Saturday Night at Bulli Beach

We had arrived at Bulli Beach on Friday, the 6th of December 2013, at one in the afternoon. Amazingly, up to Saturday night all the food that we had brought from home, was sufficient for every meal in our cabin up until Sunday morning the 8th, when we had to check out. Saturday night, however, we decided to go out for a meal.

Ruby’s Cafe was close to our Tourist Park. They had special music on that night and tables had to be booked. In passing early in the evening we noticed a lot of people already occupying all the outside tables. We went on past the playground towards the Bulli Beach Cafe.

Looking at the playground in passing I thought of little Lucas straight away. When we had seen Ebony and Lucas on Thursday, the 5th of December, for Monika’s birthday, we mentioned to Ebony that we had booked a cabin at Bulli Beach for the weekend. We discussed then that Ryan, Ebony and little Lucas might be able to visit us at Bulli Beach on Saturday afternoon. Ebony very much liked the idea. She was hoping that they would be able to come even though Ryan had to finish a lot of upholstering work before Christmas. He worked many, many hours so he could have a few days off over the Christmas period.

Unfortunately Ryan did not feel well during the week. A bug seemed to have caught up with him. Still he kept on working all day every day, while having early restful nights. It turned out on that Saturday Ryan still did not feel well enough and badly needed a rest at home. On top of it Lucas started feeling a bit wimpish and Ebony was concerned about him becoming sick and giving us the bug too. So she regrettably cancelled the planned visit to the beach.

I ended up making a lot of pictures of that beautiful playground near the beach. I am sure some of the things even 17 months old Lucas could already have enjoyed.

On we went to the Bulli Beach Cafe. We had a glass of wine there each as well as burgers. My burger was vegetarian with a huge mushroom and Peter’s was with some beef. After the meal we went outside and I took some more photos.

We went back passed Ruby’s Cafe where a lot of people were still sitting outside.

Sussex Inlet 1989

In 1989 my brother Peter Uwe came to visit us. He is the brother who is now a retired teacher and lives in Mecklenburg/Vorpommern, north of Berlin. In 1989 he was still a teacher in Berlin. He took at the time a one year leave from his teaching job. During this time he traveled the world. In this world trip he included a longer stay in Australia. Part of the time he was sailing and diving near the Barrier Reef in Queensland, but a few weeks he had set aside to visit us. We were able to show him around a bit in our beautiful area. Unfortunately it rained most of the time. Only during our one weeks stay with him at Sussex Inlet we had beautiful sunshine. That was so lucky!

I remember how Peter Uwe was really good at organizing. For instance, we had to take one weeks food supply to Sussex Inlet. Peter wrote out all the meals we wanted to cook and what sort of food was needed for all the meals for every day of the week. So we went shopping together. It all had to fit into our (yellow) station wagon. Apart from the two Peters, Caroline and myself, as well as the twins had to fit into the car. The twins were really keen to come with us again to this beautiful holiday place. They loved it there very much. Of course, we all did love it !

Because we had so much stuff to take along, we decided I would catch the train with the children. The train went only as far as Nowra (Bomederry). Peter drove Peter Uwe with all the supplies to the campsite first. Then he drove back to Nowra to pick us up from the station and take us to the camp. As I said before, the last part of the drive to the camp is a 13 km dirt- road. We always enjoyed this trip along the dirt-road which went right through the bush. We would wind the car-windows down to smell the beautiful bush-air. We caught glimpses of the water (Sussex Inlet) several times along this road. The sun would shine through the trees. The water glittered through the tree-branches. Marvelous!

When we arrived at the campsite, Peter Uwe had everything in the unit already under control. All the stuff had been packed away. So we could soon have our tea and apple-turnovers with fresh cream. Peter usually picked up these beautiful cakes at a certain bakery when he went through Berry. These apple-turnovers were always a special treat for us. The kids usually reminded Peter not to forget to stop in Berry to buy the cakes.

