Tagua nut necklace

I pulled out my jewellery-making box on Sunday and got creative. I bought these tagua nut buttons from Etelage in Newtown ages ago, but hadn't used them. Tagua nuts come from a palm tree found in the Andes in South America, and are used as an elephant ivory substitute. They dye well and I was lucky to be able to choose from a large range of colours. I wove together the buttons with waxed cotton, tying a knot after the last button. I then twisted the two strands before closing them with a crimp end and a clasp. The buttons aren't cheap at $3.95 each. The materials for this necklace cost me about $65.

Cycle Gerringong

Lesson learned. Before you get too carried away with how green the grass is, think a little about what made it green and how close it might be! As you can see by the stormy sky, my bike ride around Gerringong, Shoalhaven Heads and Berry on the weekend wasn't all blue skies and sunshine. Just mostly. The 60km ride varied from undulating hills to long flat sections through Seven Mile Beach National Park. The worst part of the ride is 8-10km of road with no shoulder and regular traffic, but this is far outweighed by a stop at Shoalhaven Heads to take a walk on Seven Mile Beach, sampling wine at Coolangatta Estate Winery and Two Figs Winery, and cafes and shops full of interior decorations in Berry. You may not get the most out of this ride if you're the type focused on riding from point A to point B. There are enough hills to keep the heart pumping and the muscles working, but I like my rides to be scenic as well, and the area between Seven Mile Beach and Berry has that in spades. After a quality breakfast and coffee at the Gerringong Cafe and Deli, two friends and I started the ride in sunshine. It suddenly became humid while we were tasting wine at Coolangatta Estate, and then the big drops started falling. We thought the rain was going around us, but no such luck. We took a ten minute break under a tree to sit out a heavy downpour and then we were back on the road. No more rain, and stunning skies for photos. A late lunch at the Hedgehog Cafe in Berry, a spot of window shopping, and then the prettiest part of the ride following Toolijoa Road. Great ride. Free tip - you can really feel a bottle of wine in your pannier when you hit the hills.

Mudgee Wine Festival

Last weekend I went to the Mudgee Wine Festival... in Manly. For those of you who don't know Sydney, they're two places separated by 280km, a mountain range and a cultural divide. Mudgee is an attractive town in the country, north-west of Lithgow. Manly is a beach suburb on a peninsula at the mouth of Sydney Harbour and a mecca for backpackers. Mudgee is a well-known wine region, and because of it's historic buildings, great pubs and even better local produce, it's a popular place to go for weekends away. But Mudgee also comes to the city for a day or two each year. With the help of two friends on a gorgeous sunny day, I sampled over twenty wines - the benefit of going with friends. $25 buys you a wine glass and ten tasting tickets which allow you to sample the wares from numerous marquees spread out on the lawns of Manly's 'castle'. Worth a look on any day, the St Patricks College grounds are open to the public. The building now houses a hospitality school, but once served as a seminary for the Catholic church. There were whites and reds, dessert wines and some great Rose's. I couldn't resist a Temperanillo from Optimiste, a Merlot Rose from Burrundulla, and a Cabernet Rose from Robert Stein, and also fell victim to a caramelized balsamic vinegar from Noble House Fine Foods. Keep an eye out for the event next year, or go to the real thing held during the month of September in Mudgee. 

Mountain Biking

Oh the rattling, eyeball shaking, shoulder tensing, dust creating, rock sliding fun of it all! Tip: it's probably best not to attempt mountain biking for the first time on a hybrid that has slicks and nooo suspension. Apart from my morbid fear that the combination of vibration and lack of vision might throw me from my bike, this was a most enjoyable first. In September I went with my club (SPAN Outdoors) to do a 40km ride along the Kings Tableland Road from Wentworth Falls to Mc Mahon’s Point lookout and return. This is an undulating cliff top dirt road, with stunning views over Lake Burragorang from the lookout. It's pretty easy as cycles go; there are no killer hills and the surface is pretty good. I'd always put off trying mountain biking because I disliked losing traction. And losing traction in sand was probably the only thing on the ride that I really disliked. I’m told this is easily improved by having knobbly's on your bike. The attraction is definitely the much broader range of tours I can now consider. I may have to buy a mountain bike though…

