A long weekend by the sea

Monday was a public holiday (a day off in lieu of Australia Day, which was on Saturday).

So Jim and I trundled down to Mount Martha on Saturday morning.  Lindsey was already there, having, you may remember, extracted Stella from the hospital  on Friday evening. She went back to Ballarat after lunch.  We stayed down.

Stella was quite frail and tottery after her extended stay in hospital.  It is difficult to eat and drink properly when you are lying flat on your back, not allowed to move. Also, the bruise down her side was very painful. She was not a happy camper.

So we set to, to feed her up, hydrate her and amuse her.

We had Sunday lunch at the Dava.

We went for a drive along the coast road in the sunshine.  Mother has not once, not ever set foot on the Mount Martha beach, not in the quarter of a century that she has lived there.  But she likes to look at it. And there are some beautiful views along the coast road.

We tried for lunch at Fine Foods in Mount Martha on Monday but were seriously thwarted. I have never seen such traffic heading into Mount Martha. I have never seen so many people on the beach, nor so many power boats in the bay, nor so many sailing boats. The life saving club was packed.  The little yacht club was packed.  There were cars parked EVERYWHERE. There were people everywhere.

I have no idea what was going on on the beach, but I assume some sort of event.

It was, it must be said, a beautiful day, but I had assumed that it would be fairly quiet.  It was the last day of the long weekend that marks the end of the school summer holidays.  I had vaguely assumed that people would have packed up in the morning and be making their way home, to prepare for the start of the school year.  But no.  They were cluttering up Mount Martha.  There was no chance of parking anywhere near Fine Foods.

We went back to Stella's place and had sandwiches and salad for lunch there. Then Jim and I headed back to Mount Helen along roads that were surprisingly clear.  Everyone was obviously still on the Mount Martha beach 😄