A place called Greenpatch is 18 km away from where we stayed. (I mentioned this place in my previous blog.) We went for an excursion to this place on one day and took lots of pictures with lorikeets.

Not far from where we were staying at the inlet there is a long beach. You can walk along it for hours. There is the open sea all along the way, called the Tasman Sea which is part of the Pacific Ocean. When we look out across the ocean we are always joking: ‘Yea, and in this direction is New Zealand!’ As though we could swim all the way to New Zealand!

Peter Uwe loved to jog along the beach. But he never made it to the end of it. Peter Uwe made lovely sculptures out of the sand right next to the ocean. There exist some photos of it. Sadly I could not find any of these amongst the pictures that we have. There’s only one picture of Ryan sitting in a boat of sand. I remember one day we spent hours and hours with Peter Uwe and the kids at some spot near the ocean. I am sure being creative with sand was an inspiration for the kids. Certainly they never did get bored.

I think we did go for swims in the ocean and in the inlet at high tide. It was April and still warm enough for a swim. However I could not find pictures of us in the water from that year. At nighttime we played lots of games with the children, such as card-games or board-games.

Caroline was ten, the twins were still nine.

Soon after waking up in the morning Caroline, Troy and Ryan go outside to greet a kangaroo.

Caroline with her Dad

Ryan and his boat

Peter Uwe and I had fun with the birds.

Hiddensee, Baltic Sea, Sommer 1936

All these pictures were taken on Hiddensee at the Baltic Sea during the summer of 1936 when I was a bit less than two. I was there with Mum and Aunty Elsa. Mum wrote into the journal that I was loved bei every one. (‘Uta war der Liebling aller.)

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiddensee

Remembering Apollo Bay

Some of my blogger friends may be interested in seeing some more pictures of our recent beach holiday at Apollo Bay. It usually takes me very long just to show a few pictures and there are so many to choose from!

The Beach at Graal/Müritz

During the summer of 1940 we were on holidays at the Baltic Sea. We had rented a small cottage. Auntie Ilse was staying with Mum, little Bodo and me most of the time. Our maid Gertrud was with us too. Dad worked during the week in Berlin and came to Graal only on weekends.

Two year old Bodo must have already been quite a walker. I remember that Dad took us for walks in the nearby forest where we would be looking for blueberries. These berries were quite delicious. We would eat them for supper with some sugar and milk.

The beach was not far from our cottage. We went there every day. A photographer had a shop close by. During the day he often took pictures of people on the beach. The following day he displayed the pictures in front of his shop ready for sale. I think people did not order to have their pictures taken. They bought them only if they happened to like them.

In my files I have two of these pictures. They are more than seventy years old now. I was reminded of these pictures when we went to an Australian beach the other day. In one of these old pictures you can see my father with my mother and Auntie Ilse. The women sit in their ‘Strandkorb’. These ‘Strandkörbe’ are very popular on all German beaches. They are popular still to this day. They are a good wind shelter. I think people usually place them in such a way that they can catch the sun. Mum and Auntie Ilse were always proud of their suntan.

Ute mit Bodo Graal Mueritz Sommer 1940

The other photo shows me with Bodo, my little brother.

Apollo Bay 26th Dec. 2011 to 2nd Jan.2012

We were six at Apollo Bay: Martin, Kristen, Lauren, Kristen’s Mum as well as Peter and I. Kristen’s dog Darcy was also with us. In the previous blog is a picture of Martin, Kristen and Lauren, which Peter took just before they all went off on a seal watching tour. More pictures I’ll try to include at a later date.

Apollo Bay turned out to be a marvellous holiday place. But all good things have to end. So now we’re back home again and getting used to the daily routine. We have good memories of seeing Martin’s daughters as well as Martin’s son with his family.

Kristen’s Mum, Margarete, who turns 80 this year, was often great company for me. It was a thrill for me, to have a fair dinkum Australian to talk to and compare memories of the distant past.

Peter made hundreds of pictures during the holiday. I hope to be able to publish some of them soon.

