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After a very long dry spell, and then a few attempts at some decent rain, it's finally here: an almost torrential tropical downpour. This should finally fill up all our watertanks right to the very top. We have been hoping for it for months!
If the torrential rain and the full moon weren't enough, then James Stewart in James Hitchcock's "Rear Window" kept us on the edge of our seats well past midnight. Here he is in the famous rainy night scene.
The joys of retirement: watching a good movie until all hours of the early morning without a worry about having to get up to go to work.
Back in the days when I was still highly motivated to relocate to some place where the temperature never drops below my age - I am thinking of good ol' Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit! - I visited Kuranda where Regine Bergmann of Australian Property Connection was selling a spectacular property at 46 Cadagi Drive in Kuranda.
And spectacular it was with large rooms and high ceilings and some quite extravagant attention to detail. At the time of its construction it was the talk of Kuranda, with the best tradies in town contracted to complete the project. The brief was simple: large rooms and high ceilings! With the help of a crane and an experienced crew, this was readily accomplished. What took more time was the attention to detail. Every beam was hand-carved, walls were sandbagged, the helipad driveway hand-paved. No expense was spared. The best hickory, white beech and kauri timbers, today no longer available, were used to line the rooms. The house was similarly dressed using bespoke fittings – doors to the wine cellar imported from Indonesia, outdoor pheasant taps from Germany, an antique lamp from Russia, hand basin from France. What I didn't know until later was that it had been built in 1986 for Peter Armitage, Alan Bond's accountant.
"Bondie" was the poster boy of the roaring 80s and famously won the America's Cup in 1983 with his yacht Australia II. Less famously, he was declared bankrupt in 1992 with debts of $1.8 BILLION, jailed for fraud in 1996, and released in 2000. Despite his criminal past, he kept his fortune and in 2008 was named one the 200 wealthiest people in Australia with an estimated $265 million. He died in 2015, aged 77.
Following "Bondie"'s downfall, his accountant was also forced to dispose of this million-dollar extravaganza in 1993 to a local couple for just $500,000. it was again for sale at $850,000 when I inspected it in 2003.
It didn't sell until 2006 when an American painter, Steve Royster, bought it for $800,000. He tried to sell it again in late 2014 for $1,200,000, but then turned it into The Grand Barron Lodge. Keeping my eyes on this object of my (now past) desires, I noticed in 2020 that it was still - again? - advertised for sale at $1,095,000. Shortly afterwards, in August 2020, it sold for $850,000! After owning it for fourteen years, he barely got his money back. I used to own a couple of properties like that!
I don't know who the lucky new owners are, nor do I know of the new whereabouts of Steve Royster. His website, through which he advertised his paintings, has gone "off the air" and the last entry on his facebook page is from 2015. Through his sister Judy Royster, who used to run a spiritual wellness centre from a renovated two-century-old farmhouse in Southborough, Massachusetts, I know that their father, James Royster, who had authored "Have This Mind: Supreme Happiness, Ultimate Realization, and the Four Great Religions - An Integral Adventure", had passed away in 2017 - click here. He had been a missionary and they had spent part of their childhood in India, Egypt, and Kenya - click here.
Which makes Steve Royster as unusual a man as the unusual house he had so briefly inhabited.
Every house has an interesting story to tell.
From the Advertisement
This rare property is positioned in one of the most stunning locations in North Queensland. Featured on the 'Queensland Weekender' television program, the prestigious four bedroom home not only has panoramic views that capture the dazzling river waters and many hued mountains beyond but also absolute Barron River frontage. Paved steps lead to the river where there is direct access to swimming and canoeing. Set on 1.06 hectares, the property has long been known to locals as "the million-dollar mansion".
The home itself has vast airy living areas with 8m ceilings, all leading to the expansive verandas. The bespoke design features display impressive attention to detail; every beam is hand crafted, walls are sand bagged, the large walk in wine cellar is temperature-controlled, the helipad driveway hand-paved. The best hickory, white beech, red cedar and kauri timbers line the rooms. Demonstrating its versatility, the property has been enjoyed both as a family home and by guests at the boutique Grand Barron Lodge, rated by booking.com at 9.7.
Most of all, the property is all about location. The tranquility, absolute privacy and beauty of the river call you to come and inspect. If you are looking for an idyllic lifestyle location where you can sit on your generous veranda and watch amazing sunsets, you will love living here. If you thought that it was no longer possible to find paradise on earth, think again!
Are real estate advertisements covered by the copyright laws? If not, I may plagiarise the last paragraph for my own advertisement.
"Most of all, the property is all about location. The tranquility, absolute privacy and beauty of the river call you to come and inspect. If you are looking for an idyllic lifestyle location where you can sit on your generous veranda and watch amazing sunsets, you will love living here. If you thought that it was no longer possible to find paradise on earth, think again!" fits "Riverbend" right down to the amazing sunsets.
