The hidden gem in the Shire of Greenough - Ecostays

A couple of weeks ago, we spent the weekend in the heart of Central Greenough (Western Australia) at "Ecostays".

A M A Z I N G !

How did we find this magical place? 

Ecostays is owned by Andrea and Fish, our friends we had met in Geraldton. They invited us to stay in one of the two accommodations facilities located on their property.  40 acres of bushland with nothing between your accommodation and beach except your private view of the sea!

Ecostays is located between Geraldton (24km) and Dongara (32km) and it's the most idyllic destination for people who appreciate peace, privacy and natural beauty.

Click here for the High Definition YouTube Version

The bedroom --360 degree view 

Fully equipped living room and kitchen 

Facilities: one bedroom with queen size bed, (REALLY great bed in fact!)  luxury sheets and towels; fully equipped kitchen; one bathroom; washing machine; air conditioner; digital TV; mini hi-fi with iPod adaptor; patios with outdoor table and chairs (overlooking the ocean) 

Magnificent sunset at your own private beach

Private ocean view from your front yard 

What can you do here? Enjoy watching the most beautiful sunset you've ever seen, from your bedroom or from the private picnic area at the beach, shared with:

NO ONE. All yours!

Alternatively, you can indulge yourself in sea kayaking, fishing, or play Frisbee golf on a 9-hole course. No need to drive anywhere - it's all at your doorstep! 

For more information about the Ecostays resort check their Facebook page. Call Andrea on 0428 038 593 or Fish on 0401 622 157 re cost and bookings. 

Andrea & Fish

New family member - Cindy

In Geraldton, EVERYONE has a dog (or two). EVERYONE.

Feeling a bit left out, last month, we met and decided to adopt Miss Cindy--a very sweet and VERY cute, eight month-old puppy who we found at Geraldton Dog Rescue -- our local dog shelter.

Cindy loves long walks/runs along the beach or just chilling out staring at the water

Cindy is a mixed-breed pup. We think Kelpie and English Pointer. She's even-tempered, gentle, friendly, (could possibly lick you to death) and happy being part of the family. She's athletic and very affectionate towards absolutely everyone as well as other dogs. On the other hand, she likes to sleep a lot (lucky Cindy) anywhere and mainly near one of us.  However, she doesn't get too close as she likes to be ready to stand up when one of us moves. It looks like she's on "the hunt" all the time.

What did we know about a dog adoption? One BIG nothing. I had thought we wanted a dog so let's have a dog and I was pretty certain that we can do all the fundamental stuff including feeding, walking and occasional playing with her. How little we'd known about all the other things and responsibilities that come with having a dog--training, bonding and giving up our Sunday morning sleep in.

Cindy is a fast learner and within a couple of weeks, she learned to sit, and stay on command (well, for a few seconds anyway...)  However, she still needs to learn to stay for an extended period of time. The big one we're still struggling with is "separation anxiety". As long as one of us is around, no probs. As soon as she's alone, panic.  We even started doing Voice-Over recording and so far, it's the only thing that can calm her down for an hour or two.

In the past, I heard a lot of sad and happy stories from our friends with dogs. I'm realising now that I've never fully understood what they were talking about. After having Cindy for a week or so, I have a much better understanding what our friends were talking about, in particular because we  almost lost her after leaving her on her own for the first time.

What happened? One day, we left her outside for a couple of hours in our backyard. This area is  fenced with a 2-meter high metal fence. However, Cindy decided to jump over the fence and find us in the big world. Luckily, she's didn't get a chance to get lost as we found her shortly afterwards - anxious and crying. This event taught us a lesson as we realised that her Kelpie's heritage enables her to jump 2 - 3 meters high!

I somehow think that there is still much more that we need to learn about our new family member and also how to train her properly so, she won't repeat this event again .. fingers crossed.

Digging deep down .. and nothing there 

What do you want Kat with that iPhone? 

Rob has now two girls to look after

I'm certain that there will be more news that we'd like to share with you until then we'll keep you up dated with some pics on Facebook.

Who could resist this face?

First camping weekend in WA

CAMPING! 

Ahhhh! FINALLY. Last weekend we went on our first camping trip since our arrival in WA. 

