Mindil Beach market

A lie in was called for today - Tish finished her first full week at work having worked the last six days on the trot. So no-one got up until about 8am which was grand. Hamish wanted to carry on learning to ride without his stabilisers so after breakfast as we had no other plans that is what we did. I moved one of the chairs under some shade, took the bins out with me and sat and watched. Both of us had a good day - Hamish is gaining in confidence and I don't think it will be long before he is away and needs a bigger bike; and I saw 16 species of bird whilst relaxing in the garden including White-bellied Sea Eagle and Grey Goshawk (house list now 24 species not too bad).

In late afternoon we decided to go out to the Mindil Beach Market. This is held every Thursday and Sunday during the dry - from May until end August. To say the smells were superb and the setting great would be an understatement. Unfortunately Xanthe seems to have caught a 24 hour bug and had not got more than 20 yards from the car before she threw up everywhere!
She did feel better after that so aside from a couple of major paddies from Cameron (requiring a 20 minutes time out with Daddy in the car) we had a great time. Although Daddy missed supper during the time out (Cameron had already eaten) so I am writing this prior to getting myself a sandwich - which will be nice but a bit of a let down after all the foods on offer!

The highlight though was buying Jo's Birthday present...

This is Nicky a 14 year old local artist painting a crocodile.