Fishing

We had a lovely day yesterday - my brother in law took us fishing. It was bit tough getting up for a 6am start, but well worth it. We headed off from Roslyn Bay, out past the Keppels and pulled up near Man & Wife (twin Islands). We started fishing and immediately caught some!

Man and Wife

This is my first one - a Hussar

Then  I got seasick!!! I was so excited to be going out on the ocean and then so disappointed that I all I wanted to do was die -well maybe just be violently ill! Then the whales came! There were 2 or maybe 3 groups playing. They were amazing.

At one stage, one of them started coming straight for us. We started to get a little scared, I could just see us being tipped into the ocean....

It did come closer, but by that stage I was just fascinated and not interested in taking photos....okay I was trying to work out what to do if it tipped the boat over, but no it was just showing off to us! I really do think they were putting on a show for us. There was a Conversation Hour (Qld, with Richard Fidler) a while ago about the whales at Hervey Bay and the Scientists doing the research had the names of whales that kept coming back each year and they had personalties, so I do think they knew that we were watching and enjoying them and so they were showing off. Animals do have conscious thought! I've been around pigs, dogs, cats, cows and even chooks long enough to know that!

Anyway, I eventually got over my sea sickness - it helped being put onto land for a little while. We stopped on a lovely beach on Great Keppel Island and then on Humpy Island where we ate our lunch.

Our view while we ate lunch. Looking out towards Keppel Island.

So after a great success on the fishing front, we headed home to our Beach Shack where we cleaned and filleted and divided the fish. 

An esky full of fish!

6 coral trout - pretty as well as tasty!

Filleting the fish

Spanish Mackerel - a fish that is a great fish to catch, as well as one that has a good bone out percentage. I'm keeping some of this as large fillets to preserve in oil (aka tuna in oil). I'll do this next week!

Dinner last night was Baked Coral Trout. No lemon or limes here, so I picked some herbs (parsley, coriander and mint) from our Host's garden, added some chopped garlic and spring onion and then added a splash of soy sauce, fish sauce and sesame oil.

Then wrap in baking paper and baking in the oven.

It was delicious!

I'm looking forward to getting sick of eating fish!!! Although, I'm going to cryovac most of it and freeze and take home - after preserving some of the mackerel. Follow Lucy's Kitchen if you want to see that.

Holiday time at the Beach

Kim and I have just started a two week break away from the Farm. We didn’t go too far – only to Emu Park. We’ve got a great little Airbnb beach shack about 50m from the beach, so it’s perfect for beach walks throughout the day – too cold to go swimming though.

When we take a holiday we prefer to be somewhere that we can cook our own food and preferably do as little as possible. So far that’s what it’s been like. The first thing was to go to the Yeppoon markets to buy some fresh fruit and vegetables and of course we brought our own meat, milk, some feta, eggs and a few vegies from the farm. We will eat out occasionally, but honestly we never enjoy it! We enjoy the going out bit and the not having to clean up bit, but usually the food is so below the standard that we are used to that it literally leaves a bad taste in our mouths. And I do hate to spend money on inferior food, when I can spend the money on the raw ingredients and have the pleasure of cooking it too! (and Kim is quite happy to clean up for me!!)

Our Airbnb Host brought a gift of fresh lettuce, cucumber and zucchini yesterday, so that inspired my lunch. Salad with a zucchini frittata. She's also told me I can use the herbs and silverbeet out of her garden as I want it......that's pretty cool for someone like me! I've already started putting the vegetables scraps in her compost bin.

For me, it’s going to be a time to do some of the things I’ve been wanting to do for a while, which will include catching up on some blog posting and some food posting with Lucy's Kitchen facebook page, so if you haven’t already liked the page, do so now if you enjoy seeing photos of food! It’s also going to be some time spent on me! For a while now I’ve had various health problems that pop up every now and again and basically we eat very well, don’t drink too much and get plenty of fresh air and not exactly exercise, but physical activity. My main problem is stress and that is a killer so I’ve been searching for a way to stress less and to find more peace and calm in my life.

I’ve just read a book that my son gave me to read and while it was very interesting, I was wondering what he got out of it, as for a start I wandered what I got out of it. I just worked out that what I got out of it is that finding peace and fulfilment has to start with me. I don’t need to search for some cure or method, its’ already within me. I just have to accept it and practice it! Sounds a bit dumb, and I have read many self-help, positive thinking, you know the type of book….and finally the light bulb went off. I’m sure my son got something different out of it and I think I will get more on reflection. (I haven't really explained that very well, but I know what I mean!)

Anyway, it’s very easy to feel this way on holidays and when you are many miles away from what’s causing the stress! The next two weeks will be spent doing things for me and hopefully this will include writing more posts.