A Kitchen Down Under

Sydney ….. undeniably one of the great cities of the world – stunning views and stunning architecture. Who in the world has never seen or heard of those great Australian icons - the Opera House and Sydney Harbour Bridge? Tourists, disgorged from luxurious cruise ships, throng The Rocks and Circular Quay to enjoy the thriving cafe culture, shops, restaurants, bars and art galleries. This is the place to be and, I suspect, this is the Sydney that blog readers will assume that Sandra and I will have been enjoying - they could not be further from the truth.

We have now been in Sydney for nearly six weeks with not even a sniff of an icon never mind dipping our toes into cafe culture, restaurants or art galleries. Our life has been bound by three parameters – Steven's kitchen, IKEA and Bunnings (the Australian version of B & Q) We had offered to help with the installation of a new, and badly needed, kitchen in the new house and had completed our trip a little earlier than intended in order to crack on with the work.

Whilst I have, a long time ago, installed a couple of kitchens I am by no means an expert – in fact thinking back on the results of these past DIY adventures I would rate myself as little more than an unaccomplished amateur. Thank goodness I was not to be the lead operator on this little operation. I saw my role as having some minor input at the planning stage then ripping out the old units and appliances, carting the IKEA flat packs back to the house and helping to assemble them. The bulk of the actual kitchen fitting was to be carried out by Steven's neighbour, who had casually informed us that he had installed many kitchens. I thought that my time was to be spent acting as gopher to the professional - handing up the appropriate tools, general lifting and carrying and supplying mugs of tea at regular intervals. How mistaken can one be?

The expected help never actually materialised, certainly not in the form of any hands-on input to the project and, other than the lending of a few tools, the “professional” was notable by his absence. In some ways this was no bad thing as, reading between the lines, he seemed a little uncertain about some aspects of kitchen installation - aspects which I considered fairly important i.e. the plumbing and electrical work. However, to give him his due, he was able to put me in touch with both a plumber and electrician who both eventually did a good job.

The last few weeks have been slow work. With the design morphing every few days as Sandra and Ana kept changing their minds, there were endless trips to IKEA – initially for planning purposes and then to pick up flat packs and starting to assemble them. High on Sandra's list of priorities was “cockroach proofing”. Most houses in Sydney have, to a greater or lesser extent, a problem with cockroaches and Steven's was no exception with many of the loathsome creatures putting in an unwelcome appearance. Sandra's theory was to block up as many holes in the kitchen as possible to keep the little buggers out. As anyone who knows anything about cockroaches will tell you this approach is unlikely to be successful – however, despite my protests, I was detailed to secure wooden battens supplemented by tubes of a substance known as “No More Gaps” around all the skirtings. Time will tell if this approach has been successful – I hae ma doubts!

Anyway, a picture is worth a thousand words as they say, so here follows about 16,000 words worth of pictures.

The kitchen was pretty grim and needed a little renovation

Ana, a miniature powerhouse, taking out the old sink unit with a wrecking bar



Steven lying down on the job

Sandra checking up on my "cockroach proofing"

The new units starting to take shape

What the elegant kitchen installer is wearing in Sydney this year

"Hurry up with that photo, I can't hold this forever" 

Slowly but surely - then we took them all down again for the next photo

Hoping that the brushed aluminium backsplash stays glued to the wall

An inspection from Ana and young Jasmine

Steven and Ana proving that marriage is a partnership - despite bloody IKEA!

Ana always wanted a sliding corner carousel unit - Steven is not so sure

With a whole tube of silicon round the sink there better not be any leaks

Starting to look the part with dishwasher in place



Sandra and Ana preparing for the first dinner party

The finished article, with Johann and Stretch as honoured first guests

And now, after almost six weeks of slow but steady work on the kitchen, it's time to relax for a few days before heading back to the Scottish winter next week. Our work is done here, we can be pleased with what we have achieved - or so I thought - Sandra and Ana are now deep in discussion about an apparently much needed new bathroom. I think we may be back sooner rather than later!

Despite rumours to the contrary we are still alive and have arrived back in Sydney

A month, or perhaps even more, since I last managed to post a blog – where has the time gone? Fearing disaster, blog followers from all over the world have inundated me with blog comments and emails seeking reassurance that we haven't fallen foul to any of the natural disasters which beset unwary travellers in Australia. I am happy to announce that, apart from a severe case of renovators exhaustion, Sandra and I have survived our trip around Australia and are now safely back in Sydney.

My last post saw us leaving the old schoolhouse at Lynch's Creek. On our travels, as well as this blog, we record our progress through the country on a map, with Sandra carefully marking our route in black ink. Anyone viewing the map covering the Brisbane to Sydney section would be forgiven for thinking that it had been completed by a drunken spider leaving a random trail of inky footprints weaving in and out between coast and hinterland. We had decided to give the coast a miss and headed off inland where I found, and not for the first time, that our route had been engineered to coincide with a craft shop – this time at a place called Stokers Siding. As (good) luck would have it, the craft shop had been rather over-hyped and thankfully Sandra found little to whet her interest and we quickly moved on – but inexplicably somehow set off back to the coast heading for Byron Bay.

