Home Again - Aldinga Beach

We have been home in Aldinga Beach for two weeks, and finally a blog.   First of all it was jet leg, always worse when travelling east, although not as severe as previous trips this way.  The sunshine on the first few days helped considerably.

Then it was procrastinating about getting the information ready, in order to put in our first Australian tax return, for the period July 2018 to June 2019.   I spent a week procrastinating where I could not do anything else as I needed to apply myself to this task but kept putting if off.     Then I spent three full days putting together everything that I thought the accountant would need, in fact pages of pages of information.   The printer worked overtime.   

 At the moment I am not recognised by the Australian Taxation Office as a resident until I put in my first tax return.    Then they will sign a British Double Taxation form which I have had for a year, and the tax on the British pensions will be paid in Australia.   And I will get any extra tax paid, refunded to me.   So I have been told.   

Walter has just filled in his final British tax return on the flats we have here.   March to June, 2018.   Numerous forms, and plenty of reading material.    We should get a refund there too.   We hope.

Our brains are slightly tired at the moment.

But most importantly we will finally be Australian residents again!. 

The first few days we were back we had blue skies and sunshine, with the temperature reaching 21 degrees on one of the days.   We were very happy.  But the sunshine did not last, as we are now experiencing typical July weather: clouds, rain and cold temperatures.   Not as cold as the UK though.  And Adelaide always needs this winter rain.

Port Willunga beach, late in the afternoon.   Such a beautiful beach.   Good to be home.

Darren had cut our hedges, and they looked magnificent in the sunshine.   Luckily the photograph did not show up all the weeds amongst the stones.   The removal of the weeds is high on my list of jobs, when we get some good weather.   

The lemon tree next door is covered in ripe lemons 

The swimming pool cover looked good in the sunlight, however under the blue cover the water was a little green.   A few doses of chlorine fixed the algae.   Amazingly the filter had come on every day for 1 1/2 hours, for the past two months.

The birds had had a lovely time sitting on the rafters and pooing on our furniture.   No one in the house to disturb their peace and quiet.   I had a massive clean up when I got back, and then put our new plastic tablecloth on the table. I had purchased it in the La Londe market. A really solid heavy plastic cloth so hope it lasts. 

When I lifted the cushions I found a couple of tiny redback spiders happily nesting there.   Little spiders become big spiders and I did not fancy being bitten on the bottom by one of them.   They are no longer there, but I must check the chairs more often.

My bike with its new panniers,

and its new Miffy (Nijntje) bell.  The late Dick Bruna, the writer, lived in Utrecht, and there is a Miffy museum there.

I was very keen to get out on the bike and join the U3A cycling group.   But I did not check the bike first, and spent the first outing struggling to ride the thing, even though I had been cycling in the Netherlands for the previous four weeks.   Every turn of the pedals was a major effort. 

Now one would think it would be a good idea to check the wheels, but I did not do so.   In the afternoon I took the bicycle to a repair shop and nearly threw it at the repair person.   Apparently the front and back brakes were rubbing on the wheels.   No wonder the bike was difficult to ride!  $40 later, the bike had been serviced and the brakes and gears adjusted.   Amazingly the bike is now wonderful to ride, so smooth, and fast.   I can keep up with the rest of the group, at long last.

There must have been the right atmospheric conditions at Port Willunga Beach, because there were about ten photographers on the beach when I took Piper for a walk.    So I took a photograph too, with my telephone.   It certainly was a wonderful sunset.

Piper chasing after the ball, her favourite pastime, and one which can be indulged in every time we come to some green grass.    Snakes are hibernating and kangaroos are happily eating plentiful grass in the scrub. 

Piper and her new harness, extremely expensive, but so comfortable.  I think she was more interested in the attractive smells in the bush, then posing for a photograph.

And I have finally finished this blog, five days after I started it!   The last two days have been glorious and I have been out digging in the garden, and buying lots of new shrubs and plants.   Lots of empty spaces to fill up.

A short stopover in Dubai

Here we are, finally in Dubai.  And very happy too.   A few nights in a luxury hotel was just what we needed to break up the long flight from Amsterdam to Adelaide.  We are staying at the Sheraton Hotel, which is on the banks of Dubai Creek, and we have a fantastic view of the water and the main city behind it.  

Dubai Creek appears to be a stretch of water that cuts through a piece of land and goes out to sea again.   It was once the old port, and yesterday we saw plenty of old transport boats being loaded up with goods, so is still used by local boats and the large luxury boats that are moored here.   

