A little train journey

Since my youngest daughter, her husband and my grand daughter  relocated to the south coast i have on occasion travelled down to visit or babysit so that they could  attend  certain functions.
Sometimes we travel down by car, but mostly I go down by train. It takes me about four hours with a train change in Sydney.As my husband is a long term rail employee, we are fortunate to be able to travel the public transport system for free.So I find train travel a real stress free luxury that  I indulge in as often as I can.
Last week my daughter asked if i could travel down  this last weekend just gone to babysit while she went to a Bon Jovi  concert in Sydney. I decided to travel by train and take a few photos along the way to share with you all.
I am happy to go down as  my husband was away working and we arn't heading up to the farm until the end of this week.

So,I boarded the  electric express service to Sydney from our local station which is about 10 minutes drive from here.It is a very pleasant trip down the coast, passing, crowded  townships, and lazy coastal villages and lovely waterways and hilly terrain, all very picturesque.

A fair part of the way the rail line follows the old highway and the new expressway down the coast. It travels past many lakes and major rivers and even the ocean at times. the little old house in the photo above is one of my particular favourite  places that I look out for on each trip. It is some bodies weekender that is only accessible by boat, what a lovely little spot to have a holiday, but still not all that far from major services.
Excuse the quality of the photographs, as they were taken through dirty train windows that were moving along quite fast.

This lovely little spot is called Hawkesbury River Marina, a quaint little out of the way place on the hawkesbury River where you can stay in accommodation  or  go out on boat trips. One such trip which we have done is called "The Riverboat Postman", you travel the mail run on the boat around all the islands in the area  and have a lovely buffet lunch while on board( a really relaxing enjoyable day)
As you approach Sydney Central Station,you pass by the beautiful old "Mortuary Station".
This beautiful old building was  opened in  1869 and was built to facilitate the transportation of the deceased to local cemeteries for internment.It has recently been restored to it's former glory.

At Central station I changed trains to then travel on the south coast line towards Wollongong.

Central is a lovely old railways station, which officially opened around 1906, replacing an earlier Central station.Central has about 26 platforms, some above ground and some below ground,it is Sydney's main rail terminal.

As we headed down south the surrounding country is beautiful, passing over large viaducts and  alongside beautiful coastal towns.

After arriving at my destination, I had a lovely lunch with my daughter and grand daughter,put my daughter on the train and then spent the afternoon and night with my beautiful little girl.

We had a ball, we read books, and played fairies, and watched Scooby Doo(The current Favourite) and cooked her favourite dinner of sausages, corn, mashed potato and peas.
She slept like a log, and I couldn't resist an early morning photo of my sleeping beauty.
We met my daughter off the train about lunchtime, and spent a bit of time together and I  started back on the return journey about 3pm.

The above are a few more shots of the beautiful scenery that I get to see from the train on the return journey, the centre one is especially beautiful(you come out of a long dark tunnel, and just as you exit, that is the view immediately to your left.) Breath taking,j ust so much  glorious scenery every where.
I arrived back at my local railway  station around 8pm that night,tired and weary, but full of joy  from my great  little expedition.
Hope you have enjoyed my little trip with me, it has been a pleasure to have you along.
Take care every one out there,
until we catch up again,
Cheers,
Jane.

 

Busy,Busy,Busy...now taking a breather.!

We have just had a really busy full on 10 days, Our  youngest daughter had to go to Adelaide for a few days and hubby had to work so we offered to take little miss Holly,now three up to the farm for a week or so.
We picked her up down near Wollongong(about 3 hours south  and then drove back to Newcastle and then after picking up the trailer fully loaded with stuff for the farm and the two dogs we set off for the four hour drive out west  to the farm
Immediately upon arrival she bolted out of the car and was amazed at the sheep,she just couldn't take her eyes off them.

It was freezing cold when we arrived late in the afternoon so we got the fires going and unpacked the car.(The farm is a new experience for Holly as she had only been there overnight once before when she was much younger).
The next morning my husband  had to assemble a small motorbike(now christened Motor Mike) for ever more.We had bought it cheaply on ebay just so that my husband could save his legs a little rounding up the sheep and other jobs around the place.

We have found it to be wonderful, It is a little on the small size, but has a 125 cc engine, so gets along quite well.
Holly was given the responsibility of feeding the dry biscuits to the dogs, a job she took very seriously.Anytime we would  wonder where she was, we just had to look for the dogs, because they were always together.

She just loves the dogs, has done since she was a little baby.
She owns the black labrador, her name is Josie, she calls her Josie Jo..
Brian  went to clean out one of the stock troughs and Holly and the dogs just had to help him empty it and refill with clean water. She was cute, got soaking wet and was covered in mud and slime,she told me she was being Peppa Pig and was "jumping in Muddy Puddles".The Kelpie belongs to our oldest daughter.

Our oldest daughter also came to the farm to visit  while we were there too and brought her baby girl Claudia with here. We had a lovely time with the little girls together and also some more cousins from in town came out to visit  as well, it was like we were running a day care centre.

We had hair braiding, chocolate cup cake making(and Bowl Licking), and a first photo of Nanny and Poppy with both of their grand daughters. holly also got to do some other exciting things, like sitting up on Poppy's  big blue tractor, and feeding the little pony  at the next door neighbours,Going to the playground in town, cutting and pasting pictures and playing with play dough.( what more could a little girl want.)

While we were there Brian went up the hill with his trusty old blue tractor and cut a load of good wood, while he was up there I took little Miss for a big walk "Up the Mountain" and we gathered many pockets full of pretty  stones along the track.

Our little "feed" block that we had shut off from the sheep had progressed quite well so we let the

sheep onto it for an extra bit of feed for them, they thoroughly enjoyed it. Elsewhere around the garden spring  is rapidly creeping up on us, the apricot tree was bursting into blossom and the hardenberger"native Sarsparella' was in flower, all is looking good.Brian also weeded the rhubarb and set up an old bathtub to make a new garden the next time we are up.
We had a day with the sheep while we were there too,We keep some of our sheep on Brian's brothers bigger block of land. All the new lambs needed tailing,tagging and marking, The adult sheep all needed drenching and checking over and the alpaca(which belongs to my Brother in law) needed drenching and his toenails trimmed.Holly just adored all the baby lambs, and had a wonderful morning followed by a picnic with the sheep(which was just a cuppa in the paddock)

On our final day, we travelled to Dubbo to catch up with my elderly mum and my sister(who just happened to be visiting our Mum also. We had a lovely catch up, lunch out and a bit of grocery shopping for great Nanny.My mum is nearly 89 and doing very well.It was lovely she got to have the day with her Great grand daughter.

We had a huge week, feel like we never stopped, we are totally exhausted, but in the best possible way. Hopefully my next posts will be more farm related, but I just had to share our wonderful week with everyone. We travelled home the day following the Dubbo excursion, and never heard a peep from our little princess, Holly's Mum had loaned us her portable DVD player, and she watched Pepper Pig and Wiggles all the way home,(with a lunch break in the middle). The dogs happily sat either side  of her.

So until next time, best wishes to all,
and cheers from Jane in Aus.