February 28 to March 7, 2015
After coming down from Bombala, we made our first port of call the excellent Wild Rye bakery in Pambula, for some bread and cakes. Then we drove the few kilometres to Wheelers Restaurant to stock up on prawns and oysters for dinner, before completing the last couple of kilometres past the golf course and airport to Merimbula. Arriving at Sails Apartments, we were greeted by our hosts, Leanne and Reece, and it was not long before we were settled into our first-floor apartment. We had decided to go upstairs this year following the great result of Ann’s two knee operations, as the view across the lake is even better from the added height.
It was very pleasant indeed eating our dinner of prawns and oysters, drinking a nice crisp dry white wine whilst watching the sun set across the lake.
Nothing much has happened in Merimbula since we were last there, and our activities were pretty much the same as on previous visits. The apartment was as clean and comfortable as we expected, the pool area and BBQ were both attractive and spotlessly clean.
One major improvement was the provision of a balloon whisk in the kitchen, but I suspect that was provided especially for my benefit, and the same utensil would not be found in the other apartments! Anyway, it was put to good use in the preparation of an omelette later in the week. Our activities were confined to walking, a little golf, a little fishing, a little painting and sketching, a lot of reading, quite a deal of eating and drinking, and not much else. Twice I went fishing at Bar Mouth Beach. The first occasion yielded only two very undersized flathead, but the second outing was very productive with the largest flathead I have ever caught, and a bream of equivalent size. The day started with a magnificent sunrise, with the sunlight reflecting off the windows from across the lake.
Bur the weather deteriorated into a very strong wind and cold rain, but the fishing, as I have said, could not have been better. But I have to admit that I rather spoiled the opportunity of baking the large bream whole, and that meal was a bit of a disaster. I blame it entirely on the low quality of the electricity in this part of the world. I am not sure where it is generated, but by the time it gets to Merimbula it appears to have lost some of its power. I am convinced that it takes longer for the kettle to boil, longer for the toast to cook, and that the oven does not get as hot as it should do. Thus, the fish was still undercooked by the time the other components of the meal were ready, and I had to resort to transferring it to a pan and frying it. By the time I got the fish to the table, it looked as though the cat had had first go at it! But it tasted very nice! The following day I cooked the flathead to perfection, so redeemed myself somewhat.
As for the golf, I had a couple of outings. The first was to Mandini Resort, where a bucket of balls hit into the lake got the swing going very well for an assault on the course itself. All was going well until the 4th tee, where a rather unwelcome spectator appeared in the shape of a long shiny black snake. Keeping one eye on him, I misaligned myself with the fairway, and the ball disappeared some 200 metres into the bush off to the left of the fairway. Re-aligning myself a little, but still with my spectator visible in the corner of my eye, I speared a drive straight down the middle, but because of the slope of the fairway, it then kicked to the right when it landed. The spectator looked as much as to say “can’t you do any better than that?” and had it had any shoulders, it probably would have shrugged them in contempt. It then slithered off toward the third green, presumably to watch the approach shots of the next group of golfers. However, it would have had a long wait as there was not another soul to be seen anywhere on the course.. For my second outing, I had intended playing at one of the local ‘proper’ courses. But Merimbula Golf Club charges $40.00 a round, plus $6.00 for a buggy, and I was not prepared to pay that sort of money. So I phoned Tathra Country Club, which has a much lower fee. Unfortunately that day the course was closed for a ladies competition, so I drove to Tura Beach, which has a special lower rate for seniors after 2.00pm. However, that course was closed for a corporate day, so I returned to Mandini. The shiny black observer of the previous game was not visible, but a baby brown snake, no fatter than a drinking straw and about 30cm long, positioned himself between my ball and the hole on the 7th green. No danger to myself, of course, but I was unsure what the rules according to St Andrew had to say about removing snakes from the green, and as I did not want to hurt him with the ball, I picked up, added two to the score for the hole, moved on and played the last couple of holes. And that was the end of the golf for the week.
General walking went very well, with Ann’s new knees. As well as walking around the ‘Fish Pen’ a couple of times, we went all the way along the board walk and back—a trip of the order of 3.5km. We saw plenty of wild life, including a small stingray, innumerable fish, large and small, a huge swimmer crab, and a pair of Lewin Water Rails.
At the far end of the boardwalk, there is a ramshackle shed, which serves as the office of the boat-hire man, and also serves possibly the best coffee in Merimbula.
It is idyllic sitting on the deck outside the shed, drinking first-class coffee and enjoying the magnificent view of the lake with the hills behind, and the quaint boats that are for hire lying quietly at their moorings on the mirror-smooth lake. On other walking/coffee drinking outings we saw large pods of dolphins, white-breasted sea eagles, and sting-rays about the size of a kitchen table. There were also notices around the lake warning people to “stay away from the resting fur seal”, but we were not fortunate enough to encounter him. However, we did meet a couple of ladies who had come across him one evening, and he was apparently very grumpy at having his rest interrupted as they walked past him whilst he snoozed on the footpath.
We did a little drive to Tathra one afternoon, and after a stroll along the sand spits at the mouth of the Bega River,
took afternoon tea at the café now established in the heritage-listed wharf building, which was very pleasant. After tea, we walked along a cliff-side track, which quite clearly had, at some stage in the past, been a sealed road, as there were patches of the original pavement still in place.
Following the track as it wound round the headland, we eventually came to a well-maintained area of parkland, which had a number of information boards around its periphery, telling of the local history. It transpired that the track was the original road to the wharf, but a severe storm and exceedingly high and rough seas simply washed most of it away. That was in February 1971 and the storm and encroaching seas flooded much of the Bega Valley below the town. Two people were reported as being swept away and drowned. The road was a good 30 to 40 metres above normal sea level, so it must have been a doozy of a storm to have done so much damage. They have since built a new road approaching the wharf from the other direction. It seems as though these storms are quite regular occurrences, with one in 1919, another in the mid-1950s, the ‘big one’ which destroyed the road in 1971, and some serious flooding in March 2014, (but nowhere near ‘the big one’ of ’71). The other interesting thing about the small park, is that it serves as a memorial garden, and there are plaques along the edges of the paths in remembrance of deceased residents of Tathra. There is no cemetery at Tathra, so people are buried or cremataed elsewhere, but they are remembered in this small park. Right next to the Memorial Garden is the Tathra pub, which has an extensive deck out the back with great views of the ocean, and on the warm evening it was very pleasant to enjoy a cold beer and, for Ann, a glass of local white wine, before heading back to Merimbula.
And that was about all we did and saw on this trip. On Saturday we left Merimbula and headed home, with the intention of spending another couple of days at Lakes Entrance. So more on that in the next blog.
Slingsby's Miscellany 