Indelible Adventures

I’m sitting at the  San Remo  café   overlooking beautiful LakeComo in the picturesque village of Bellagio sipping my second cappuccino of the day, the first devoured in a thirsty appreciation of the Italian way of making a great coffee…so simple yet so delicious! Of course a breakfast cappuccino at 11:20 am is so decadent, but after my alarm woke me for 6:45 am (yes, I was actually going to go for a run) I rolled over and fell back fast asleep, although lightly woken each hour as the church bells rang out each successive hour I lounged in bed until 9:15 am.  It was one of those deeply restful sleeps that takes you a little by surprise, but refreshes you to your core if you know what I mean.  The welcoming sign of San Giovanni di Bellagio at dusk I arrived into San Giovanni di Bellagio yesterday afternoon; this sleepy little village is situated about a 2 km stroll along the road from Bellagio.  A well renowned escape from the summer heat of...

Mum grew up with grandfather as the single parent, which for the late 1920’s and 1930’s was an unusual circumstance but one mum and her siblings seemed to revel in.   He provided a strong parental figure for her and siblings, living mostly in Mackay - Queensland with stints in Melbourne as well over the years. She had little to do with mother during her childhood after she had left grandfather and the children (see the blog:  Amazing Tales of Grandfather Conolly).  Although on occasion she did make an impact on mum’s life as you’ll find out in today's blog. Mum, Bill Forbes & Aunt Dorothy  circa 1938 It was September 1939 – Australia, as part of the British Empire was now at war.   These were heady days with tensions and passions running high particularly for the young men.  This latest generation had cut their teeth on the stories of Gallipoli and the Western Front, where their fathers and grandfathers had forged the ANZAC tradi...

As I mentioned in prior blogs I was very fortunate to have had time with dad in the last six months of his life.  It was an emotional rollercoaster both for him, my siblings and me…   After his initial surgery and diagnosis we were all given the stark reality of what lay ahead – Dr. Brown (head of Oncology at the Ballarat Base Hospital) had a family conference where he outlined in bleak detail what would happen.  He said that only 1% of patients with Dad’s type of advanced Brain cancer - the official name - Glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) - Stage IV   survived more than a year.  James, dad and me - at Glenda & Max's apartment Cuthbert St, Ballarat - Australia 1971 One option was to do nothing (initial diagnosis) and let it takes its own course but that would have meant days and weeks...   So to be honest I was surprised that given the severity and the aggressiveness of the cancer Dr. Brown asked if dad was willing...

I’d finished my final year of University and gone straight into farm work as a contractor with my old boss on that years harvest.   In the early part of the season we spent most of our time slashing, winnowing and baling hay into the small rectangular bales you used to see once upon a time.   Now-days the large circular bales that now dot the countryside have replaced these smaller more manageable ones.  We worked hard with twelve-hour days, seven days a week until we had completed the 2000 acres of his 5000 acres of grass cut and baled.   Which to the layman is just over 3 square miles – yeah, that’s a lot of bales!  I got to the point where I would actually dream of bales coming up the elevator at me…just couldn’t escape the never-ending monotony of the job or the nightmare of the “sea of bales” awaiting me the next morning. Thousands of hay bales - after a while you'd see them in your sleep  After completing the early part...

As I mentioned on prior blogs my year back packing around the world was an amazing experience not only for the opportunity to expand my horizons and frame of reference of the world around me but also for the wonderful opportunities to experience the array of people and cultures.  At first traveling by myself was a little scary, particularly after my experience in Thailand at the very start of my adventure, but once I settled down into a rhythm of “the road” I found my groove and really started to enjoy my alone time as well as the opportunities that presented themselves to me over the course of the year.   A young TW traveling in Scandinavia circa 1985 I guess in total I spent close to three months exploring Scandinavia using Copenhagen as my home base and primarily traveling by train and ferry all over the region.  Not only are the people friendly (see my prior blog about my experience in Oslo ) but also the countryside, cities and terrain exception...

In my first year of college I stayed in residence at the Gillies Street campus, surprisingly I was part of an experiment in co-ed housing on campus.  Traditionally this residence had been all-girls until I showed up in early 1977….(crazy is it really that long ago???)   And an experiment it truly was, having only one set of showers and toilets made it a rather interesting situation for me as well cos’ in those days I was a shy country lad who got embarrassed if a girl so much as spoke to him let alone run into them in a shower or going to the toilet!  I can still remember waking up extraordinarily early (like 5:00 am early) each morning to have a shower before anyone else as I didn’t want to either embarrass myself or anyone else in the process.   To say I was nervous taking my three-minute shower each morning was a massive understatement – in and out and back to my dorm room with footprints down the hall.   Wow, it would be a rather differe...

This weekend has been a series of life lessons for Zach and Sami.   Earlier today they both played in their final soccer tournament for their local house league.   As of Friday night Zach’s team was sitting at the number 7 spot out of 8 teams and his team had to win their final game of the season leading into the tournament to move up to number 6 spot and so get a chance to play a lower ranked team.  Prior to the game they were destined to play the number two team, who having beaten them on each occasion during the regular season was pretty intimidating to say the least.   To move out of this bracket they needed help from the team above them who had to lose for them to move up, but given the situation it didn’t look good. Watching Zach play his heart out in that game was inspirational.   He knew that a lot depended on the game and so he had steeled himself to do whatever it took to win.   He played an awe inspiring game scoring both goals in a 2-1 win....