A little break down south

On Sunday it was our traditional day to put up the Christmas decorations: the first Sunday in Advent. We all got stuck in and by the end of the day we had 6 (yes, you read that right!) trees up and decorated, the stockings hung and the advent wreath out with candles ready to go. I still have a bit more tweaking to go, but that is what Advent is for!

I was glad to get this done, because on Monday we drove the longer way round to Albany (350km or more) on the South Coast, for a little break in our favourite place. We had a lovely time! The weather was much cooler than up here in Perth, and yet the sun shone and everything looked glorious. We wore our jeans and a jumper on one evening!

On the way, we stopped at a WAQA quilt show in Katanning. The quilts were made by a small group of women quilters, who were all riffing on the same 'drunkards path" block. They were all wonderful, but these ones I took a particular note.

Here are some of our favourite views around Albany. The one below is near the Gap and the Natural Bridge. 

Albany is a natural harbour with offshore islands.

The water is either deep blue or turquoise. There is a national park which keeps much of the very fragile ecosystem safe. It is a 'biodiversity hotspot". We have been visiting this place for 44 years, on and off. It is special to DH because he did his high school here, and brought me down to show it to me, as one of the first things we did together.

It was only a couple of days, but it was such a refreshing thing to do.

Since we got back we had several very hot days -more than 40C, and will have more next week again. Australia is suffering during a climate crisis that our government refuses to acknowledge or act upon.  I am throwing shadecloth around over plants which have survived previous summers -one of our blueberry bushes got burned leaves last week. I am saving all the water I can from sink and shower, to either use on the garden or flush the toilets.

One of the things that keeps me going is the stories of people who are working hard in troubling and difficult places, to keep on growing things and thrive in them.  This youtube series by Geoff Lawton on "Greening the desert" is an inspiration. As he says "The Greening the Desert Project is located in the Dead Sea Valley of Jordan. At 400m below sea level, it is one of the lowest places on earth. The project is positioned on a West facing slope, in an extremely hot, arid climate, with extremely poor, shallow highly alkaline top ‘soil’, covered in rocks, with very limited water supply. It's here that we're demonstrating and educating people on permaculture because if it can work here, it can work anywhere!"

What humans do best is adapt to changing circumstances -that is why our ancestors survived! So we just pick ourselves up and keep adapting.