Ho Hum Horsham

Horsham is a town of about 19,000 people. It is built on the Wimmera river and often referred to as the “capital” of the Wimmera region of north west Victoria. It’s a nice but not particularly interesting place.  The extremely helpful lady at the Information centre promptly encouraged us to visit a place about 25 min OUT of Horsham.  And then, after discovering we were from Sydney, talked about the Lindt café siege for the next 15 minutes.  We were grateful for her filling us in on the siege details ( knew very little about it up until that point) but a little bewildered regarding the fact that she did not recommend anything in Horsham itself.

We did our best to get a feel for the town. It has an impressive Anglican church at the end of a typical main street of a typical regional Victorian centre. Reminded me a little of Mildura but smaller and more generic.  It has an Aldi and an RSL, we patronised both. At the  the latter, Andrew had his face painted as Spiderman. To be honest, it was kinda creepy.

 I am struggling find much else to say.  I know, unbelievable, huh?

Our information lady suggested we go to Mount Arapiles and visit the quirky town of Natimuk on the way. Natimuk apparently had received a Federal grant a while back and embarked on some artsy-crafty town improvement projects. We found the quirky town of Natimuk was, well, let’s just say it was closed.  Strange for Thursday lunchtime .  The only thing that was open was a very average convenience store/takeaway shop, the likes of which you could find in dozens of Sydney western suburbs. Reckon they took the Federal grant and left town.

Arapiles is well known for rock/mountain climbing and it’s easy to see why; lots of craggy, weather beaten cliff faces, canyons and pinnacles with great views from the top.  Fortunately for us, you can drive to within 50 meters of the summit, so we got the views without the rope burn.  At the summit you can see Mitre Lake, a natural salt lake surrounded by Samphire,  Melaleuca and other salt tolerant vegetation.  It was worth the trip.

Not much else I can say about Horsham, so I toyed with the idea of regaling you with “Tales from Bullseye”, but alas most of the shenanigans do not translate well on paper.  Instead, I will try to paint the picture of life in the car while travelling between locations.

I am pleased to report that the “are we there yet” chorus has faded. As long as Andrew can see the Satnav map and has the occasional update of progress, he seems at ease.  He is usually happy to watch out for sheep, cows, wheat, harvesters, tractors, dogs, silos or large trucks and listen to music. Georgia will read. I am the navigator and Rod does all the driving. Rod is extremely patience with the navigator as I cannot express left and right accurately. I know which way I want the driver to turn, just can’t work out what it is called.  I am amazed we get anywhere – but thankfully we have never gotten lost.

We all take turns to be DJ. The Ipad has proved very valuable, it connects to the car audio system and is synced with my Itunes account.  I admit to having heard more Becky G than I care for, but I get my revenge by playing classical or baroque. We have all learned to be patient with the different musical tastes.

That’s all for now, promise to try and make our next blog on Bendigo a bit more engaging.