Heavy rain accompanied by a strong wind awoke us at five minutes past five. Tiki arose to shut the bedroom window while I did likewise to use the toilet. The window, however, blew open even wider at the very moment she freed it from its fastening and by the time she had retrieved it and replaced the flyscreen which had fallen off, she was drenched.
It was five past seven before we awoke for a second time, as the rain continued to teem. We entered the lounge room for ten minutes to farewell Susan and Roger, both of whom were about to leave for their respective places of employment for half a day of work. They’ll probably call in to visit us during the course of their two weeks’ holiday in March.
During breakfast and the writing of my diary at the kitchen table we, again, listened to Peter Evans on A.B.C. radio. I shaved, showered and washed my hair by nine o’clock, as Tiki packed our belongings. We departed from the unit by a quarter past the hour just as it was about to rain, again.
Under my navigation, Tiki drove along Toorak and St. Kilda roads and over the Prince’s Bridge. We turned left immediately at Flinders Street and just as immediately to the right, into Elizabeth Street. It was a relief to us to find the centre of the city to be almost deserted.
Veering to the left, we entered Flemington and thence Smithfield roads. The latter took us past Flemington Racecourse with ‘Chicquita Lodge’ in the foreground. In all honesty, we found the directional signs to be rather indecisive.
Farms supporting sheep and wheat can be found only fifteen to twenty miles from the heart of Melbourne. The drive to the city of Geelong is a flat one, with the You Yangs being the only hills in sight. An hour of sunshine was terminated when it once more began to teem as we entered our destination.
An electronic clock, which doubles as a thermometer and is perched atop what appeared to be silos, indicated that it was half past eleven and that the temperature was just thirteen degrees. The rain ceased and the sunshine reappeared as we parked within a block or two of Moorabool Street before walking along Malop Street, in the direction of Melbourne, to the small roundabout which possesses a correspondingly tiny statue in its centre. Crossing the street, we entered Johnstone Park which is located in front of the Art Gallery. The rotunda there is dedicated to Howard Hitchcock, who was the Mayor of Geelong in 1919.
It literally began to pour, yet again, as we were walking down to Corio Bay. Consequently, we dashed back up Moorabool Street and across Mallop Street and into the corner takeaway bar where we each purchased a cup of tea at a cost of forty cents. Upon our return to the ‘Galant’, the sun was, again, shining.
I drove down to the bay and parked opposite the new — it wasn’t there six years ago — seafood restaurant, Fisherman’s Pier. We walked along to the ‘Hi-Lite’ amusement park before continuing on to Eastern Beach, in the face of a biting wind.
Taking the ‘Galant’ along the Tourist Drive, we entered the outer suburb of Newcomb where I purchased petrol to the value of five dollars at a Shell service station. The young attendant thought we were from South Australia. Returning to the city’s centre, I drove down Moorabool Street passing the ‘Palais’, which is now painted brown, and the youth hostel situated at number one Lonsdale Street and diagonally opposite Kardinia Park, the home ground of the Geelong “Cats” Australian Rules team.
Geelong’s northern outskirts were visited before I returned us to the central business district, yet again, where I pointed out the Travelodge and the circular “dome” upon its roof. The building had been nearing its completion in January of 1972. I passed St. Mary’s Church prior to our departure from the city that is second only to Melbourne within the state of Victoria.
Shortly after we had passed through the town of Elaine, we came upon the sight of a caravan blocking the road. Towed by a Holden panel van, the caravan had jackknifed and overturned in the strong winds. The police were in attendance and it wasn’t long before we were, again, on our way. Quite a few of the farms that border this Midland Highway between Geelong and Ballarat possess old boundary fences constructed of gatherable stones.
Before we began our search for accommodation, I drove out from Ballarat to the village of Napoleons to cast my eyes upon the now apparently deserted youth hostel. As a hitchhiker, I’d found it to be a difficult hostel to reach because vehicles travelling out there from Ballarat were few and far between.
Backtracking, we re-entered Ballarat through Sebastopol prior to entering the broad, picturesque Sturt Street via Skipton and Armstrong streets. Having parked at an angle in Sturt Street, we walked down to Bridge Street and up to Main Street, which leads to Sovereign Hill. There we entered a hotel to shelter from the wind, rain and perishing cold while we took time to ponder how the season could possibly be that of summer.