Only a bit more than an hour's drive north of here there's a little sign by the side of the highway to Kalbarri just before a National Park pointing to a dirt road that says "Wagoe Chalets" beside a bit of odd scupture with a quad bike and a reindeer.  Did a bit of Googling and discovered it's a little spot used mostly by fisherman on holidays from Perth. 

http://www.wagoe.com.au/

This is so different than what we're used to seeing around NSW. If you haven't been on the West coast of Australia before, you might want to know that the Kalbarri NP is one of the most spectacular parts of the Western Australia. 

On the way, you pass the beautiful Hutt Lagoon "Pink Lake"
  (sorry, but we didn't actually take this picture, but found it on someone else's blog! (jagjourney)

 Kalbarri NP - Z-Bend lookout

In particular, we love the Murchison River gorges that is located in the NP. These gorges have been developed over millions years to its current dramatic look - colorful landscape that is formed from layers of sandstone cliffs. A good thing is that you can walk around and get down to one of the Murchinson River bank. However, you need to leave very early in the morning as it might not be a good idea to stay in the gorge in the middle of the day as you can  suffer from heat stroke any other times .. as it happened to me previously. Further, you might encounter any number of unwelcome inhabitants crossing your path...

Murchison River gorge

As this was our first camping trip, we decided to take it easy, and spend all weekend chilling out. Believe it or not, Rob didn't even take his kiting/surfing gear! But, he did have two fishing rods with him .. and he caught a fish. 

We stayed in the Wagoe Chalets (we'd call them shacks) and camping area. This place is located on the top of the hill and it's quite exposed to the wind .. which were privileged to experience on Saturday night. Luckily, the owned had erected a number of windbreaks to set up tents behind to keep your tent from getting blown off the hill. YES, it's really windy in WA most of the time in summer!

 Chalet or shack ...?

 Wheat field ready for harvesting

One of 200 bird species 

On Sunday morning, we drove down to Wagoe beach.Even more beautiful than any other beach I've seen so far in Australia. It actually felt like we were in a paradise! White sand, turquoise water, empty beaches! Like Hyams beach near Jervis Bay but many times larger! WOW. As per the size - think of the Stockton beach (near Port Stephens, NSW)  and multiply that space (40km) by two!

Rob fishing from Red Bluff - Kalbarri

 At Wagoe Beach. This is an 11kg Mulloway with two
fisherman from Perth who came up for the weekend

"Chalets"

Quad bikes

Lucky Bay, about a 15km drive down the beach from the Chalets

Lucky me relaxing at Lucky Bay

Our trusty Prado. Goes anywhere and takes us to lots of magical places!

On the way back, we drove via the Chapman Valley region that offers much more scenic landscape than if we're driving via NW Coastal Highway. This area has a few olive farms,  a winery, the Lavender Valley farm, and covered in wildflowers. 

View from the Lavender Valley farm

All in all, GREAT weekend. Still much to be explored in the region so many more trips will be required. And all so close to home! 

Summer is here!

For the past few weeks, every week we keep thinking "Summer is here!" Then it gets cold and rains again! Well, this time maybe it's finally arrived!

We're SO looking forward to camping, fishing and kiting opportunities.

Since I came back from Sydney (early September), we've had a really busy time. Rob has been tirelessly looking for work, exploding flies with his new toy, gardening, and some making some very successful fishing expeditions (down at the end of our street). You wouldn't believe what we have now in our backyard - Tons of cherry tomatoes, white potatoes, three colour carrots, corn, beetroot, delicious rocket, coriander, garlic chives to name a few. Last week, we had so many cheery tomatoes that we decide to make tomato chutney, and it's super-yummy so, if you come you might get to try it. Looking at our garden now, we need to make another chutney. Any great tips would be appreciated.

Cherry tomatoes, white potatoes and beetroot

Rob loves Gero, and in particularly, he love fishing from our front yard. He's caught jewfish, tailor and mulloway - we don't need to go to a fish market anymore and pay ridiculous prices for fish.

Two mulloway

 Fishing could be a great fun for a photographer as well 

 Our new friend Toby

And this is me - a dedicated support crew 

Lucky for Rob that he can organise his busy schedule according to the wind conditions as now is the time to fly his new kite .. well, it was until last weekend. Now, we're heading to the really windy season and he needs a 7m kite ideally (Chris Plaat, are you reading this?) as his big one (9m) is hard to control in the local wind conditions. If you know about any 2nd hand kite (7m max) let Rob know. Sorry guys, no pics from me as I'd probably get blown away with my camera  in these windy conditions ... not even talking about the sand getting into my camera body - not a desirable thing.

