During two days I was lost and discovering a wonderful land like Alice in Lewis Carroll’s story. I believe in the ‘ask and you should get don’t ask and you will never know ! One of my mate was staying at this place and I saw the pictures he posted on a ‘famous’ social network website and I thought why not ask them if I can join them for the week end. It is only a couple of hours away from Sydney…Even though they were away for the week end, they agree for me to come and stay with my friend and their brother while they were travelling to Adelaide!
In exchange I just had to help with the cooking, cleaning in the house ! Pretty good deal really !
Pendant deux jours je me suis perdue tout comme Alice dans le roman de Lewis Carroll. Je suis une fervente adepte de la méthode demande et tu auras et si tu ne demandes pas tu ne sauras jamais….Un de mes amis résidait dans cette ferme d’accueil et en voyant ces photos sur un fameux site internet je me suis dit: pourquoi pas demander aux propriétaires si je peux me joindre à eux pour le week end. Leur ferme se situe à seulement quelques heures de Sydney. Je leur ai donc envoyé un courriel ! Etant absents pour le week end les deux frères ont tout de même accepté que je vienne tout en me prévenant que je resterais chez eux avec mon ami et leur frère Robert. En échange du gite et du logis je n’avais qu’à donner un coup de main pour les taches ménagères et faire un peu de ménage.
Tamarillo or tree tomatoes and orange from the garden (http://www.abc.net.au/gardening/stories/s328653.htm)
Tamarillo une variété de tomate qui pousse sur un arbre et des oranges fraiches du jardin
Mulberries from the garden (http://www.daleysfruit.com.au/fruit%20pages/mulberry.htm)
Variété de mures
Orange/clementine/mandarine to be honest not really sure the only things I am sure is their heavenly taste !
Orange/cleémentine/mandarine je ne suis pas très sure mais en tout cas avec un gout délicieux!
The vegetable garden and the chicken hut
Le potager et le poulailler
Some huge insect definitely coming from wonderland looking like flies but ten times bigger at least !
Un énorme insecte ressemblant à une mouche mais en dix fois plus gros !
Our good friend Fish, an adorable female labrador. Fish loves to go for a walk and play with you in the garden. Very efficient to scare the wombat and black wallabies away as well when walking in the forest.
If you are wondering what the wombats are : http://www.wombania.com/wombats/
Notre bonne amie Fish, une gentille labrador. Fish adore se ballader et jouer dans le jardin. Très efficace pour effrayer les wombats ou les kangourous noirs lorsqu’on se ballade en foret.
The two retired horses and their friends the ducks !
Les deux chevaux à la retraite et leurs amis les canards !
In the afternoon when everything was done in and outside the house we went for a walk with Fish the following pictures were being taken while walking in the ‘forest’ surrounding the house.
Nous sommes allés nous ballader en fin d’après-midi après avoir terminée nos corvés. Fish nous accompagnait les photos qui suivent furent prises pendant la ballade.
On sunday it was pouring but Ros a friend of the Wesley-Smith brothers kindly offered me a lift to Sydney. It was so much more that just a normal lift, we had a great conversation she showed me some of the lookout on the way and even invited over for dinner before dropping me back home !
She is a clarinet and saxophone teacher who also wrote a book on the East-timor musical culture, instruments and traditions you can find her book sounds of the soul on her website www.tekeemedia.com
Dimanche il pleuvait des cordes mais Ros une amie des frères Wesley-Smith m’a gentiment proposé de me déposer en voiture à Sydney. Ce fut bien plus qu’un simple trajet, nous avons énormément discuté sur le trajet, elle a ait quelques détours pour me montrer la vue et m’a même invité à diner chez elle avec son mari et sa famille avant de me déposer à la maison !
Ros est professeur de Clarinette et saxophone, elle a aussi écrit un livre sur la culture musicale au Timor Orientale, vous pouvez consulter son travail sur le site www.tekeemedia.com (en anglais)
Here she is braving the rain to show me the view and point me towards the different towns we could see from the Mittagong lookout.
La voici en train de braver la pluie pour me montrer la vue et m’indiquer le nom des villes que nous surplombons depuis le haut de Mittagong.
Our host this week end while his brothers were away, was Robert Wesley-Smith, I do not have enough words to describe Robert but he went out of his way to make me feel welcome in the house, I learned sooo many things that my brain is still processing some of the information. Robert worked as an aid worker in East Timor and you can read his account of the experience while working there after the destruction caused by Indonesian military and militia on this page:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/181115510/117-Days-in-East-Timor-R-Wesley-Smith-pdf
Notre hôte ce week end pendant que ses frères etaient absent, Robert Wesley-Smith. Je ne trouve pas les mots exacts pour le décrire mais Robert a tout fait pour me mettre à l’aise et j’ai appris tellement de chose en discutant avec lui. Robert relate son expérience au Timor orientale dans ce compte rendu : http://www.scribd.com/doc/181115510/117-Days-in-East-Timor-R-Wesley-Smith-pdf (en Anglais)
Unlike Alice I did not grow as big as a giant or become as small as a mouse, but I had a wonderful time, ate some wonderful food/fruits and met some amazing people while staying in the kangaroo valley !
Contrairement à Alice je ne me suis pas transformée en géante ou en petite souris, cependant j’ai passé un super moment, me suis régalée en découvrant des fruits et recettes succulents tout en rencontrant des personnages magnifiques !
I couldn’t wait to do something with these lovely lemons so I made some lemon curd and it is yummi !
I was having so much fun mixing the ingredients for my oranges’ cake !
At the back of the house Martin’s studio for his music, Robert and Ionel had been working on it during the week to had a little roof in front of the front door.
Derrière la maison le studio musical de Martin, Robert et Ionel ont travaillé dessus dans la semaine pour traiter le bois et ajouter un petit porche.
Ionel doing some work while I am just watching 😉
One of the arena in barcelona this one is in the north of barcelona and is now a museum. No more corrida and bulls in the area…
The French school in Barcelona.
While window shopping in Newtown I saw this display on one of the shop window and I was quite ‘surprise’ by some of the articles….
Overall I had lots some fun in Sydney, I met some very nice people , I do hope to stay in touch with them and hopefully come back to this wonderful city to share some more moments with my new friends. We had a barrel of fun and I cannot wait to come back again.