Latte art

I learnt how to stretch last weekend. I haven't got a personal trainer, I've just learnt how to make a coffee. I can't drink a lot of it myself, as I get the shakes, but I still love it and wanted to get over my fear of coffee machines. I got a half-price deal on a one-day course at the Sydney Coffee School and on a sunny Saturday, headed to school. The Sydney Coffee School provides training for baristas wanting to work professionally, and for people like me who just want to make their own. Everyone gets their own coffee machine and an endless supply of milk and coffee. I got the hang of making espressos pretty quickly, but I admit to trouble with 'stretching' the milk.

Stretching milk is the process of adding foam and texture to your milk while heating it. The secret is to keep the steam wand at the right depth for the type of coffee you're making. For a cappuccino you want your milk to have some froth, whereas for a latte, the milk should stay more substantial. If you're doing latte art, the milk has to be perfect, especially for a layered drink or to do etching. It took me a while to get the hang of stretching the milk. I was okay at latte milk, but my cappacino milk was either too thin or became meringue. The photo is of my mocha. I started with the milk pour, then added the chocolate sauce, which sank to the bottom. We then poured the espresso over the back of a teaspoon, and then decorated the top. If your milk isn't right, the chocolate sauce decoration sinks straight away. I also had a pretty good go at etching, basically drawing designs on the top of the coffee with a skewer and chocolate sauce (which I personally think would ruin the taste, and they couldn't give me any real alternative - I suspect you can do it with crema). I was really bad at pouring art. It must take so much practice to get it right. By that stage of the day I had the milk worked out, but then my hands just wouldn't cooperate and I ended up with something that looked roughly like clouds! I wouldn't hire me yet, but if you have a coffee machine and you're willing to be a guinea pig, I'm willing to practice :)

Cutting off the curls

I've always had so many reasons for not cutting my hair short. My past boyfriends preferred I didn’t, or I thought it might affect my chances on online dating sites. I'm sure most men can look past a hairstyle, but the photo counts for so much on an online dating site. I once tested how many responses I got first with a photo with my hair curly, and secondly with straight hair. Curly hair lost. Then there's the wierd mohawk you wake up with in the morning. However, short hair does wonders for my face, bringing out my eyes and exposing my neck. I can show off my jewellery and I don’t have to decide how to do my hair in the morning. I’m saving money because I need less hair product, and I’m saving the planet because I need less water to wash out said hair product. I’ve put off cutting my hair for years, and I’m ecstatic that I’ve finally done it. Now that it’s short, a dramatic colour change isn’t such a risky option. Thus I replace one quandary with another. Pink or blonde?

New huts and Mt Jagungal

Cesjacks

O'Keefes

   

The following weekend (28 August) I met up with a few people from SPAN Outdoors for a backcountry ski trip. I got to see four huts on this trip I hadn’t seen before: Wallaces, Cesjacks, O’Keefes (new version) and Mackays. I’m slowly working my way through the Snowy Mountain Huts, and was lucky enough to see a few before they were lost in the bushfires of 2003. Dad took me to O’Keefes one summer when I was about 17, so I’d seen the original version, and it was great to see the replacement built in 2009. As a member of the Kosciuszko Huts Association, Dad was a proud member of the working party that rebuilt the hut. They did a great job, using recycled and aged materials and lining the hut with newspapers from the 1930’s. Unfortunately they didn’t finish covering the lining with plastic, so a lot of the papers are being damaged and you have to leave the door slightly open when the fire is lit to prevent asphyxiation from smoke (very authentic). Cesjacks was packed to the brim with a working party. There must have been about twenty people crowded into it cooking their dinner. A crowd always means a more social night! Mackeys is a little more isolated and so was quieter. I’d like to head back to it at some stage to explore the area between the hut and the Happy Jacks Plains. It was a big moment to ski to the top of Mt Jagungal. My father has asked that when he dies I throw his ashes from this majestic mountain at the northern end of Kosciuszko National Park. As one of the true areas of wilderness in the Snowy Mountains, I have to applaud his choice.

 



Mackeys

Wallaces at dawn (private)