Overlander - but greener?

Wednesday: by train to Geelong. 'Australians', said Topsy, 'aren't really set up for trains'. She was right. This one was refurbished three years ago, but the decor is very 1970s and though (in Red Premier - i.e. First Class0 it's perfectly comfortable, with a lot of space between seats and so on, the tables aren't brilliant (mine is being held just about level by a 20p piece judiciously inserted under a hinge) and there is no power, no internet, none of the things that we now take for granted on dear old East Coast. And it's s-l-o-w! A journey of under 600 miles takes ten and a half hours - though come to think of it, Cross Country from Newcastle to Penzance isn't far different. But top speed can't be more than about 80 mph (everything is in km here, by the way) and often it's much, much slower. The comparison is with the Rocky Mountaineer, through the Canadian Rockies that I did three years ago: but there the terrain was much more interesting and there was a real attempt at a 'guided tour'. Here there is little commentary and what there is tends to be almost inaudible due to a strong Australian accent. They would do better to include a detailed map and a more frequent commentary on points of interest, or even just where we are and what goes on outside. There are miles and miles of plain dotted with trees and nothing much there: and I've not seen a vestige of either a kangaroo or a koala: what wildlife I have seen has been all birds, and most of them are magpies. So although we're comfortable and well looked after - well, reasonably well: I've just eaten a chicken sandwich, on soggy white bread though with a decent bit of salad, along with an exorbitantly expensive quarter bottle of wine - the journey is on the whole boring. The train company can't make up their mind if they are transport or experience, and it shows. As transport, I do wonder just how much carbon emissions I'm saving by not flying: these big diesels must be throwing out a good deal and there are only three passenger cars, of which ours at least is less than half full and I guess the others are too, as there weren't very big crowds at the station. A nice full, modern, efficient aeroplane might well be able to beat this, on a per passenger basis. And as an experience, I have to say so far disappointing: though we are not much over half way through the trip. I tell a lie, above: I was briefly connected to the internet, and without even asking! But this was only because we were in a township: as soo n as we left it went again. Ah well: try the next town!

I was met at Geelong by Judy, who took me back to her home and made me very welcome. We spent most of the evening chatting - she's a great talker, and has been doing some interesting work in Prison Ministry. She has a lovely cat, a bit Garfield-style, who was displaced by me from its usual place of repose, and ended up under Judy's duvet! However, it was only for one night. Thursday saw us setting off for Torquay - and even more riviera-like than the Devon one: this is where Frances and James live, in a beautiful modern house, a good example of Australian architecture. They have a wonderful piece of art in the garden made from corrugated iron, and some fine modern pictures in the house as well. It's been good to stay and talk - we had some deep conversation about Quaker beliefs and the differences between notions and 'the way', and where God came in (if anywhere). Today (Friday) we're off out to lunch, and then I'm taking the train again into Melbourne (about an hour's run) to go to the Meeting House for my next talk, also on Ministry. It promises to be an interesting few days.

Quaker Shopping

Monday was a busy day. After breakfast we went to the Quaker Shop, a charity shop (they call them 'Opportunity Shops' or Op-Shops for short here) run by Quakers with the help of a vast army of non-Quaker volunteers. My host Topsy is the manager and moving spirit behind all this. It's quite a big operation: when we arrived, so did someone else with all his deceased aunt's clothing, a boot and back seat full (and it wasn't a small car!). My job was to sort all this into categories, and put everything on hangers. It was quite fun, and I had various people assisting and advising: and some of the clothes were, you might say, a bit different! Cups of lovely filter coffee abounded as needed, and the morning soon went by.

Back home for lunch followed by a snooze and a revision of the talk on Ministry I was to give in the evening. I discovered I'd left the 'final version' behind, though in fact it had only been a few notes on paper: most of my talks are in my head and get embellished as the Spirit moves at the time. So I did a bit of restructuring of what I had (the previous version, done for local Elders), and felt reasonably happy with it.

Soon after six, folk started arriving: we were starting with a bring and share meal, and indeed with a drink. When you live surrounded by vineyards, most people simply appreciate the local produce. So the usual delicious meal, including some quite scrummy desserts: and then we were ready. There were twelve of us including me - a good number for a discussion without the need to split into groups. I talked for a bit, with extracts from the wonderful 18th century Quaker Samuel Bownas, and some more modern writings, and then asked some questions about what makes Ministry 'real' or deep. The discussion was a little slow moving to start with, but warmed up and most people were participating. It seemed to go down OK: I'm doing the same talk in Melbourne in a few days, though I guess it will have changed a little, and I think I'll ask different questions!

