Wednesday, Day 5 Grey Nomads: A kookaburra sat in an old gum tree....

....merry, merry king of the bush is he.
Laugh, kookaburra, laugh kookaburra
Gay your life must be."
Every time I see a kookaburra I think of the first few lines of this Aussie folk song, which is frequently sung as a round.  It is almost obligatory for every primary aged (5-12) school child to learn it as part of their music lessons, and every adult Aussie who grew up in the country knows it.  Of course it was written in the days when 'gay' meant happy, as it did when we were children.  Sometimes another word is substituted for that now. 


Peter did manage to capture a photo of the very large kookaburra yesterday, even though he was using my camera and he isn't very comfortable using it.  He used a zoom lens, whereas I find it better to take a photo and then crop later but I like this one.

He'll be disappointed if he is waiting for some meat scraps from the campers - most of whom are vegetarians lol!  


The meetings were their usual wonderful selves, and instead of buying lunch today a group of us - old friends, or rather long standing friends - that sounds much better, doesn't it lol? - got together and decided we would have a 'pot-luck lunch' together.  We all brought our own chairs, plates, glasses and cutlery.  Peter and I brought our table to add to Bob and Laraine's.  Each of the four families brought a salad, savoury and sweet and some drinks.  We didn't organise what we would bring, but it all complemented each other perfectly, it couldn't have been planned better.


We chose the caravan that was in the sunniest spot and sat and chatted and laughed for nearly three hours.  The men discussed photography a lot of the time, we ladies spoke about a whole range of things from photography to families to wills to how difficult it is to plan for the future when one has a child with special needs - I was the only one who didn't take part in that discussion vbg.


I have been working out the answers to a few questions about blogs for a friend, and doing the minimum of 'housework' - I wonder, is it called 'caravanwork'?  Of course the secret in a caravan is to keep things tidy.  My husband does not keep things tidy and it is a constant job to go around clearing up.  But he is wonderful, cooking and helping in other ways too so I shouldn't complain.


I have begged some photos from Richard (again) taken at lunch time.  We have one couple, Bob and Laraine, who have been members of our church on and off between postings to different places since we were young marrieds, and they are dear friends. Denise and John we've known for many years, in fact but Denise and I grew up together in the same church.  She is just a couple of years older than I am.  Richard and Marilyn are our dearest friends, and have been for 38 years now.  They've been with us through some pretty tough times.    We used to go on holidays together each year so their children and ours grew up together.  In fact our girls and their daughter Nicole are still really good friends too.  And now Nicole's son Daniel loves to get together with our grandchildren, so the friendship continues through three generations.  Their children and our two girls have left home long ago but we still holiday together and Nathan loves them and knows them better than some of his 'real' uncles and aunties.

This evening's meeting was preceded by some songs by Manuel Escorcio again, which was just so inspiring.  It will be an early night ready for another lovely day tomorrow - the week is just flying by far too fast.
See you tomorrow
Blessings,
Sandie