Tilly was reluctant to wake up yesterday, somehow snuggling on my lap cuddling three of her paws. As we had a breakfast catch up scheduled for 9am she was left by herself.
We met our friends at Stanley’s Barn Restaurant at Upper Coomera. The large rustic style barn was built using 100 year old recycled timbers. Dogs are allowed in the undercover outdoor area. Goats, ponies and free ranging chickens live on the property and can sometimes be seen on the lawn area.
There is an unrestored vintage car in a corner of the barn. A mannequin is wearing a dress, fur and handbag that were worn by the restaurant owners’ grandmother in 1963 when she escorted the Queen during a visit to New Zealand.
The Barn is colocated with the Gold Coast Motor Museum which has an extensive collection of cars and motor cycles. My favourite is the 1935 Packard given to Amelia Earhart by the President of the car company after her solo flight across the Atlantic.
The eclectic collection includes a life size statue of a chauffeur. His facial expression caught my attention. The members of the pop group The Monkees made the Monkeemobile famous. The museum has a replica of the modified Pontiac GTO (Gran Turismo Omolagato).
The rain started as we drove home in our very staid Toyota Landcruiser, and continued for much of the day. Between showers I fitted a new strap to stop the Bushtracker door opening too far, refitted a seat cover after sewing up a hole, and replaced the elastic strap retaining Tilly’s kitty litter box.
Bluey walked to the park but we ran home because the rain started again. He had plenty of exercise running and wrestling indoors with Tilly.
This morning we took Bluey to the Salt Cafe at the Ferry Road Markets where we had breakfast. It was cold enough to leave him in the car while we shopped.
I took a few loads out to the caravan, and restacked some cupboards finding the missing egg cups! Heavy tinned foods are now stored in a floor level cupboard, and the critters’ dry foods are in the more accessible pantry.
Our friends arrived in their motorhome mid afternoon, and little Leo was able to run around the house and play with Bluey. Tilly was confined in the bedroom.
We took both dogs for a walk and met up with my dog walking group. Six month old Harley slipped out of her collar a couple of times. When she did that the last time she decided to run around on the sand and in and out of the river. She has not been able to run since being desexed 12 days ago, so had a lot of pent up energy.
Bluey was going crazy on his lead so it was safer to let him off to run with Harley. He got wet but fortunately doesn’t go swimming. They both rubbed themselves in the sand so I had to give Bluey a bath, washing him twice all over to get rid of most of the sticky sand. He was very compliant and appreciated Anita warming his towels in the clothes drier. After blow drying his fur I sat him on my lap and brushed out his curls. Leo kept visiting and snuggling with us, sometimes with obsessive interest in Bluey’s willy.
We had planned take away Thai for dinner, but it was closed so we settled for pizzas. The new owners of Jafa don’t make the pizzas as well as the original chef. Bluey and Leo finally crashed from tiredness. When the others had taken Leo to their motorhome, I let Tilly out. She was cranky! I had to step in to stop her from picking on Bluey. I followed her downstairs and played with her chasing a length of Velcro. She eventually settled down and had a cuddle on Anita’s lap.
Committed Travellers 