I'm good and keeping busy (as usual) teaching now five Pilates classes every week and have two more coming up in next month or so. One of these classes is Pilates for kids - I can't wait to get stuck into that one as I can imagine it'll be a challenging exercise and also very rewarding if it goes well. Bring it on!

Last week, I submitted a business proposal (re marketing consultancy) and if it goes ahead I'll have a very "full on" year ahead. However, I still feel very privileged to have some spare time over last four months or so that allowed me to do some further thinking about my future career/things I want to do. As a result, I sent live my 2nd website www.flashmarketing.net. Feel free to share it with your friends or people/businesses that could benefit form this kind of service.  (Happy to work on Sydney/other accounts remotely too!) Thanks.

Over the weekend, we've finished setting up my photography studio where I can now take portraits, family photos or product based photography. What have I learned so far: there are a few advantages to studio flash light - modelling lamp, consistency, power and control. The more I'm learning about photography, the more I'm discovering how much there is to learn. One thing I know for sure is that it's an exciting journey that is full of discovery.

So far, I've had no chance to practice as I was nominated to be a model, however, I'm looking forward to taking some portraits soon. Anybody interested to be my model? Feel free to put up your hand - it won't cost you anything other than your time (one to two hours).

Kat

Overall, we're having a good time and I feel it's been also very productive two months since Rob's departure from CGG.  What next? We'll let you know in our next blog ....

Mingenew and wildflowers

Last weekend, we hit the road again and drove around 150km southeast to the small town of Mingenew for the largest Agricultural Expo in the Mid West region.

Rob was exploring possible new job opportunities with exhibitors including local farmers. So, we met some interesting people from Irwin Valley Milling that are involved in lupins production (low GI, high in protein and gluten free grain), Perth based farmers producing carob beans that are quite often substituted for chocolate. We also met some business people that are introducing GPS based farm mapping software that enables farmers to do very efficient automated planting, fertilising and harvesting these days with self-guided tractors and things - my granddad would probably love this high tech stuff for "efficient" farming.

Here's one of the "non-GPS" tractors from a few years ago on display...

Gotta love those wooden wheel spokes! Beautiful works of art!

On the way back to Geraldton, we decided to stop in the Depot Hill Reserve located northwest of Mingenew and finally saw what everybody has been raving about - wildflowers of many varieties set among the vast landscape. I've no clue what we saw and was told that two of my pics included South African weeds - interesting and a bit unusual to see such variety of colours wild in nature.

This week, Rob is fully engaged with job hunting and hopefully, he'll find more suitable job/project that would enable him to apply himself. I'm getting busy with my Pilates teaching, marketing and also seeking new business opportunities within the social media arena.

In the meantime, we'd love to hear from you if you're considering to make a trip to the Wild West in the near future. Don't forget, we're now moving into the "windy" season and there is plenty to do if you don't like to be out when it's blowing.

Seven months in Gero!

It's hard to believe but we've been living in Geraldton already seven months.

Since Rob's departure from his last job, he has had finally a chance to catch up on his lost sleep over last six months or so, and also do more enjoyable things such as fishing, chilling out, a bit of surfing, and getting back to his backyard - now also growing potatoes, more corn, etc. 

 Happy Rob

THREE fish

I'm now teaching three Pilates per week, and getting more and more people interested in my group and also private classes so, my marketing efforts are finally working. A few weeks ago, I started doing Iyengar Yoga that puts emphasis on details, precision and alignment in every posture and must admit that this practice nicely compliments my Pilates teaching. 

Happy Kat

Last week, I've been also working on one of the upcoming event "Dare to Dream 2050 - Future of the Mid West". Attached for you is our logo that we created for the event. More information re this project will come later on. 

Next week, I'm off to Sydney for a Pilates Conference 2013 and also to renew my passport - yep, it needs to be done in a person these days including pick up--in SYDNEY. Something to keep in mind for all of you who are still holding your European passport. On the other hand, I'm really looking forward to seeing some of you while I'm in the Big Smoke again. 

 Geraldton Port during the sunset

Stormy clouds in Drummonds