So altogether a good day. Tomorrow will be quieter: and then on Wednesday the first journey across Australia, leaving this state and going into Victoria. I've sensed a bit of rivalry, though not quite on the Sunderland-Newcastle level! It's good to feel the enterprise is well and truly under way.

From host to host

Saturday was a quiet day: my host Christine had engagements early morning and from mid afternoon onwards. So we went out at about 12, initially to the Quaker Shop, an enterprising charity shop which Chris used to run and which is now run by Topsy Evans, who is my next host. We called there briefly, but long enough for me to buy a blue bead necklace, something I've been wanting for ages. Then we went to the National Wine Museum: on one exhibit you could play the winemaker, and make all the vital decisions as to how to make your wine: then it told you how good yours was. I chose to make a riesling, and ended up creating a Gold quality prizewinner. Maybe I should think of taking this up....

We had a sandwich lunch at the museum, very pleasant in the open air, and walked back to the car through the Botanic Gardens. Christine was pleased to see these little red Sturt's Desert Peas: apparently they are very common in the drier parts further north, but she'd not seen them here before. We also passed an ancient tree trunk of a Red Gum, some 1500 years old or more.

Then back home, where I rested while Christine got ready and then went out to her function, a reunion of a group who had visited Japan together some years ago. I had quite a time for myself, which was good: I was able to rest, write, check my talks, play the piano and help myself to a few bits to eat. I've been eating so much since leaving Heathrow, it was good to have a day when I didn't eat much: after a sandwich lunch (half a filled baguette each) I still didn't want a lot, and settled for new bread (I took it out of the breadmaker, half an hour earlier) and some soft blue cheese, and some pieces of fruit. More than adequate: we all eat far more than we need.

Christine's husband Norman arrived home from a trip to Melbourne before she did, so we introduced ourselves and had a bite together. He had some immediate homework to do, though, so I continued to read quietly until Christine got back, quite late: by then I was ready for an early night.

Sunday morning saw me finishing my packing before breakfast and then going to the Eastern Suburbs Meeting. Only eight people: three more were in hospital and three visiting another project that morning, and others away for other reasons. A pleasant Meeting all the same: I felt led to speak about the importance of Being as well as of doing, and the continual challenge of seeing, in the Light, how we need to change.

After Meeting we went back home to collect my luggage and take me off to Topsy's house, where she was laying on a barbeque for all the volunteers who worked at the Quaker shop that we visited yesterday. This was great fun: party animal
Sarah enjoyed herself a good deal! I had a snooze, though, when the guests were finally gone, after which we chatted and had a supper of leftovers. Topsy is definitely a morning person and goes to bed early, so I did too, giving me a nice long time to write up this and to read a little before sleep.

A good deal more than Shiraz!

Friday:  I was left to myself in the morning as Christine, my host, had to go to an early optician's appointment.  I was picked up at 10 by Drew (see yesterday) for a drive out to the Southern Hills, where, as he put it, 'there are squillions of wineries;.  We visited no fewer than six, tasting wine at five of them and having lunch at one.

It was fascinating to me, as a wine drinker who's not - until now - been madly sold on Australian wine.  This is only a little because of the 'food miles' attached:  much more because most of what gets exported to the UK is made from the Shiraz grape, and moreover is very 'in your face', ultra full bodied wine with not a trace of subtlety.  I learned differently yesterday!   The Australians have been for a few years now experimenting with warmer-weather grape varieties, so some European familiars, like Tempranillo and Pinot Grigio, are being used increasingly, with great success.  The nicest of all the wines I tasted yesterday was a chenin blanc, crisp and fruity and just the thing for a warm summer evening out on the patio, with a few nibbles prior to dinner.  They make a good Cabernet Sauvignon, too, the wine I chose to accompany a delightful lunch of 'saltbush lamb' (the sheep apparently feed on saltbush, a local kind of vegetation, which is supposed to give them a distinctive flavour, though I couldn't have told you that it wasn't Welsh lamb from Sainsbury's!).  It was beautifully cooked, though, quite rare - something we don't do with lamb at home - and tender as can be.  Sorry, vegetarian Friends, but it really was good!

