toto)

along with a magical view over the hills beyond

You can just about see the road that climbs 700' up into Toowoomba in the middle of the picture below

 

On the way home we drove through some of the areas that were devestated by the floods earlier this year. The entire region was completely flat and huge - very scary to think that somehow this entire area was under water..

Frozen fingers

Sunday morning dawned beautifully clear in Toowoomba, which also meant is was abosulutely freezing. I saw somebody scraping ice of the windscreen of their car - the first time I've seen that since moving to Australia in 2005. When we mustered for the ride at 8am it was just under 2 degrees...

Maybe fingerless gloves weren't the best option

We left Toowoomba in a pack of about 200 riders, and not long after leaving the city limits we found the fog

 

It was a bit unsettling descending down unknown, potholed roads without being able to see what was at the bottom. But that also helped in the hillclimbs - you only realised how big they were when you got to the top

It was very atmospheric out there, and a little bit frightening once the rides split and the 'social' riders were on our own with seemingly no support car

but the views of the rolling hills were worth it

Eventually the sun started to show its face and our fingers started to thaw out

 

and for one spooky minute I thought I'd been transported back to the mining villages of the north of England - albeit with a sky so blue that the locals would run for cover

After the ride we warmed up and then wandered over to watch the bike racing being run under the Tour De Toowoomba banner. We were lucky enough to have a friend racing in the A-grade criterion race, which gave us someone to cheer 

An hour plus 3 laps of aerobically maxed out racing - crazy loons. Attack!

Toowoomba

We've escaped from Brisbane and are up in the hills of the Darling Downs in a town called Toowoomba for the weekend. It's a beautiful couple of hours to drive out here through wide open farmland under the dome of a blue blue sky - it makes you feel like you're living in a snow dome. And just before you reach Toowoomba itself the road turns skywards and you grind up 700 vertical metres before popping out in what seems like the town centre.

The town is in the middle of prime farming areas and the architecture reflects that heritage of civic cash









Although the street layout is that of a classic Aussie country town - a grid network of wide streets stretching off to the horizon with central parking



We're not here to sightsee though, we're here to ride. There's a ' tour de toowoomba' bike race along with an accompanying charity ride, and we're here to make sure the intensity of the charity ride is kept high. Our motel is right next to the criterion course, which means it's slowly filling up with lean, shaved-legged cyclist types. Hope they don't keep us awake with their wild roadie partying tonight.

The icy wastelands of Brisbane

Global warming is obviously having an effect - the centre of Brisbane has iced up...

The council has put in an ice rink in the main city square. It's easy to be cynical - we're constantly being told we need to cut back on the power we're using, but they're running an  rink in the middle of a subtropical city for a month. Plus inline skating has been bannned on this square for a while - you can roll through it but stop to have a mess around in a quiet corner and you get moved on pretty quickly.

But it's looking to be very popular, and for some people it will be their first experience of ice outside. Hard to be curmudgeonly when so many people seem to be enjoying themselves.

Rickety plumbing

We live in an old rickety flat and the plumbing is slowly falling apart. Today we had a tap fail and run constantly. There's part of me that's a little embarrassed that we had to call a plumber instead of rolling up my sleeves and fixing out myself. But thats why we pay rent, and I'd also be scared that I twist the wrong bolt and create one of those comedy geysers. And with plumbing like this it could easily happen!

Chilly days

It's a cold cold morning today - the coldest june day in the last ten years. Brits will laugh but we're all shivering at 10 degree nights. The cold seems to be more bitey, with the wind feeling like it just came off the antarctic. Either that or I'm getting soft.
In other news I have a new toy - a desire s smart phone. This should allow me to blog on the go, so expect more random posts with random spelling as I get the hang of the swype keyboard. Which incidentally rocks...if you have an android phone download out and give out a go.

Chestnuts roasting on an open fire

We were in the Sunshine Coast Hinterland a couple of weeks ago for a wedding. We were staying at an apartment with an open fire, and it got us thinking about how nice a fire would be at home. But unfortunately we rent a 2 bedroom unit on the second floor, so it's hard to put a chimney in.

Then we thought about a brazier - the joy of an open fire, a wood-fired barbecue and all on our small balcony

It was a great idea and in many ways it was very relaxing sitting outside, watching the flames licking through the brazier walls, cooking sausages on the grill and (later) roasting chestnuts on the coals

 

It was a great idea, although slightly flawed in practice. Because the balcony only faces one way there is no through-flow of air, so the wind always blew in and swirled the smoke directly onto either one or both of us. So we kept the fire low, which in turn meant the sausages took a while to cook. The roast chestnuts were just as I remembered from the streets of London - extremely atmospheric, too hot to peel without the risk of third degree burns, flavourless and a little floury. It took me around an hour to tidy it all up the next day, and for a week or so afterwards the flat smelt of smoke. And one of the neighbours keeps giving us dirty looks, although she is a little bit odd so that could be for many reasons.

Don't think it will be a weekly thing, but it was fun and very relaxing to hang out watching the flames. Something to do when we want to spoil ourselves - as well as any washing left on the line downstairs :)