The Mount- home for now

Mount Gambier in one word? Friendly. Now I’m not sure if it is necessarily more friendly than back home or many other towns for that matter, but that is my overriding feeling and I know it is shared with other new residents of the area. You walk into any shop and you are greeted with a genuine smile- as if they actually enjoy seeing a customer! I don’t get disapproving looks when carrying Nabeela in the sling, rather we get curious glances, people stopping to ask us where we got it or just a pleasant smile. Not once have we encountered road-rage! On leaving Christies beach our parting gift was an earful of expletives spewed from the brutal face of a manic driver. Here we can drive around in the relatively safe knowledge that this will not be a weekly occurrence!

The Mount is not all roses of course- I have heard of the ‘youth issues’ that plague the town (stupid driving, excessive drinking and drug taking) and the nasty history (aboriginal people were basically wiped out) but it is a quiet little town and so far it feels right to be here- at least at this moment in time.

I love how green it is. It is colder and slightly wetter than Adelaide and planners/council have had the foresight NOT to cut down every tree in the area. So we get to enjoy the shade when it is scorchingly hot and feel the energy of the plant and animal life that surrounds us.

Nabeela saw her first (huge) possum the other day. I didn’t get to see it as she was having ‘daddy and daughter time’. It was at the Sunken Gardens where they are fed regularly by tourists on bread and other inappropriate foods- so it appears they have grown to gigantic proportions if the one Bee saw is anything to go by- they’ll be talking about the endemic obesity crisis (of possums) in town soon, I’m sure.

The parks, lakes and gardens around the town are lovely and I look forward to winter to enjoy long walks around them- summer is too hot to go for a long walk in the middle of the day. We’ve been told it’s too cold to go out in winter, but somehow I think if we managed to go to the woods in foot deep snow in the middle of an English winter, we’ll be just fine here!

The beach is about 20 minutes away by Brucey van (or possibly 15 minutes by car). You can enjoy spectacular sunsets of neon pink, bruised violet and fiery orange as you listen to the surf and pick seashells. Yoga is immensely grounding surrounded by these things, with the feel of the coarse sand between your toes.

Our house is situated so close to everything- we can walk or bike into town and the big park at the end of the road and natural beauty surrounds us and is only minutes away. If we want to stay at home our huge back garden is the perfect place to spent time outdoors. Our veggie patch (or patches to be more precise) has a profusion of cucumbers and little else! But seeing the tiny seedlings poking up through the earth and watching Nabeela’s eyes sparkle with wonder at it I don’t really care if that’s all we eat for the next year!