Anzac Day 2009

Saturday 25th April 2009
This morning we went to Dunsborough Anzac Day Service, the kids Scout Troop were taking part in the parade and laying of a wreath so we thought we had better be there and show our respects.
Dunsborough is quite a small community so the parade was not that large, but they did have a wide cross section of the community being represented from Scouts and Schools to the Red Cross, ex Servicemen and Veterans of many wars gone by.
It was quite an emotional experience to see our kids lined up and marching with these other groups while the crowds on the sidewalk applauded them as they passed by, it was only a short march but a significant one and if it has made our kids, who let’s face it have been pretty sheltered from the affects of war, think about the effort and sacrifice that those people put in to ensure that they have the cushy life they have now, then it will be a march well done and will hopefully make them think twice about war in the future.
After the march we all went into a hall where a commemoration service was held, the hall was overflowing with people to the point where they are now looking at other venues for future years services so that all who want to attend can be accommodated comfortably.
The service took the best part of an hour with hymns and prayers along with the usual speeches and laying of the wreaths, there was no war memorial that people gathered round as this is a fairly new community, just a flag on a flag pole that had been wedged inside the centre of a wheel rim, it was basic, it was heartfelt and it was emotional.
After the service we drove in to Dunsborough for a coffee and a bite to eat, the town was really busy, presumably loads of tourists about as it is a long weekend.
We decided to stop at the Yallingup Coffee Roasting Company, a small Café with seating outside, the only problem being that they only do coffee and cake and don’t do rolls or pies which was what we were really after.
We stopped there anyway as we had never been there before and if we still felt hungry afterwards, it was a nice day, we could go for a stroll and get something else to eat elsewhere.
The kids had Smoothies which was easy, Carolyn had her usual Black Coffee, Ian fancied a pot of Tea. One of their Coffee Machines had broken down so there would be a delay, for some reason because the coffee machine had broken down we could only have our tea and coffee in take away cups as opposed to Tea Pots and Coffee Cups and it would take about twenty minutes to serve it.
We agreed to the wait and the paper cups, after all we hadn’t been here before so we should give them a chance and it had already taken fifteen minutes for the kids to work out what they wanted.
When it arrived, the Cakes and Biscuits were ok, the kids Smoothies were ok, Carolyn doesn’t mind drinking out of Take Away cups so that was ok, but Ians Tea was rank, not just because it was in a paper cup although that didn’t help, it would have been rank if it was in a Tea Pot.
We probably won’t bother going there again and definitely not for Tea, more because on the food side of things than anything as we don’t tend to go out just for coffee unless we are overlooking the sea, here it only overlooks a car park, so is not very interesting.
From there we drove back towards Busselton and popped into Archery Park to see if we could have a go with the Bow and Arrows, it was very busy and there was going to be a fair wait before we could have a go, so we decided to leave it until tomorrow morning when we will try again, weather permitting.
From there we popped into our local Brewery, Occy’s Brewery, we have been living here over a year now and still not tried it out. We bought two halves of beer, one fairly strong and the other, the weakest in their range.
The weaker beer was the one that we both liked so we didn’t get to finish the stronger one, it’s a shame we didn’t try it earlier in the summer because it would have been a pleasant place to spend an afternoon when the sun is shining. There is ample room for kids to play and they have live music on at the weekend, food is available, albeit served by the business next door but it looked good.
The Sunday Sesh is very popular in this part of WA, families drive out to Breweries and Wineries, eat and drink all afternoon, then all jump in their cars and drive home before it gets dark so that they can sleep off their hangovers.
The only time we have seen roadblocks or people being breath tested since we have been here has been on a Sunday afternoon, but as most people don’t seem to worry too much about losing their licence over here it’s not a problem, they just carry on driving anyway because if they didn’t, all the breweries and wineries would close down due to lack of patronage and their would be mass unemployment. People just don’t realise that if it wasn’t for these persistent drink drivers the economy would be more shot to pieces than it is already.
After our half of beer we drove home, picked up the kids buckets and spades and went down to the foreshore where the kids played while we sat drinking coffee and reading the papers, in an ideal world we would be able to do this part of the day every day.
In the evening we watched a family film, Cars, which surprisingly enough is about cars, no violence, no swearing, just a good animated fun film about a racing car.