Nice view. My mum lives up the mountains and can see Sydney, but not that clearly. I grew up in the shadow of the mountains in the far NW. Lovely landscape.

I am so jealous!! Our current suburban abode is not a bad compromise, but it is a compromise nonetheless. When I drive out to the country to visit my parents, there is a spot in the drive where I can literally feel the tension from urban living drop away. Enjoy weez!

This sounds idyllic…lucky you.
I wish I could live somewhere this fantastic!

Cam, I’ll admit to using a zoom which contributed to the clarity in the lead piccie, as well as the weather being reasonably good. It’s astonishing to see the amount of air pollution hanging over Sydney most days.

Rainie, about the only place I can think of in your neck of the woods which has a similar feel to the Blue Mountains would be in the Appalachian foothills down around Bedford or Jasper, Indiana.

The Blue Mountains terrain is a bit more like that on the edge of Los Angeles, with a coastal plain leading up to an abruptly vaulting line of mountains.

Suki, I suspect you live in a similarly idyllic place… 😉

I too know the joy of bush fire season, watching the CFA and DSE websites VERY closely, and cursing not having done more fire prep earlier.

and re net speed, I just moved from a hypothetical 100mbps to a hypothetical 256kbps.

Never mind the house, your connection sounds idyllic!

weez, where my parents live is very much like the topography around turkey run and the shades state parks. it’s not quite like your current place, but it is hilly and wooded. in the long run sthe southern part of the state is where we would like to end up, however at the moment, we’re where the jobs are. enjoy 😎

Kieran, we truly do feel for the folks down in Victoria this weekend. Looking much scarier down there than it was here a couple weekends back.

The 1.3Mbps DSL isn’t as bad as it could be, for sure. It’s OK for web browsing but it’s a bit of a hindrance when downloading large MP3 podcasts from ABC Radio. Got a podcast aggregator (Doppler) which allows automated downloading in the middle of the night, but Doppler isn’t the most reliable app. Tends to crash for no known reason. However, it is the best I’ve found so far for our antiquated Windows 98 system.

Rainie, I always found Indiana to be rather topographically bland. I wouldn’t be alone in that estimation, despite a few picturesque places in the state.

I do recall a spoof poster from the 1980s done by Rose-Hulman Poly students titled ‘Ski Terre Haute,’ featuring a picture of a helmeted skier schussing across a recently harvested cornfield. The camera was on a 45 degree angle to add drama. The caption extolled the virtues of Terre Haute’s skiing conditions, up to and including the astonishing ’45 inch packed mud base.’ 😀

Agreed that it’s necessary to follow the buffalo. When last in the US for a ‘working holiday,’ I worked in Lafayette and slept in Indy. It’s 70mph motorway all the way up I-65, but it’s still an hour and a bit each way. The drive wasn’t so bad, but the fuel costs were outrageous, even in 1999. With housing costs so very cheap in Indy, there’s no need to live too terribly far from where you work.

Hey Weez,

Welcome back pardner.

I drove through bushfires up in yr neck of the woods back in 2002… quite a horrible spectacle. In Smelbin, it’s been smoky for quite a while this season… Victoria’s burning alright.

*sigh*

Take care,

@ndy.

Good on you weez – I hope everything goes well in your new home.
I am envious that your spoutings were cleaned so quickly.
I spent a whole day up and down the extension ladder round my house, encouraged to keep at it by the awful smoky pall hanging over us from the fires the other side of the state.
Enjoy your verandah!

Thanks @ndy & Brownie. There’s plenty of evidence of recent bushfire in the immediate area, just not close enough to our new house to believe that the fuel load has been reduced enough so as to not be a problem for a few years.

Instead of blogging, I’m still filling my days with little repair tasks… and correcting the incredibly bad decorating taste of one of the recent occupants. 3 bad light fixtures down, 2 to go.

Task #342 is creating a sprinkler system which will wet down the edges of the roof nearest the rain gutters. Needs a rainwater tank and a petrol-powered fire pump to be really effective in case of failure of water pressure, but we’ll get there. The fun part will be designing in a drainage feature into the sprinker system so the pipes don’t burst when we get into the sub-freezing temps of a Blue Mts winter.

Since our recent fires, we’ve had much more rain than usual. No chance of any bushfires around here for many weeks to come. Wish I could pipe some down to you poor folks down in Vic…

[…] thanks again for saving our house, […]

Big shout out to the neo-nazis searching Goog for ‘weezil’ and ‘Blue Mountains.’ Wozzup, homeys? 😀 Still up for that little meeting at the Campbelltown copshop? They tell me they’d sure like to talk to you. Why would that be? Soon as you grow some balls, we’ll set a date, darls. 😆