Little update on Lightly Toasted lovely people, I’ve had problems with my web hosting for a little while now. Long story short I’ve finally moved through two abysmal web hosting companies and found one that I like. Thanks Doug for your help. Life will get normal again… or so I hope.
Below is the start of a slide show of a few photos from our O’Reilly’s Mountain Villa retreat in the lap of nature. If the link doesn’t work in email or RSS please visit this link. Hope you had a fantastic weekend.
It was about six in the evening when we walked back in the Boathouse Restaurant… the place was immaculately set and looked very nice. In the short time between the wedding and the reception, you’d remember me mentioning the sun being out followed by the promising rainbow — but by this time it was raining again. It started off with a light drizzle and kept alternating between heavy and light pours. We were inside chatting, congratulating, jubilating and having a good time… it was fun to meet so many of Ruth’s childhood friends and their partners some of whom I had met earlier in Sydney. Loretta & David, Katie & Gavin, Nick, Laila, Rebecca, John, Jake… the list continues. We got to meet a whole new circle of her childhood friends and Andrews family and some of his friends too.
It was three in the afternoon. We were at the Boat House in Noosaville mingling with friends, family and loved ones to share in Ruth and Andrew special day… such a privilege indeed. There was a vague hint of a rainbow in the sky. Soon we heard lots of smiles, squeals of joy and I could tell Ruth was about… that long awaited beautiful moment was upon us. The bride had arrived — she looked really beautiful and busting with joy from within… what a precious and memorable moment it was. The celebrant started in earnest.
Saturday was Ruth and Andrew’s big day. The ceremony was to be held at Maison La Plaga Grove in the backdrop of the Pacific ocean skirting the hills in the horizon. Noosa is truly gorgeous, you’d already know this if you’ve been up there… It poured on and off all day. We had wandered down for a walk earlier in the day to the Noosa Heads when there was a short respite from rain. The sky had cleared out as you’d notice in the photo below but in just about fifteen minutes from taking this photo we were running for shelter. It pelted down so heavy we gave the leisurely walk down Hasting street a miss and ran back to our car! Good thinking Ruth and Andrew for having an alternative arrangement in mind!
Our flight was delayed leaving Sydney for Brisbane and another flying up to Brisbane half hour earlier, cancelled. Commotion all around. We were onboard after some more delay and then took more time before we taxied onto the runaway and then finally took off piercing through the thick grey clouds. I could spot Brighton Le Sands between the patches of thick rain clouds but in moments we pierced through a few layers of thick dense fluffy cumulous clouds. Qantas served a light lunch which was nice and soon in about an hours time we were descending over Coolangatta. Landing into Brisbane was exactly like landing at Heathrow or maybe the air traffic was just bad at that particular time. We circled over Moreton Bay at least twice if not more. Luckily the car hire was snazzy and so was getting our bags off the carousel and we were northward bound to beautiful gorgeous Sun-shiny Noosa except that it was going to rain the next three days in a row. We had an inkling so it didn’t really bother us. It looked really lush and green. And yes it was raining, sometimes a bit heavier than normal. We stopped at a café in Coolum for a quick bite and reminissed Kath and Kims holiday at the Coolum Hyatt! And then we’re off again driving along the costline heading up to Noosa. It was raining all the way but was still pretty. David had recently ordered the Now 69 from Amazon. It was perfect we raved up the volume and sang along to “The Journey Continues” by Mark Brown featuring Sarah Cracknell & Elena Kats-Chernin. Watch the video of the song here, its on Disc 2, track number 14! Addictive! Love it, love it, love it! It was pretty much one of our theme songs for this short holiday and can I just say poo on iTunes (DS yes you were right) for not letting me buy songs from other iTunes music stores e.g. iTunes UK!
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Indeed, we’re off to Noosa for Ruth and Andew’s wedding and a short holiday! Life is too short to absorb youself in work all the time. Past week has been very busy on many accounts and to make matters worse I fell sick early on this week. It started off with a throat irritation like they always do and then landed up with a secondary infection in my throat. All drugged up, and hallucinating but should be OK soon. Touch wood.
An aerial view of Noosa head and a collage of 3 pictures of Noosa under the wide aerial pic.
We’ve come back from a lovely visit to the far north tropical Queensland. There is so much to write and so many photos to share. I don’t want to spoil it all by giving you bits and pieces, so wait until my next post on Cairns and hopefully you will see a bit of what I saw captured with my lens… until then, here is a little teaser.
Not long to go now before we head off to Cairns. We are all very excited about our upcoming trip. We did have the luxury of visiting Sunshine Coast, Queensland earlier this year in February even though it was a short holiday. Holidays are never long enough are they? It was a lovely few days of soaking up all the decadence we could at the lovely sun drenched beaches of Noosa and picturesque hinterlands of Maleny and Glass House Mountains. Queensland is beautiful. Fascinating! Stunning! No wonder they say “its beautiful one day and perfect the next“.
New South Wales is lovely but Queensland is just stunning. It really is… and now you know why I just cant wait to get on that plane and be in that beautiful paradise state of Queensland yet again. And in the company of loved ones its heaven on earth.
Photo Caption: Henry Ross lookout, Cairns
Photo Credit: alandot | Profile