Merry Christmas!!!

Okay, so this year we have been a bit slack and have not put together a Xmas letter to update everyone on what we have been doing for the year. Sorry about that :-( In lieu of a proper Xmas letter, here's a bit of a summary of what we have been up to this year:

December 2010 After more than a year of searching, we finally found a house to buy and we moved into it in December. Some people commented that we now had a "grown-up house".  In any case, we are now living in Malvern in our new house and loving it!

January
We went on a cruise ship!  We've never done that before, and we were rather surprised at how much we enjoyed it.  The ship was the ms Statendam, and it was a two week cruise starting from Fort Lauderdale, Florida and ending in San Diego, California via the Panama Canal.  On the way we stopped at a number of places, including Aruba, Costa Rica, Huatulco, Acapulco and Cabo San Lucas.

After the cruise, we flew down to Queenstown, New Zealand, where we met up with our friend Karen and her son Odin.  We walked the Milford Track, which is a four-day hike covering about 60 kms or so through some of the most beautiful scenery you can imagine.  They said to be prepared for cold, wet weather, and boy did it rain!  We thoroughly enjoyed the experience, but we are glad that we opted for the comparitively luxurious "guided" option rather than roughing it with the "free-walkers" in their much more basic huts.  At least we had hot showers each night and drying rooms for our gear (not to mention cooked dinners and breakfasts).

February
Did a "Sail Training: Boat Speed" course at RYCV.  This was a course instructed by Mark Tonner-Joyce who is a renowned small-boat instructor.  It was a great opportunity to refine our sailing skills and get some new tips on making the boat go faster.  The unscheduled "dip" taken by Liz when she fell out of the boat was not quite in the glossy brochure, but it did make for great stories later!

March
Tour of a select few of the Yara Valley wineries with CoMLife (the social club from Liz's work).  Included four wineries with much drinking and a yummy lunch too.

April
Ski Planning Meeting at the Geebung Polo Club.  Okay, to let you in on a little secret, there's not a lot of planning goes on at these things -- it's mostly just an excuse to get together and drink -- but hey, there's no polo played at the Geebung Polo Club either, so it's not just us living a lie ;-)

May
Dinner at Ocha!  For those not based in Melbourne, you wouldn't know about this fine example of Japanese cuisine done in a very modern way.  They expanded to a new and bigger location but it didn't reduce the wait time for a reservation.  You need to book at least two months out to get a table.

Also went to see the latest Warren Miller movie.  Those who are ski fanatics should know who he is; those who don't ski probably don't care who he is.  Doesn't really matter anyway, as he doesn't even appear in the movies anymore: he got too old.  It's just fun watching crazy skiers careen down absurdly steep slopes.  Oh, I should mention that Liz didn't actually come to this one ... she just joined us for pre-movie dinner.

June
We had solar panels installed on the roof of our new house!  We are now officially "green".  This was a brilliant idea of Liz's and has worked out really well.  We are making money and saving the environment at the same time.

Had a "Cruise Reunion" at Apollo Bay, where almost all of the group who did the cruise in January (there were eight of us, did I not mention that?) got together again to reminisce and eat Mexican food and drink Margaritas - ole!  On the subject of drinking, we also headed into wine country for the "Winter Wine Fest".

July
Ski season!  We had two weekends in the snow this month, one at Mt Hotham and the other at Falls Creek.  Also, to round out the month, we went to see "Anything Goes" (a Cole Porter musical) and had a fondue night at our new house.

August
We decided to become certified divers this year, so in August we did a PADI Open Water Diver course.  We are both now qualified to dive to a depth of 18m :-).  Also went to see a musical tribute to Eva Cassidy which was very well done we thought.  Claire Bowditch was the singer who told us the story of Eva and sang her songs.

September
My friends Teresa and Chris came to visit from the US for a few weeks.  This is something that was in planning for a while, and it finally happened!  While they were here, a group of us chartered a yacht in the Whitsundays and went sailing for 8 days.  On the yacht, apart from the four of us, we also had our friends Ed, Jeanma and Catherine.  Jeanma is a French chef, so we ate extremely well -- so much so that some people are now refusing to go on another holiday that doesn't include a French chef!

October
Attended the "Marengo" footy tipping end-of-season luncheon with our friends Susan, Bernie and Doc.  Did much better in the footy tipping this year, and so made some money on the bets - yay!  Oh, for those of you not in Australia, you probably don't know what footy tipping is.  Basically, everyone tries to predict which team will win each football game (of which there are about 7-8 games each weekend).  Prizes for the most correct guesses!

Also in October we went to see a musical production of "Beauty and the Beast" with our friends Denis and Jan (Denis was the skipper of Serenity III, the yacht we used to sail on).  And for something different, went to see a Roller Derby match with another friend, Brendan.  Brendan is quite into the scene, but we couldn't convince him to dress up like the roller derby girls for some reason.

November
Lots on this month.  We did the Eastlink Ride, which is a 75 km ride on the Eastlink Tollway (which they kick the cars off for the day).  Liz and Amy did the 35km option, and Tim and I went all the way (as they say), which considering I hadn't done much training at all I was quite pleased to have achieved.

We also went to visit our friends Sheree and Derek up in Brisbane.  Derek has bought a catamaran and so we cruised with them on that for a few days.  Oh, that's all detailed in a previous post on this blog so you can read that for more info.

In other November events, we went to see comedian Alan Davies, went to our friends Rick and Sue's housewarming in Bendigo (yes, they had to keep up with us and buy a new house too - sheesh!!), and saw Stevie Nicks perform at Mornington Racecourse.

December
A month of Xmas parties and trying to get ready for Xmas!  Highlights of that were Christmas drinks at Susan and Bernie's, and the annual Christmas BBQ at Gaby's.  We also spent a weekend up in Sydney where we explored Sydney Harbour by ferry (including one unscheduled voyage due to jumping in haste onto the wrong ferry - d'oh!) and wandered the streets of the city soaking up the Sydney "vibe".

Dinner at Mamasita!  Okay, it turns out this is like the Mexican equivalent of Ocha.  Or at least that's how I'm categorising it for now.  This is completely different from your usual "Tex Mex" offering.  Afficionados of "Taco Bill" or "Chevy's" would barely recognise this as Mexican food, but it is probably more Mexican than anything else you will get outside of Mexico, and was really yummy!!

Oh, and also in December, Christmas!  And with that, a very Merry Christmas to everyone, and a Happy New Year too ... see you in 2012!!!!

    -- Dave and Liz