After convincing ourselves that we’d thawed out a little, we returned to Sturt Street where we walked backwards and forwards before, at two o’clock, finally selecting a cafe near Bridge Street at which to order a belated lunch. Tiki ordered a chicken Maryland while I opted for a T-bone steak. A cup each of espresso coffee followed along with the bill for six dollars and seventy cents.
Braving the cold, we crossed the main street and bought some apricots and bananas. At the Tourist Centre on Armstrong Street North, a vocal redhead treated us, along with a family that was bound for Creswick tomorrow, like children. Nonetheless, she did supply us with some pamphlets and sold Tiki a map of Ballarat, which has a population of sixty-eight thousand five hundred, at a cost of twenty cents. The woman then presented us with a questionnaire to answer, by the use of ticks, on some facts about our visit to, and stay in, central Victoria. Tiki became irked by this, as she seemed oblivious to the fact that we still had accommodation to find. As stated, her demeanour had already started to grate before this for example: “Close the door and come over here, so I won’t have to say this twice!”. As a result, Tiki responded by writing “COLD” in that space set aside for comments at the bottom of the page.
Soon afterwards it was my turn to have my feathers ruffled when, during our search for accommodation, Tiki decided to read the local paper, ‘The Chronicle’ instead of navigate. Therefore, after a visit to the Lake Wendouree Caravan Park, in an unsuccessful attempt to rent an on-site van, we changed seats and she drove. At The Arch Motel, the last building on the left-hand side of the Western Highway, we paid twenty-two dollars for a night’s accommodation. As breakfast was included in our tariff, Tiki filled in our menu for that in front of the somewhat distant young woman and at four o’clock, we walked across to the room, which is equipped with a ‘Baird’ colour television.
After I had delivered our luggage to the room, I drove Tiki around Ballarat. In Eureka Street we passed the historic Montrose Cottage and the Eureka Military Museum before proceeding on to the Eureka Stockade Memorial, where I alighted, in spite of the freezing cold, to walk to the Eureka Diorama. Others had gathered and someone had already inserted ten cents into the slot in its outer wall to activate the wonky tape which delivered an account of the historical event.
I backtracked to Queen Street where we passed the Old Curiosity Shop prior to entering Victoria Street. We visited the observatory beyond Sovereign Hill after which Tiki drove as I navigated us along dirt roads and through a forest of pine to Mount Clear Road which led us to projects that involve the construction of new housing estates. We located Victoria Park, having passed the Bray Raceway where a trotter was observed to be fractious in what was by now torrential rain.
Upon our return to the motel I noticed that the car’s rear tail-light wasn’t functioning as Tiki reversed the vehicle almost to the door of room seven. I turned on the radio at five o’clock and learned that the temperature was just six degrees Celsius. This really hadn’t come as any great surprise as our room’s interior was bitterly cold. There was some sunshine, as we sat and observed the rural scene and the passing traffic on the highway. Nonetheless, this sunshine was interspersed with squally periods of rain and even a hailstorm!
At half past five, Tiki watched a programme of the series, “Gentle Ben”, from the late Sixties. ‘Ben’ is a huge bear. Lorne Greene’s “Last Of The Wild” followed at six and is about the beaver. The ‘News’ on Channel Six, at half past the hour, is on relay from Channel Seven in Melbourne. The “A.B.C. National News”, at seven o’clock, informed us that Sydney experienced a maximum temperature of thirty-five degrees today with bushfires being fought at Menai in the city’s south-west. Melbourne only recorded a maximum of sixteen which is the average reading for Sydney in the middle of winter. A maximum of seventeen is forecast for Ballarat tomorrow, with the showers predicted to decrease although the wind is to remain strong. My work-mate’s voyage across Bass Strait last night must have been a rough one!
Johnny Farnham narrates this evening’s programme from the series, “Survival”. It is about the bee. We watched the concluding half of the Australian series, “Glenview High”, from eight o’clock. Its cast includes Grigor Taylor and Elaine Lee. Bob Raymond’s “Australian National Parks” series tonight looks at national parks of Tasmania. It is a programme that we’ve seen previously and Tiki fell asleep shortly after its commencement.
Whilst on the subject of Tasmania! That state today won its first full first-class match when it defeated India by eighty-four runs. India could only score ninety-five runs in its second innings.
It became too cold for me to sit in the chair provided so at twenty minutes to ten I placed a blanket of our own on our bed and turned the electric blanket up to the reading of three. Before I fell asleep at about ten o’clock, I turned it back to one.