The Admission Clerk turned out to be a Fawlty Towers fan!
In addition to the above $2,968, the surgeon charged Medicare another $934.75, and after I had paid the anaesthetist $190 to knock me out, the Ether Bunny charged Medicare another $558.35. All up, with the hospital charges, a total of $5,918.10. Then, in mid-December, the surgeon telephoned to ask me, "Is everything all right?" That's nice of her, I thought, but then I saw my Medicare statement: another $40.85. They don't miss ya! Can you see what's driving our go-for-broke medical industry? Ka-ching, ka-ching, ka-ching, ka-ching, ka-ching, ka-ching, ka-ching, ka-ching!
For the last seven days, I have been looking like a cross between Elephant Man and an Egyptian mummy but today the wraps will come off and all will be revealed. Did I get my money's worth?
Maree, the super-efficient nurse at the Batemans Bay Medical Centre whom I know from her performances at the Country Music gatherings in Nelligen Hall, will cut and unwrap and then wrap and rewrap me again.
Click on image for close-up
Of course, all this is merely a precursor of what awaits me when my ambulatory abilities have been reduced by advancing old age which is not something to be looked forward to. Old age is no place for sissies.
I remember some time in the '90s when day trading in shares was considered to be the new way to instant riches. Of course, you first had to be taught by some cowboys who considered running seminars in day trading to be their new way to instant riches.
I had just come down to my new weekender at "Riverbend", where two neighbours had jetted off to some expensive day trading seminar in which they would be taught how to buy and sell shares with almost no money down and a big pot of gold at the end of the day. "He's given up his day job and is a day trader now", the wife of one proudly told me.
Well, his day job hadn't been much to start with, so perhaps it didn't matter that his dream of buying low and selling high was also dashed. His finances, though, took a bit of a beating, first through paying for the expensive day trading seminar, and then finding that the real life charts often looked the opposite to the ones he'd been shown at the seminar.
I don't do day trading; I do occasional trading! I hold a regular long-term portfolio of shares which pay me regular fully franked dividends twice a year. I regularly monitor this portfolio and trust its performance and never change it. What I do do is that perhaps twice a week or twice a month I add to those same shares at a price which seems below trend, and sell again at a price which seems above trend. It's the same chart as the one shown above but stretched over several weeks or even months.
It gives me an added interest in life and it pays for the housekeeping!
Ich wanderte im Jahre 1965 vom (k)alten Deutschland nach Australien aus. In Erinnerung an das alte Sprichwort "Gott hüte mich vor Sturm und Wind und Deutschen die im Ausland sind" wurde ich in 1971 im Dschungel von Neu-Guinea australischer Staatsbürger. Das kostete mich nur einen Umlaut und das zweite n im Nachnamen - von -mann auf -man.
Australien gab mir eine zweite Sprache und eine zweite Chance und es war auch der Anfang und das Ende: nach fünfzig Arbeiten in fünfzehn Ländern - "Die ganze Welt mein Arbeitsfeld" - lebe ich jetzt im Ruhestand in Australien an der schönen Südküste von Neusüdwales.
Ich verbringe meine Tage mit dem Lesen von Büchern, segle mein Boot den Fluss hinunter, beschäftige mich mit Holzarbeit, oder mache Pläne für eine neue Reise.
This blog is written in the version of English that is standard here. So recognise is spelled recognise and not recognize etc. I recognise that some North American readers may find this upsetting, and while I sympathise with them, I sympathise even more with my countrymen who taught me how to spell. However, as an apology, here are a bunch of Zs for you to put where needed.
Zzzzzz
Disclaimer
This blog has no particular axe to grind, apart from that of having no particular axe to grind. It is written by a bloke who was born in Germany at the end of the war (that is, for younger readers, the Second World War, the one the Americans think they won single-handedly). He left for Australia when most Germans had not yet visited any foreign countries, except to invade them. He lived and worked all over the world, and even managed a couple of visits back to the (c)old country whose inhabitants he found very efficient, especially when it came to totting up what he had consumed from the hotels' minibars. In retirement, he lives (again) in Australia, but is yet to grow up anywhere.
He reserves the right to revise his views at any time. He might even indulge in the freedom of contradicting himself. He has done so in the past and will most certainly do so in the future. He is not persuading you or anyone else to believe anything that is reported on or linked to from this site, but encourages you to use all available resources to form your own opinions about important things that affect all our lives and to express them in accordance with Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Everything on this website, including any material that third parties may consider to be their copyright, has been used on the basis of “fair dealing” for the purposes of research and study, and criticism and review. Any party who feels that their copyright has been infringed should contact me with details of the copyright material and proof of their ownership and I will remove it.
And finally, don't bother trying to read between the lines. There are no lines - only snapshots, most out of focus.
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