The wineries we visited were all quite small, and what they sell is basically individuality.  You won't find acres of supermarket shelves loaded with depressingly uniformly tasting bottles:  these wines vary from one year to the next as much as any, and the winemakers do some imaginative combinations of grapes.  (We saw one with no fewer than five different grape varieties, though Drew opined that this was a blend of the leftovers!)  The sad thing was that they weren't cheap, or even (in my book) medium price:  the first winery were all A$25 or more (£15 to you back home) a bottle.  Only at the D'Arenburg winery did we find a whole range at $11, though Drew said you can get perfectly drinkable wine for less than $8 if you know where to look.  So my total purchase was one bottle of riesling - very quaffable - for $11.

It was an enjoyable trip, though, but took rather longer than we'd really planned:  I wasn't home till 4.30 pm.  There was an event in the evening, for the local Quakers to meet the Anglicans in the Cathedral:  there's a close relationship because the Meeting House backs onto the Cathedral building, and Friends own a small part of the land on which the Cathedral is built!  But the meeting was at 6.00, which would have meant leaving at about 5.15 or so, and I was feeling quite tired and hot, as the day had become sunnier and sunnier.  So we opted out, and Christine and I had a pleasant supper of salmon and fruit, and chatted:  I tried her baby grand Bechstein while she was walking the dogs, and read my emails, and then had an early night.  No special plans for tomorrow, though possibly a visit to the National Wine Museum:  a relaxing day, I think!

Australia at last!

I hadn’t realised that flying business class really does, as the advertisements said, deliver the businessman ready to do business: it certainly delivered the Quaker ready to meet Quakers, and with virtually no jetlag. Two days got compressed into 36 hours, but two periods of sleep, even if the second was relatively short, made it feel like morning when I arrived in Adelaide. The airport were very efficient at processing two big plane-loads of people at once: they send officials along the queues to pre-process so that when you get to the immigration and customs desks most problems and queries are sorted.

So I was spotted at once, coming through to the arrivals area, by Jo Jordan, who whisked me back to her home for coffee and chat and some delicious toasted fruit bread. After a shower, we went out in the car to see what we could see from the top of the highest of the local hills, appropriately named Mount Lofty (though in fact it’s less than 3000 feet high!). It was damp, spots of rain (the locals were delighted, there’s been a heat wave the last few days), and rather misty, so the usual panoramic view of the city was rather muted and it felt cold. So we went back down into the city, and to the central market. This had reminiscences of the Grainger Market back in Newcastle, though it seemed cleaner, fresher and with loads of locally grown fruit and other foods. Australians are evidently keen on getting local produce. We wandered round, sampling some exotic delicacy from a stall in the fish market, and then going through to the food court where there was every kind of Asian food on offer – Indian, Chinese, Japanese, Malayan and the one we tried, Vietnamese. We had huge bowls of beef broth with ‘cold rolls’, a kind of spring roll but in a cold rice-based wrapper around more rice and vegetables. The broth is apparently boiled for ages, and was very tasty, full of beef, noodles and several other bits and pieces.

Well fed, we went back home, Jo having an instinctive sense for my needs which by then were for a nap and a rest for my knee, now making its wounded presence felt. I had a good sleep, and then sorted out a few things, repacking a bit after the journey, and enjoyed a cuppa and the company of Naomi, Jo and Joseph’s granddaughter. Then Christine James arrived to collect me: she’s my host until Sunday, when I move on to the next family. Chris was a little delayed, so I’d not been at her house ten minutes before Drew Thomas arrived to take me away to my first Quaker engagement. Drew is part of Quaker Learning Australia, which is a group trying to tackle the difficulties of providing learning opportunities to a small and very, very scattered collection of Friends. QLA were interested both in my experience of distance learning with the Open University, and my knowledge of Quaker learning in the UK, at Woodbrooke and elsewhere, It was a good meeting, and I was pleased to be able to contribute some ideas and suggestions – which of course has also given me some follow-up work to do! But that’s partly what I came for: to offer what I can and learn what I can, and I’ve already started on both of those. The other unexpected thing is that although I’ve been here barely 24 hours, I’ve started thinking in terms of ‘when I next come’. This is, I think, because the Friends I’ve met, quite a few already, have all been easy to relate to, people who are clearly on the same path as I’m trying to follow and who will be good companions with whom to share the journey.

