We celebrated our new COVID freedom by driving to Goorambat to see Jimmy DVate's new painting of Rusty the nankeen kestrel and have a cuppa at the Digger's Wife cafe.
A pity it was closed because its outdoor tables look directly at the working clydesdales painted on the tall silos.
On Saturday, we met our four-year-old in Wangaratta's Merriwa Park.
She rode her new two-wheeler bike on the footpath all the way from home, with mum beside her for safety. She was so excited.
*** Day Trips: A visit to Broken Hill
The park was full of picnickers, kite flyers, some playing shuttlecock and men playing tennis.
Little children were queuing for turns on the play equipment. The atmosphere was wonderful.
Our four-year-old loves this park, its stone bridge and hidden hillside walk where she looks for fairies. It has wide non-slip steps and handrails for less than nimble grannies.
The park is large, beautifully landscaped and maintained and has lots of new picnic tables.
*** Day Trips: A visit to Benalla Art Gallery
Every town is competing for tourists who will spend money. Some have natural advantages of spectacular landscape, unique history, buildings or sporting venues.
Others have to be clever and create active or passive enjoyment which can be as simple as a happy environment, a well maintained town and a twist of clever design, trees and landscaping.
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When our children were little, in Geelong, I walked them to school past a large garden that was always in flower, usually with a predominance of one colour accented by red or orange flowers, blue always stood out.
Its microclimate helped it survive Geelong's severe drought in the late 1970s and early 1980s.
*** Day Trips: Wangaratta winter wonderland
This garden influenced an ongoing habit of ‘looking over the garden fence’ to notice seasonal changes and the benefits that trees and plants bring to humans and nature.
It didn't make me a great gardener, just prompted a desire to see gardens throughout Victoria, Australia and the world.
Have you seen Western Australia's wild flowers?
Visiting parks and gardens is as popular as going to sporting events. In China thousands enjoy their parks 24/7 and some highways have kilometres of flowering hedges.
*** Day Trips: A Sunday drive to Corowa
This week we also had a look at what Benalla's Botanic Gardens had to offer with wide compacted gravel paths with steel edges.
Those paths have been there since the 1860s and requires minimal maintenance and are suitable for all users.
They wind around the gardens, a perfect model for paths everywhere.
The botanical gardens are pretty good too and always worth a visit in spring.
Happy ‘day tripping'.
If you would like to send a letter to the editor on this, or any subject, click this link ###- Suzie Pearce.
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