When I told people…. and not just any people – I mean close friends and family that Kiki and I were embarking on this journey, they all asked if there would be a blog to follow.  I must admit I was a little reluctant because of the time and energy that it takes to produce such a quality piece of literary art.  However, when my close family and friends heard this, I was met with cries of “but you have to…”, “but that’s my most favourite time of day – reading your blog…” and “that would be a real shame, I love it…”  Which were quickly followed up with “… but, perhaps you could cut out on the history” “… maybe just with not so many facts…” and “… you could do a ‘blog lite version’ where it’s not so long”

So, I thank my would be publishers – please know that I have taken all this constructive feedback onboard and plan to deliver a masterpiece filled with wonderful short stories with no boring facts and no history of the locations we visit.

Let me start by sharing a photo that Kiki showed me yesterday whist we were waiting to board the plane. Allow me to set the scene for you.

Kiki and I were about 11 years old and it was the Easter Parade at our primary school.  All the kids had made Easter bonnets to wear and be judged on…. Kiki and Kèlyfos had other ideas.

A few months earlier, Kèlyfos’ mother (me Jenny) had participated in the Geraldton Sailing Club Christmas panto-style play where she played one of the 7 dwarves in the much loved story of Snow White.  The dwarf costumes were designed so that the hat sat over your head, shoulders and arms and sat thusly just above the waist….. a face was then drawn on the stomach of the actor and the neck of the jumper sat on the hips and hung down to the knees.  The jumper arms were stuffed, with gloves sewn on for hands.  String was then attached to the wrists which were controlled by the actor under the hat – ingenious!

So when it came time for us to design our Easter bonnets for the school parade, this is what these young, creative and yet slightly naive girls chose.  I’m still not sure what it had to do with Easter or eggs or bunnies or the death and resurrection of Jesus, but when you’re 11, what does that matter?

Now, we can’t remember who won, but we did make the local paper, and as it says in the blurb “the two little fellows pictured above were certainly amongst the winners”, so even though Ted Smith thought we were boys….. we were most certainly grinning under our hats.

Here we are with our fellow winners
L-R: Lara Dalton, Julia Manley (I’m assuming the first fellow is Chris based the width of the face of the one on the right = me) and our dear friend Shelley Wilton

Now….. who thinks we look like a couple of penises?