Family Celebrations

We arrived from Germany on the SS Strathaird, a British P & O liner. We actually disembarked in Port Melbourne on the 31st of May 1959.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Strathaird

The Strathaird had come from England with a lot of British migrants and stopped at Cuxhaven to pick up more migrants from Germany. So, Peter, myself and our two baby daghters were among all of those German migrants. We had stayed at Bremen-Lesum overnight. From Bremen-Lesum goes a direct train-line to Cuxhaven. All the migrants, that had stayed together with us at Bremen-Lesum, were taken by train to our destination at Cuxhaven where the Strathaird was already waiting for us.

The Strathaird took five weeks to reach Port Melbourne. It was the most terrific cruise we had on that ocean liner! We were treated like first class passengers. We could not believe how lucky we were. So, this was 60 years ago in 1959!!!

This year we drove to Sussex Inlet on Friday, 31st of May, to celebrate this 60 year Anniversary with our extended Australian family. Most of them also arrived on Friday; some more people actually did arrive on Saturday, the 1st of June. Saturday night we had a great barbecue that was enjoyed by all.

All of us left our beautiful holiday place early on Sunday. Some of us stopped at the Lone Pine on our way home. I did like this very much!

As I said we spent some time with Martin in Melbourne. But Martin also spent some time with us in Dapto. He arrived at our place right on time for our wedding anniversary. Christmas Eve we spent with him and Caroline and Matthew at the place of Monika and Mark.

Monika as well as Roxy with one month old Baby Carter came to see us for afternoon coffee the day of our wedding anniversary. Caroline and Matthew had moved to suitable accommodation in inner Sydney the weekend before, but were back in time for the anniversary.

We were only ten people at our Anniversary Lunch in Wollongong (including Baby Carter). Some working people in our family were glad when we suggested instead of taking time of work for the anniversary lunch, we could all together have some anniversary celebrations on Christmas Eve. Monika and Mark were happy to have these celebrations at the back of their house.

Usually the whole family would turn up at our place for Christmas Eve celebrations. This had always been the tradition in our family. In a way I was glad, that we did not have to have it this time at our place. It was the first year that we also did not bother to have a Christmas tree.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

This is the sort of health food that Caroline likes to prepare

Martin travelled with Peter and me to Melbourne. We left very early in the morning of the 27th of December. Peter drove up Macquarie Pass. (He knows this Pass very well!) After a stop at Moss Vale, Martin took over the driving. It was very good that Martin could take over a lot of the driving to Melbourne, but Peter drove part of the way too.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA — Matthew bought this Cognac. I quite liked a little bit of it.

Tag: Family Celebrations

Diary June 2019

December Days with Martin