It was whilst in Byron Bay some 15 years ago we got the news that Rhoda, our Rhodesian Ridgeback bitch, had an inoperable brain tumour. Our next dog, another Ridgeback but this time a big male, was given the name Byron – so we felt some affinity towards Byron Bay. However, we never got there. Finding ourselves in a queue of traffic moving at snail-like pace on the outskirts of the town we finally lost patience and said “Bugger Byron”, did a U-turn and headed back inland again. Eventually, with light fading and very little sign of a decent campsite for the night, we ended up at little more than a roadside stop at a place called Crooked Creek.

Camping was pretty basic with no facilities, although perhaps that was not quite the case, there was a toilet. If you refer back to my last posting there is a photograph of the “thunderbox” toilet which Sandra refused to use – in retrospect this was pure luxury. The Crooked Creek toilet was of similar construction and had once been a “longdrop” toilet with several feet between the seat and the final resting place of deposits. However, decades of use and no maintenance had seen the “longdrop” metamorphose into initially a “shortdrop” and finally into a “hardly any drop at all drop”.

Not for the faint of heart

An extremely strong stomach and the ability to hold ones breath for the duration were essential toileting skills for this type of loo – once again Sandra was unable to come up to scratch and decided to hold on for more cultivated facilities.

A quick visit to Tenterfield to pick up directions (and cultivated facilities) then saw us heading for yet another “Scottish” town called Glen Innes – stopping on the way to visit Bald Rock – “the biggest single lump of granite in the southern hemisphere” and to photograph a Dalek which just happened to be standing by the roadside – strange place Australia! (For the full Dalek story Google - DWater dalek

Two big lumps of granite at Bald Rock

Yet another granite lump

Strange what you bump into in the outback

Glen Innes purported to be a Scottish, or perhaps Celtic, town and as such had a “genuine” crofters cottage tea room standing next to a stone circle allegedly based on either the Standing Stones of Callanish in Lewis or possibly the Ring of Brodgar in Orkney, no-one seemed to be quite sure which.

 

Crofters Cottage in Glen Innes

The Standing Stone Circle

Whilst nearby a large single stone with a sword embedded in it (presumably Excalibur) defeated the combined Douglas efforts to release the sword and thus proving worthy of ruling the kingdom – so we left to scour the streets looking for the many street signs in Gaelic – yet another unsuccessful venture.

 

Personally I don't think she was really trying!

 

That night was spent once again in splendid isolation camping at the waters edge at Copeton Waters.

Knocking up a feast whilst knocking back a cold one

As it is now a few weeks ago, trying to remember our exact route is difficult but Sandra, who claims that her dementia is less advanced than my own, confidently says we visited somewhere called Bundara before stopping at Tamworth for a couple of new tyres and of course to be photographed beside the giant golden guitar. Tamworth is famous for its country music festival, epitomised by the giant guitar symbolically sited equidistant between McDonalds and the Kentucky Fried Chicken outlet and a photocall at its base is a Tamworth Rite of Passage for all tourists.

The Tamworth Big Guitar - between Maccas and KFC

With only a few days before were due back in Sydney we were looking for a nice restful place to camp before hitting the big city – and so ended up in Nundle, where coincidentally there was a woollen mill which was on Sandra's to do list. Camping by a waterhole half way up a mountain and with plenty of birdlife in evidence it should have been an ideal place – it wasn't. At night-time the temperature dropped to not much above freezing and I refused to stay for another night. Packing up we decided to head for Dunns Swamp a popular camping place just a few hours from Sydney which we had been to years before.

The fact that it was popular - and it was the end of the school holidays - and it was a holiday long weekend should have alerted us to the problem of Dunns Swamp – it was packed out. With small boys tearing round on bikes being chased by small girls pushing dolls prams it was far too dangerous for the likes of us and, despite darkness falling, we headed for the small, quiet and attractive village of Rylestone where we squeezed into a corner of the local caravan park and had a surprisingly enjoyable couple of days.

We camped next to the second tee on the local golf course but were not disturbed by golfers as, in our two days in residence, not a golfer was to be seen, only a few dog walkers.

A green at Rylestone Golf Course

One interesting feature of the course was the greens were made of a gravelly sand and, instead of flags to mark the hole, fine toothed rakes were used with golfers expected to smooth out the putting surface after completing the hole. I'm not sure how they handled the bunkers!

Sandra disappearing into Fern Gully

An interesting outing to Fern Gully followed by a very acceptable meal in the local pub just about completed our stay in Rylestone and indeed our trip around Australia. Sydney was to be our next stop where we had a bit of house renovation lined up which will probably keep us occupied for a few weeks.

Steven our son bought a house in Marrickville one of the inner suburbs of Sydney. Being near to the city centre allows him an easy commute to and from work but the downside is, being so near the centre the property prices are sky high and you don't really get a lot for your money – the house needs a lot done to it. When we arrived in Australia, Sandra and I spent a week or two decorating a couple of bedrooms and offered to replace the kitchen when we got back from our trip. The last few weeks have been spent on this project – more of which anon.