Geocaching - Hiding our first treasures

We have been geocaching for about six months and really enjoy the challenge of working out the cryptic puzzles and finding ourselves in new and interesting places.  This week, we have started to hide our own geocaches and have released two out there.  We have been working on them for  a couple of weeks, and researched the locations around the caches. It was fun and turned out to be very interesting. 

We have one called Woodvale Railway Hotel and  this cache is hidden across the road from the site of the Woodvale Railway Station Hotel - every town has a Railway Hotel, but this one was special. It was established during the gold rush, and the railway line was extended to Woodvale in 1882. It was originally called the Baden Baden Hotel (based on the German bathing / spa town) and the name was anglicised before World War 1.   In the gay 1920s, the world had seen the end of the war and the local soldiers were home from London and Paris. A Saturday night dance at the school hall was tame indeed, and many men travelled to the Railway Hotel on a Saturday night where nude table top dancing was the fashion. One local scandal involved a police raid and a well-known respectable Bendigo patriarch bolting naked from the Hotel.

Another is hidden near the site of the old  Woodvale Railway Station. The railway line was extended to Woodvale in 1882 and it provided a new opportunity to receive goods from Melbourne in only a few hours, rather than several days. Originally, this area was called Sydney Flat Railway station and was adjacent to the crossing which is a little south of here, opposite the Railway Station Hotel. In 1912, the Railway Station was moved north and is now just near Nuggety Creek. A large mound of dirt, bordered with Sugar Gums marks the site of the old platform. A violent windstorm blew the station down and it was rebuilt, before being closed and removed in 1931.

It's been fun and we have learned so much about the history of the town we have lived in for the past 15 years.

Christmas 2009

We had a quiet Christmas this year.  It was my first Christmas since my mum died and I didn't feel much like celebrating. We had a lot of offers for Christmas lunch, however we decided to stay at home for lunch and have a cold seafood and salad lunch.

It was great. We made phone calls in the morning and caught up with various family members across the country and have a leisurely lunch that needed little preparation.  Helen was happy with her fish smoker, and Jim got a fantastic multi-purpose torch/ radio/light.

For Boxing Day we travelled to Point Lonsdale to catch up with Jim's family. We took the dogs and Rocky (the new puppy) was well behaved and slept most of the way. We had a great day and it was nice to catch up with the latest news.

Here is  a family  photo of us all on Boxing Day, and our dogs - Reggie and Rocky.  Rocky was exhausted by all of the excitement!