A short camping trip to Budgewoi, about 1 hour North of Sydney,
mainly to escape the freezing Canberra weather, but also to try out Holly’s new
hobby.....Kayaking. The campsite was on the shore of a huge lake and just 2 min from the beach. It aslo
took dogs, so Wilson was able to join in the fun.
We all really enjoyed using the single kayak on the lake, and quickly
realised that it was an activity that we could all enjoy together.....it was great
to see Holly exploring the lake for hours.
Crazy hair (and leggings) time...
Rasta
Levitation.
Team Dorsett’s enthusiasm for ‘our’ new water sport nicely
coincided with a local chap selling his ex-hire gear, so after a bit of hard bargaining
with the kid‘s inheritance we were all equipped to take to the water.
A lovelly start to our last day, a family trip out on the water.
Wilson enjoyed it as much as we did.
Happy Days – Immi’s asleep on Sal, not being sea sick as you
may think!
Ok, so they all made the Team, but that’s not the point.
After
a few practice sessions last year (ball skills, basic netball rules etc) Immi’s
is now playing for Team Sunrise 8Yr unders every Sat morning. Last weekend was her first match – four full
15min quarters.
First quarter was entertaining as they had only ever done ball skills before, which were only done standing still – The whistle went and both teams were completely static. It was like a game of subbuteo, but with less movement! By half time things were moving a bit better, with only the occasional reminder needed to stop both teams playing in the same direction.
Immi
loved it and will be back out on the court again every saturday morning throughout the winter......personally,
I’ll be staying in, and watching from, a nice warm car. ;-)
With Winter on its way, Snoopy needed a shelter in his
paddock. Unlike the UK, we just couldn’t find a mobile shelter..............time
to DIY yet again!
Blue Prints – Glenn you’ll appreciate the detail and
accuracy in these fine plans – only 2 fonts used.
As the ‘monster’ grew in the carport, the cunning plan of
transporting it 300m to the field was looking questionable.
A Team effort with friends got us to the field in kit form –
driving slowly through the estate, with people either side in case things
departed – bit like a Mardi Gras float!
Roof on in the field, a few finishing touches and its good
to go............does Snoopy now sleep in luxury or remain in the wet weather
under a tree?............its early days, give him time.
Following an informal quote of $5K to remove an old rotten
tree in our garden, it was time to DIY........how card can it be! Biggest challenge
- the entire tree was leaning over our neighbours fence and more importantly
their brand new septic tank system. No room for error......oh, its its my first
complete tree felling experience.
After cutting the first small branch with a chainsaw, it
made me realise that balancing at the end of a ladder whilst cutting chunks
from the very tree that is supporting the ladder is a recipe for disaster. The
only escape route, was drop the chainsaw, get down the ladder and run – a bit
too slow to escape a falling branch. So, a bit of research on the interweb and
we have a homemade Dorsett rope saw. Plan 2 – throw saw over branch, stand to
the side of the tree and saw the blade back and forth, run when cracking is
heard – easy.
I now know that trees a heavily over engineered. I found
that the first ‘crack’, which was
followed by me doing a Linford Christie style sprint, came about 10min of
sawing before a branch was even near breaking.Noting that there are only so many times that I can beat Linford out of
the blocks, it was time for Plan 3 – saw until first ‘crack’ and then pull the
thing down with rope.
Now you can probably see the flaw in my plan in the above
photo. I took all of the easy branches first and left the biggest, most
threatening until last.The last branch
was the one which, if it fell naturally, would destroy the neighbours septic
tank and that would be messy in many ways. Time for plan 4- 2 mates, several tensioned ropes and a
Land Rover.....all trying to get the tree to fall in any direction but the way
it wanted.
One hour of nervous cutting (with the neighbour watching!),
low range power in the Land Rover and it falls perfectly.....Job done...............the
$5K quote doesn’t seem so bad now.