There are negatives to this wonderful stay over, of course.   And surprisingly it is not the expense, as the cost of staying here is similar to staying in Singapore.   The rate of exchange we are getting for our £ is 4.5 AED (Arab Emirate Dirham). 

We are here at the wrong time of the year as it is extremely hot, with temperatures in the high 30s to mid 40s.    We knew this of course.    

But we did not realise that the quality of air would be so poor.   Yes Dubai has terrible air pollution, made worse probably by the high temperatures.   When I looked at the weather app it said the temperature was 37 degrees, but felt like 47 degrees (probably due to all the hard surfaces around) and the air quality was very poor.   It advised people not to exercise outside and those with respiratory problems to stay inside.

Travelling around Dubai is a problem, well at least it is from our hotel.   It is too hot to walk anywhere, and it would appear walking is not something one does in Dubai at any time of the year.  The taxi drivers get uptight if you only want to travel a short distance.   This happened yesterday when we took taxis to the Souks (local markets) and back again.   The Souks were about half an hours walk away.   Both taxi drivers complained quite aggressively, and the second one was not happy with the tip we gave him.   And we were not mean with our tip either.

The traffic problems in central Dubai are horrendous, and no doubt contributes to the air pollution.  The Emiratis, and some of the Expats, love their large vehicles and insist on driving everywhere in them.   Cars and petrol are naturally very cheap in this part of the world.   We spent a fair bit of time yesterday in traffic queues.  

Now that I have written about the negative aspects of being in Dubai, I will focus on the positive side.

It is certainly a lovely stopover, and it was easy to get to our hotel by taxi at 2 a.m.   The plane was two hours late getting to Dubai, due to the high number of travellers and planes leaving Schiphol.   School holidays for a third of the Netherlands started the weekend we were leaving the country.  That was not good planning.

Another positive aspect to being in Dubai in the middle of summer, is the lower number of tourists here.   There were only five people collecting bags from the carousel, and we were on a very full A380 plane.   The hotel is relatively empty, and this makes for a blissful stayover.   As long as one stays in the hotel.   The staff, mostly Indian, Chinese and Indonesian workers,  in the hotel are very friendly and helpful.

The view of the inside of the hotel, which is very airy and spacious.

The night view from our bedroom window. 

We have one of those new fancy rooms, which has a large window between the bedroom and the bathroom.   Luckily it also has shutters too. I warned Walter as he was putting his toilet bag away so he was happy to pose for a photograph.

A view of our room, second from the right, on the lowest level. 

 The swimming pool which I am going to use this afternoon.   Looking forward to that.   Walter is going to spend some time in the sauna and steam room.   He is looking forward to that.

Our daytime view of the river, looking towards the city centre.   Note the buildings surrounded by haze.

One of the local ports is only a short distance from the hotel.   It is possible to see the type of local boats by zooming in on the photograph.  Fascinating boats.

The banking building next to the hotel is Emirates NBD.  I think you worked there, Aaron, nearly twenty years ago, and stayed at the Sheraton too.  Quite a coincidence.

Our first outing yesterday was to the Souks, and there was quite a cluster: markets selling touristy stuff, plus markets for household goods and spices, and of course the gold market.

The passage ways had insulated roofs, fans and in some cases were air conditioned, which made visiting the markets very pleasant.   The lack of tourists helped too.   The stall holders in the main touristy goods part were a bit of a pain, as they were constantly trying to get us to buy their goods, which meant that I could not really have a good look at items. 

Lots of goods for sale.   Walter bought a cashmere scarf for himself, and who knows whether he got a good bargain or not. Probably not, but it will keep him warm when we return to Adelaide.   The stall owner told him it was made of camel wool! 

A view, via a narrow side street, of a mosque and a corner shop.   It was certainly a fascinating area.

I loved the display of spices, and would have loved to buy some, but I doubt if I could take them back into Australia.   However, if we still lived in the UK I most certainly would have taken some back.   But then we were able to buy the same spices from a stall in the south of France.

The gold market.   We sat on a bench here and watched people walk past us.   It was fascinating.

Everything glittered!

In the afternoon we caught the free bus, provided by the hotel, to Dubai Mall.

I tried to take as many photographs as I could, but not always so easy from a moving vehicle.

So many architectural building designs.   It was amazing.   And many, many more buildings being built.   A real growth city.

Dubai Mall, the largest shopping centre I have ever visited, and indeed, I believe it to be the largest shopping centre in the world, by total area, but not by shopping space, as some of the area is taken up with an aquarium, skating rink, cinemas and restaurants.   Dubai is currently building an even bigger shopping shopping centre, close to Dubai Creek.

