Thank you Maleny
I was chatting with Bajar today, and he commented on the quality of my blog. I suspect he’s been marching through Columbia or something, but I’ll accept the compliment graciously. Since someone is reading it, I figured I should post something.
This week has seen the return of our favourite work colleague “Leave”. He’s really quite nice and gives us time to do things away from work. It would be nice if “Leave” did our work for us while we were gone, but beggars can’t be chosers. Since my darling wife is on leave as well, we decided to take a bit of a trip and see where it would take us.
We drove south through Kenilworth (which is quite lovely, but I don’t think I’d like living there), tasted some cheese at the Kenilworth cheese factory and had a picnic. The cheese was good, but some there was a man who somewhat ruined the experience. I shall call him Grumpy McGrumpster, the grumpiest grump that ever did inhabit the cheesery. Basically, the cheese factory also had wine available from one of the local wineries for tasting. For some reason, Grumpy McGrumpster didn’t like his standard serve of wine and decided to do what he does best. Now, within worrying about whether or not the sales girl/s had completed RSA training or not, he continued to do his thing until they agreed to give him a ‘proper’ glass. Now, the ‘proper’ glass they gave him was probably 200mL, which might be ‘proper’, but it’s not standard. After all the grumping, Grumpy McGrumpster managed to upset 3 sales people, 2 small children, and one blogger in a peartree. At this point, said blogger left to continue on his journey.
After a bit more of a drive, we arrived at Maleny Hideaway. This place is brilliant. It’s off the main road and down a fairly narrow, windy driveway (which is also quite steep by the way). The owners were really friendly, the bed was comfy, the shower was hot, and breakfast was tasty. Thank you Kerri and Gavin, it was really good night away from home. Each of the guest rooms are also painted a different colour. Ours was a pinky, purply colour, but nothing overdone, while another we saw was a pale blue. Not a huge thing, but a pleasant individuality.
Since we had some time to kill, we headed to the Maleny Hotel. Now, the hotels in Gympie need to work on their appearance. Nothing at home quite has the atmosphere of the Maleny Hotel. Watching one of the bar staff check the door lock, then close the door, then walk away, without considering that they’d locked us on the balcony, was quite an experience. The rum went down well, and we headed off.
We ate at Capricio’s Italian Restaurant. The atmosphere was really nice, you don’t believe how much of a difference is made by not having top-40 music blearing through a restaurant, until you have something soft and subtle instead. The staff were friendly enough, without being in-your-face. The food was hot and very tasty and the service was prompt. My highlight for the meal was watching a group of half a dozen children stare bug-eyed through window as Paul (the host) topped pizza after pizza, ready to be cooked in their very fancy rotating pizza oven. All in all, I couldn’t fault the evening at all.
Have you ever been to Montville? If you haven’t, I recommend visiting. If you have a female partner, and you’re taking her along, I recommend locking up the credit cards. I wouldn’t have believed it, but people do actually buy small pottery toadstools. Not just any small pottery toadstools, but those that you can sit upsidedown in your fridge, filled with vanilla essence, to deoderise it. Fascinating! The pie, with mushy peas AND mashed taters inside, was amazing, and will definitely be recreated the next time I have anything ressembling a pie at home or elsewhere.
All in all, it was a good trip. One that will be repeated as soon as we have the chance.
peace
Woodstock