Wombat Bend again

Before I write about Wombat Bend, I would like to write about the lovely morning we had with Lucy, the owner of the Airbnb we stayed at in Healesville. Because one of the Airedales at Wombat Bend needed to have surgery, we delayed our visit to the afternoon. It was an overcast morning and quite gloomy so instead of touring the Yarra Valley, we sat in Lucy's lounge room and enjoyed a long talk with her. She is about ten years older than us and mentioned that while she enjoyed bringing up a family, she wished she had done some overseas travel when she was young. You could see the gleam in her eye when she talked of possibly going on another trip to Paris sometime.

 

So we headed off to Wombat Bend after lunch on a gloomy misty day.

 

The Studio which was built a few years ago. If I lived here, this would become my hi-fi listening room. Whenever I come to a new place, I look for where to plonk my loud speakers.

 

The pipe leads up to the top of the roof where there is a sprinkler system is ready for the next bushfire. The awful bushfire of 2009 came only a few yards away from the house.

 

The bnb part of Wombat Bend. Since it was Melbourne Cup weekend, there were paying guests occupying it.

 

Sue and Bill looking at the Airedale Quilt.

 

Marianne has made a quilt to be auctioned by the Australian Airedale Rescue.

 

Last time we were here, there were six Airedales. Unfortunately two died since then but another two have arrived. This is Lochie.

 

Sue had won the quilt from the US Airedale raffle a few years ago and here it is displayed in the bnb building in pride of place.

 

This year, the lucky Sue won a small bonus quilt and Marianne volunteered to take it with us to present to Sue. Here they are trying to work out where to place it.

 

 

What a couple of hams.

 

While the ladies were having fun, I went for a walk around the property. Remember that all of this was once just a paddock. Bill is an incredible landscaper.

 

It is amazing how the Internet has produced such great friendships.

 

Dogs having an afternoon nap on a dismal afternoon. 

 

 

Bill brought home the very woozy dog from the vet. 

 

Soon the doggie was up and about.

 

Memorial for on of the dogs who recently passed away.

 

This is a particularly rare bottle brush from the Boulia region in the far west of Queensland. It is a very hot area and the flowers are unusual in that the flowers are further apart than usual.

 

Sue had discovered these small frogs under a camp fire oven.

 

Notice the babies.

 

They have many varieties of bottle brush here.

 

The seeds.

 

Dead trees from the 2009 bushfires.

 

Wombats live in the creek bank at the edge of the property. More about the holes by Sue

The wombat holes in the cliff are actually very old tunnels that are exposed as the cliff edge wears back.  They would originally have had the proper entrance high up on the flatter ground, and the tunnels are dug by the wombat from the entrance.  What we see now is a bit like when David Attenborough puts a glass wall against an underground nest so you can see the inhabitants  .. only in this case, no inhabitants. Hope that makes a kind of sense.

 

I loved this purple variety. More about it from Sue -

 Callistemon forresterae, named by Bill after me.  Comes from the remote  Genoa River in far east Gippsland .... we discovered it about 25 years ago and we did bring this one into horticulture.  It’s known as Callistemon Genoa Glory.

 

It was wonderful to visit our friends again. The previous day was Bill's 80th birthday and we celebrated this achievement and we hope he has many more.

If you want to know more about Wombat Bend, look at the blogs from our other visits.