Today started with another walk up the Bluff!

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Followed by more frolicking.

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The End

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This weekend Nash got to go on a holiday. Things started on Friday with a walk from Encounter Bay to Victor Harbor.

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Along the way there were signs of things to come.

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On Saturday the sun was shining and we walked up the Bluff.

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From there it was down past Petrel Cove and on the walk to King's Beach where Nash got to be her best self.

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This walk justified a visit to Port Elliot Bakery and then another walk around the cove and up the hill.

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After some rest and then another walk along the Hindmarsh River (without the camera) the end of a long day came to a close.

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Seems a little strange that a single 96 year old lady halfway across the earth dies and today I get a day off work. But in 2019 a single person got a little too close to a pangolin we all know how that turned out.

Like a few people in Adelaide I spent my morning in Belair National Park getting my feet dirty.

Here's some photos.

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There may be claims that internet algorithms rule our lives, but after Vanessa and I curated the 26 hour, 45 minute Mega Road Trip 22 I clearly had too high expectations for the power of Shuffle.

It wasn't just that despite sixty hours of driving I don't think I heard a good chunk of these songs. But the thing that bothered me the most was Spotify's seemingly poor timing of random tracks. For instance, Home by Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros, as well as Good To Be On The Road Back Home Again by Cornershop both got played in the first five hour of the drive. Further, Snow (Hey Oh) came on a couple hours premature of our arrival on the Hay plain, and Go West by the Pet Shop Boys featured on a very eastern drive between Griffith and Young. Live's Lightning Crashes played on a sunny day. The Cure's Friday I'm In Love was the soundtrack to a Saturday morning, and The Wallflower's One Headlight came on the day after I successfully replaced a blown globe in Lower Beechmont.

Crowded House's Weather With You was at least appropriate, it played on the drive home and today in Adelaide it was sunny and warm.

While taking a holiday was supposed to be an escape from much of life's routines, I was not expecting to abstain from eating almonds for over a week. Finally this weekend I have resumed my almond and apple morning teas in the presences of some grand waterfalls in Springbrook and Lamington National Parks.

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Guardian of the bridge, and supervisor of breakfasts. After concluding that he wasn't getting any banana, weet bix and yogurt he vomited, shat, then flew off.

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At sunset I went back up the mountains a little to take photos of spectacular cows.

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Honestly I have too many sunset cows for a single entry, so contact me directly if you need more.

Today was Yamba Day, a 24 hour itinerary I'd originally drafted for my birthday but thanks to flexible holiday scheduling we decided to do it on the ascent instead. It was a fantastic day. We walked around picturesque coves as the sun rose. The sky was blue all day. After breakfast on the balcony we walked and rock hopped from Pippi Beach to Angourie. At the other end we ordered coffee and visited the Blue Pool.

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Sitting in the shade of that coffee shop, hearing the ocean, watching the ferns, and smelling the coffee was particularly serene.

After racing the tide back and a quick swim we went to the local brewery for lunch and a tasting paddle.

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A lazy afternoon followed which included drinking beer at the seaside and sunset walks, and finally delicious chicken stir fry.

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What a beautiful day, definitely deserving of a birthday.

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Last night I cooked sausages on a BBQ in subzero winds, and today I ate them at 110km an hour.

This morning we had breakfast in Blackheath's grand canyon.

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Then two Coles Express coffees later (actually, very reasonable for the price) we arrived for sunset in Port Macquarie. I tried using the "animal" and "bird" autofocus features of my new camera.

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Breakfast in South Australia (apple, oats, chia and yogurt), lunch in Victoria (pepper steak pie), dinner in NSW (schnitzel and pizza).

Everything worked as expected today. The new windscreen wipers proved their worth, the $30 phone holder held my phone for 800km, my shoulders did not fall off, the Hay Plain was boring and beautiful in the golden light, Google maps took me down a dirt road for 30 minutes to try and save fifteen seconds. The road trip playlist only got two skips between 7:30 am and 6pm.