50th and 55th

Last Saturday we were invited to a 50th birthday party. I took a few pictures, but unfortunately they are not ready for publishing yet.

It so happened that at the party all of our daughters and quite a few grandchildren were present. And we did get the good news, that another great-grandchild is on the way! So that means our daughter Monika is going to be a grandma first time around. She was thrilled about the news. I think she had been longing for a long time to become a grandma. She’s going to be 53 next week. Her partner is the one who turned 50 and in his honour the big party had been organised. They did not have a barbecue this time, but Monika had prepared lots of delicious finger-food. There was enough to eat for everyone. And Mark, the birthday-guy, had engaged a disc-jockey, who had set himself up in one of the big garages. In the other connecting garage all the food was later served. The disc-jockey played nearly non-stop from 7 pm to midnight!

When we arrived towards 8 pm Monika very enthustically let me know that she had ordered a couple of songs especially for me. It nearly blew me away when soon after ‘Rock around the clock’ was played. Nobody danced. Young and old were scattered around the backyard, sitting on garden chairs around huge garden tables or standing with drinks in hand, talking to each other. Mark had shown me before where the music was and he and the disc-jockey had obliged to pose for me for a picture. When I heard the sounds of ‘Rock around the Clock’ I immediately found my way back to where the music was. As I said, nobody danced. So I had the dance-floor all to myself!

Later on I danced with Peter to the sounds of Glenn Miller music. Still nobody else danced. Anyhow, I had had my fun. After that my old bones needed a rest. Not so Peter. He continued dancing with a few younger women once a few people had finally appeared on the dance-floor. The music was beat, beat, beat and extremely loud. I found a conversation was impossible! I enjoyed the balmy night, taking some pictures here and there, resting for a while on a chair outside; then getting up again and making a few movements to the music. The noise was easier to bear when I was able to do a few dance movements by following the beat.

I watched the dancers in the garage from outside and took pictures. Mark’s slim, tall, blond daughter and her boyfriend were by far the best dancers. It was a joy to watch them. I saw none of Monika’s three daughters dancing. The youngest one and her girlfriend were giggling a lot when they saw me dancing! We went home soon after 10 pm, after all the birthday-cake ceremonies were finished. Maybe some more people, who hadn’t danced before, started dancing later on.

Our youngest daughter, who turns 33 a few days after Monika’s birthday, went home with us, feeling quite sick. Her partner stayed overnight at our place too. He had to leave early on Sunday morning to go back to Sydney to work. Daughter Caroline still felt too sick and couldn’t go to Sydney with him. We took her back to her place in Sydney on Monday morning when she felt a bit better. Sunday night, when she still hadn’t felt all right and hadn’t been able to eat anything for twenty-four hours we took her to our Medical Centre at half past nine, where a doctor was still in attendance. He advised her not to eat anything till she felt better and then only eat dry toast with honey. He told her to drink plenty of water, but only boiled water. He said he had a few people seeing him that evening with similar symptoms. Apparently it was a virus.

After having delivered Caroline back home we went on to a newly opened IKEA shop for lunch. We had Swedish meatballs. Simply delicious! Then on to Fairfield, one of the Western suburbs of Sydney. Gaby, our eldest daughter, was to meet us there. Gaby had managed on Saturday night to get two of her carers to take her to Mark’s party. By the time she got back home with her carers and put to bed, it was close to 3 am!

Now to the 55. This refers to Peter’s and my wedding anniversary. We invited the family to have lunch with us in Parramatta (another Western Sydney suburb) on Sunday, 18th December. This is not just for the wedding anniversary but also a pre Christmas celebration. This year the family cannot come to our place on Christmas Eve.They are all upset about this. To spend Christmas Eve at our place has been a long held tradition. It saddens them that this year is going to be different.

On the 23rd of December Peter and I are off to Melbourne to stay with our son, Martin. On Monday the 26th of December we’ll be off to the holiday cottage at the beach. This is were we’ll be celebrating the start of 2012.

This year is coming to an end. It has been a very eventful year again.