The inside of the Mall, as you enter it, but of course it goes on forever.   We managed to look at most of the lower ground floor, and the second floor.   We ate biryani for lunch in the food court on the lower floor.   Delicious and reasonably priced too.

The aquarium was huge, and some of it was visible from the Mall.   Enough to entice people to buy tickets and go inside.  An amazing sight.

We went outside onto the square, an amazingly large space, with a huge expanse of water.  Sadly the fountain was not working. 

I managed to get some good photographs of the surrounding buildings.

The Burj Khalifa, 828 metres high, the tallest building in the world.   Walter would have loved to go up, but was not prepared to pay the equivalent of about £100 in order to do so.   Too high for me.   I had to put my camera close to the ground in order to take the photograph.  It took a few attempts to get the tower straight!  Walter just found a site where he could have got a ticket for Australia $113 for two people.   However still not for me!   It certainly pays to book in advance though.

A view back towards part of the shopping centre.

The Olympic sized skating rink.   I think the surface of the rink is made of a composite materials rather than ice.

Mini golf with a difference.

There were two of these large waterfalls in the shopping centre.

Star Wars returns to Dubai Mall.

After another lunch of biryani, much more expensive in the hotel than the lunch yesterday, and spicy, I am now ready for a sleep, then a swim in the pool.   Walter ordered chicken curry, which was also delicious.

After lunch we went into the hotel shop, and I bought a pashmina shawl, plus two bowls.  All items i seen in the Souk.   We bargained a price but who knows whether it was a reasonable price or not.   The problems of being a tourist! 

Tonight we travel back to the airport in time to catch our 2 am flight!

Looking forward to seeing everyone back in Adelaide.   Hope Piper remembers us.

The last few photos of our trip to the Netherlands.

As I write this blog, I am sitting in the hotel in Dubai, where it is very hot and dry outside.   The greenness of the Netherlands seems like a world away.

But back to a life that was so real a few days ago.

On one of the trips into Utrecht we watched this young lady walking on a rope across a canal.   Two musicians helped her along by accompanying her by playing some music.   They stood safely on the edge of the canal.   We left before she fell into the water.   Perhaps she was so good she did not fall.   We were not going to wait around to find out.

Lunch at a delightful little cafe in this lane.

We had a lovely time with Mia, Raphy and Abi. 

Raphy was fascinated by the swing, which was meant to be able to charge a telephone.  Only the swing mechanism did not work.   Well the idea was a great one, anyway.

Abi, Raphy and Mia and I went on a picnic, which was a lot of fun.   Except that we chose a spot where there had been a teenage party the evening before.   Lots of plastic and broken bottles around.

Raphy was impressed with the skate park.

A climbing competition on the statues.

Raphy riding his scooter very fast down this hill.   He loves to do tricks on his scooter, and is very agile I might add.

Our favourite cafe, Barista, on the edge of the Rond.    They gave us a wifi password, so we returned the favour by having coffee there most mornings.   Delicious coffee.

Abi goes to ice skating lessons every Friday evening, which she loves.    She is a very graceful skater, I must say, and glides around very easily.   I managed to watch about half of her lesson, before heading outside into the sunshine.

We were fascinated by the preparation of the land opposite the campsite.    There must have been about six tractors, plus trailers with what appeared to be rolls of turf, plus trailers full of soil or manure.   They spent days preparing the soil for the crop.    We found out later they were putting in sedum matting, which when the plants grow, will be lifted and placed on roofs of houses.    This form of roof insulation is becoming very popular in the Netherlands and hopefully, in the future, it will be supported by local governments. 

Special tables, which hold paper containers filled with frites.   It saves getting mayonnaise and ketchup on one's clothes.

This hot air balloon was so low over the house we could see the people in the basket.   Naturally we waved to them, and they waved back.   A beautiful clear and warm evening.

Walter and I visited the bike shop in order to buy new bells for our Australian bicycles.   I bought a Miffy design bell and Walter bought a huge green one with Amsterdam crosses on it.

Yesterday we cleaned up our old caravan and handed the keys back to Camping de Vliert.   We also said a very sad goodbye to Aaron, Kylie, Mia, Abi and Raphy.   It has been a lovely four weeks staying in our old caravan, and riding our bikes to and from the camping ground.   We have caught up with most people we know in Houten too, and that was great.  And it has been fantastic being part of our Dutch family again, which is one of the downfalls of living so far away.   It used to be so easy to pop over to see them before.    Now it will be another year.   Thank goodness for Skype, Facebook and WhatsApp.