Back, then, to Christine’s, for a cool fruit juice on the terrace, overlooking the city from the elevated location of the house. The evening temperature was cool and pleasant: a lovely way to end the day. I went briefly on line to check my emails, ‘and so to bed’.

On the way!

After the months of planning, thinking, praying and organising, it's finally happening! I left the house at 3.35 pm this afternoon, took the Metro to the airport, and in due course got on the plane to Heathrow. Now it may not be either green or Quakerly, but I'd always promised myself that on this one journey in my life, I'd travel in comfort: so I booked the long haul flights business class. I'd not really realised that this meant you get access to the Lounges - hey, the business class do themselves very well! Free tea, coffee, snacks and internet! and a nice quiet and comfortable place to sit whilst waiting. I made myself a cuppa and had a scone and jam, something just to keep me going until later.

We made good time to London, arriving at Watford 13 miles out at 6.40. Congestion meant not landing till 6.55: and then, would you believe, the steps wouldn't work! Finally we got out, into a bus (heck, this is BA, not Easyjet!) and into the much vaunted Terminal 5 a full half hour after touchdown. Then it was a long, long walk to where you catch another bus to other terminals, in my case Terminal 3: the designers of T5 built long corridors and never thought of travelators for ageing women with doubtful knees! I finally arrived at T3 a whole hour after arriving at Heathrow.

Then through the whole security business again (I reckon this is just to keep the bottled water sales up), and so into the terminal. A quick call at the transfer desk, and then on via Smiths to get more water to the BA lounge, where they have meals, even - I couldn't resist a wee taste of chicken tikka masala and rice, and an apple, even though in about 90 minutes I'll be served what I hope will be a sumptuous meal. No wonder I'm overweight: but then I don't do this jetset lifestyle every day. Free wifi, too, so I can post this now, with the picture of my plane to Heathrow, and then it's time to board.

Nearly ready to go

Less than three days to go now before I finally leave the house and head for the airport to start the adventure. As ever, so much to do, so little time! I’ve finally heard from the man who’s going to be fixing my kitchen, so I‘ve been madly moving things out of the kitchen so that he’ll be able to strip out what’s there and put a new floor in so that the fitters can put the kitchen in: hopefully it will all be done by the time I get back. All the food is now in its temporary home on the old dining table. It’s amazing what you find that you didn’t know you had: a pack of tarka dall (I love Indian food), some pudding rice dated ‘best before 2001’ which I’ve thrown out, and several other things… I discovered I had two packs of rice and two of spaghetti on the go! So when it all goes back I’ll at least know what I have and where it all is. The new kitchen has its main food storage in drawers rather than a cupboard, so it’s easier to see what’s there at the back.

So many plans seem to have fallen into place. Amazingly, I heard that two young people were looking for temporary accommodation in Newcastle just when I’m away, so I got in touch, met them and they will be house sitting for me – much safer for me than having the house empty. They are a lovely pair (just to make it confusing, she’s also Sarah!), and are both planning to do postgraduate study, she at Newcastle and he at Durham, and I hope they’ll become good friends even after they’ve found a more permanent home and I’ve reclaimed mine. They weren’t at all fazed when I asked if they were happy to have the kitchen replaced around them, either!

And Australian Quakers really have been great. In several places they’ve arranged a complete programme for me: so much so that when I get to Sydney, half way through the six weeks I’m travelling in the ministry, I’ve booked myself into a hotel for three days so I can just chill out and have a complete rest. After that I’m moving into the accommodation at the Meeting House. Sydney is the one place where nothing much seems to have been arranged: but I’m not bothered by that, I always said that my main objective is simply to be there and to meet with people, and anything else is an extra. I will be able to go to Meeting in Sydney, and that’s as much as is necessary.

Meanwhile I’ve also been madly tidying my bedroom, moving clothes around, selecting what I’m going to take (about half a ton, I’ll have to cut back a bit!) and making the room at least vaguely habitable for the house sitters.

So there’s still a lot of loose ends to clear up: but then I’ll be up, up and away!