First Settlement Festival

During our second weekend in Redcliffe there was a festival celebrating the arrival of the first settlers to Redcliffe (first penal colony in Queensland). It was a lovely day out with for all the family. What was a little strange though was that it started at 8am! Yeah - I've heard of festivals ending at 8am but not starting then.


John Oxley was the leader of the expedition and he brough a few prisoners with him (5 - Irish and English). One of the Irish boys was a McQuaid! (Suzie - any Australian relatives in the family tree?) Apparently he enjoyed trying to escape quite frequently.

Another interesting thing we learned from the day was that the Aborignies that they encountered where ... fat. Looks like the whites have taken on that role with aplomb.


Diarmuid in his Ian Poulter gear :)



The first round of the Australia Super Boat Championship was held during the festival. We could hardly see the boats but you could certainly hear them as they zipped up and down the coast at over 250km/h - I've love to put one of those on The Shannon - it would come in handy especially during the rally.



The girls enjoying the festivities.

And now some news...

Nara the news reader - sitting on the balcony of our holiday apartment (that's the pacific ocean in the background).


Look who's sitting up all by herself! ...


Even though she was just after getting her latest batch of shots (on both flanks).

We've just completed moving apartment - we took the easy way out and stayed in the same building (it does have a pool and a gym, is surrounded by café's and restaurants, and is located right on the beach so it suits us really well).

Cool or what?

Aren't they so cute? Triona has left nothing to chance with regards to the sun and our bub (that's what they call babies here).

Nara's first swim

We've got a swimming pool and 'spa' (large hottub to you and me) in our building which is great. Nara took a dip with us on Saturday - her first time in the drink so to speak...

Our Apartment

A little video to show you where we are living at the moment - you'll have to excuse the mess :)

Redcliffe Calling!

Well finally you might shout! Apologies all for the delay in our first update from Oz!



We got into Brisbane on Saturday morning - shattered - after a pretty straight forward and un-eventful flight (with Eithiad Airways - a mediocre airline at best based on the quality of their flight staff). We departed Dublin on Thursday last at 9pm (our journey actually started at 3pm), landed at Abu Dhabi at 4.30am on Friday morning, Singapore 10 hours later, and finally Brisbane (8 hours after that) at 8.30am on Saturday morning. Nara was a trooper through out the journey and slept like the baby she is.

Even at 9am in the morning in Brisbane the weather was beautiful and made the journey worth while, especially considering the terrible weather we left behind. It's just coming into spring here and already the temperatures are in the mid twenties which is a little scary.

We picked up our plain but enormous rental (a Holden Commodore Wagon - which thankfully was able to swallow our mountain of luggage), then we made the short trip (26km) to the Redcliffe Peninsula and checked into our very comfortable accommodation in the Scarborough Beach Resort.

Did I mention that we were shattered?

Lunch, baggage un-packed and then we desperately tried to stay awake for as long as possible to try and reduce the effects of the jet lag. We did manage to take a quick walk around the beach which was refreshing (Tim - you'll be delighted to know that my first beer here was a VB as well).

We've had a busy few days since arriving trying to get a house sorted out and a school for Diarmuid. We also needed to purchase some supplies for her ladyship (play matt, proper car seat, and high seat - basically all the stuff we couldn't fit on the airplane!). Hopefully we'll be able to actually relax next week and start enjoying our surroundings.

I haven't really been in the mood for taking photos lately (my muse seems to be scared of stress and has run off for the time being) - thankfully Triona has been snapping away though:


Nara - coping with jet lag


First bath ... in Australia. We couldn't bring the bucket with us so Dad had to function as the prop in the big bath.


Diarmy helping out with Nara


We saw some activity across from our apartment so of course ever nosy we decided to see what was going on - we realised fairly quickly that it was some sort of function for the local Asian community. Needless to say we headed back in doors (more on that later).


Don't I look pretty? Nara having some lunch down in Redcliffe CBD.


I like my new high chair...


but I'm not so sure about the car seat!


Same laptop - different couch!

There's an annual festival starting this weekend so that should be fun. Diarmuid has made some friends from the area already (albeit online only - he hasn't actually met any of them yet!) so he might get to meet them as well.