Soldiers Point

Arrived yesterday by train and bus to see my dear friend in her once hidden retreat at Soldiers Point,a peninsula  just north of the very popular retirement resort of Nelson Bay, four hours north of Sydney.

It is in an exquisite area but becoming more and more developed like most beautiful natural places. J's 1930s house is one of the few original ones left, with stark concrete monstrosities appearing all over the place, and unfortunately,  right next to hers. She has constant ongoing disputes with her one neighbour who most recently has taken to surreptitiously poisoning some or her very old eucalyptus trees which he decided he didn't like.

It is an unforunate situation, but J is brave and as well as fighting the neighbour, she is actively pursuing litigation against the developer of the nearby Marina who wants to double its size, thereby  encroaching on not just the natural habitat, but getting dangerously close to an Aboriginal owned island very close by. It is indeed a saga, and stuff that films are made of à la Erin Brokovitch.

After a nice brekkie we went for a long stroll on a cloudy,  but happily dry, morning, to look at the beauty and the disfigurement of the area. She is right, the beauty is nearly all gone. As Bob Dylan sang, 'When will they ever learn'...

Brekkie, by J.

View from her veranda......a dying tree!

Sadly gazing at the beautiful bay

..another dying tree!

Last night we had along catch-up as I haven't see her since the tragic death of her daughter, dying from bulimia. A brilliant troubled girl whom I knew quite well and who could never tolerate the many injustices in the world around her. So in effect, she just signed off. J has recovered somewhat fromthis horrific loss, but it is always good to talk and she doesn't have too many friends to do this with. She was like another daughter to my dear Mum, so she is a veritable sister to me.

She spoils me with lovely cooking, steak and kidneys last night, and today more fish for an early lunch before I resume my travels to vist M in Woy Woy Bay whom I am very much looking forward to seeing. Lots to talk about with him and his partner D, a Kiwi originally from the southern tip of the south island, a place called Bluff, famous for its fabulous oysters.