Helene Young's Blog, page 5

Thanks to everyone who shared, commented, liked, subscribed, and registered to win one of the four photos books – it’s been fun!

Graham’s hat wasn’t large enough so we had to break out the collapsible bucket for the draw.

Without further ado the winners are:

Karen Cousens

Yvonne Bauer

Gailene_Gailene

Barbara Denton

The books will be winging their way to you tomorrow and I hope you enjoy the small slice of our sailing life!

Capt G modelling my new book :)

It’s time to celebrate my new look web-page with a give away or four!! All the bugs and kinks have been worked through by Kerry, my lovely designer from Internet Thinking. (Huge round of applause for him and his hard work – I particularly love that I have a gallery of my photos so you can browse them at your leisure.) There’s also a link so you can subscribe to my blog and never miss another sailing, writing, flying, or adventuring post again.

And I’ve decided it’s time to launch a newsletter. It won’t be a monthly newsletter, but I’ll update you when I have good news, or other writer’s great books to share, or something funny to make you smile. Of course, your details will also be kept private so I promise no spam!!

To help celebrate the updated look I’ve made a slight detour into self-publishing

Back in 2014 I toured Half Moon Bay with the Get Reading team and I had the pleasure of speaking at a high tea in the Seppeltsfield Winery. I promised Graham I’d take him back one day as it is a beautiful winery with a rich history.

While we were in Adelaide for the RWA conference we snuck off to the Barossa to do the historic tour. It was worth it. If you haven’t visited Seppeltsfield  then put it on your list. Last time Bill took me for a short tour. This visit we had all the time in the world and Jan did the honours.

The Seppelt’s family have left an amazing legacy and the winery’s new owners are keen to bring back the village feel that existed with 100 live in staff at the height of its fortunes. Barry Gardener’s forging knives from recycled metal that are both beautiful and sharp. He very kindly allowed us into his workshop long before opening times.

The Jam Factory is home to artisans who work there as well as display their treasures. There’s plans to add even more to the estate.

And if you’re after something a little different there’s a Segway tour of the estate as well!

Enjoy!

Seppeltsfield Road, planted with Date Palms by the family as they are hardy trees that require very little water.

Love the vine growing like an old man’s face over the side of the building

The knife maker’s forge glowing hot.

Barry Gardener – The knife maker :)

One of the original buildings now used for functions

The wedding photos would be stunning in amongst the sandstone.

The view from the family crypt where all members of the Seppelt family have been interred. I can see why they might enjoy gazing out of their estate still.

Part of the original winery and in summer the colours change dramatically.

They used to produce vinegar along with jams, cordial and wine.

They clearly had a love affair with palm trees.

Congratulations to all the 2016 Romantic Book for the Year winners. The results were announced at the recent RWA Gala dinner in Adelaide – and what a fabulous night that was too! You can find all the details  at the RWA Blog.

Special congrats to Michelle Somers, whose Romantic Suspense story, ‘Lethal in Love’, took out the Long Romance division. Her story was originally released as a serial, but has just been released as a complete book – fingers crossed it’s available in print very soon as well! It’s wonderful to see Australian Romantic Suspense recognised by readers.

The Adelaide 25th Anniversary conference was another stellar affair. Well done to the volunteers who put the event together. And a very big thank you to Leisl Leighton and her committee for all their efforts over the past twelve month. Romance Writers of Australia have provided so many of us with opportunities and support and it just keeps going from strength to strength. Long may is prosper!

Despite the lovely hotel concierge and the nice man in the information centre doing their best to dissuade us, Graham and I had an adventure on Adelaide’s public transport system today. Perhaps we look a little too old for changing buses three times in one journey or perhaps guests of the Stamford use more salubrious transport, but we had a ball!

Three buses, and an hour and a half later, we were in Hahndorf exploring the quaint little out post of Germany. The sense of history is wonderful and the buildings postcard pretty. I refrained from buying the Alpaca wool hat and the calf-length red coat – Graham seemed to think they weren’t appropriate for sailing through the night on Roobi – so we dined in style instead.

The story of the Lutheran Prussian immigrants who founded the town is uplifting, but tempered a little by the hardship forced on the community by the First World War. Like so many who weren’t of British stock they were immediately judged to be a risk and some were interned. Yet they too lost sons who joined up to fight as Australians.

I was also fascinated by Captain Dirk Hahn, after whom the town is named. He went far above and beyond what was required of a ship’s captain bringing immigrants to a new land. It’s a shame that he never returned to Australia but presumably he stayed in contact with the community that he helped to establish.

We’ll have to visit Hahndorf again. The bare trees lent an air of gravity which I’m sure must change dramatically with summer. And, for the record, we made it back to the hotel on public transport

Roobinesque’s moored safely in a marina and we’re off to Adelaide for six days to attend the Romance Writers of Australia conference and the Australian Romance Readers Association Booksigning. Really looking forward to catching up with everyone again, but we’ve had to dig out our winter woollies with the mercury forecast to dip below 5 degrees!

I promised Graham that I’d play hooky for a couple of days so we’re off to explore Hahndorf tomorrow and then up to the Barossa on Saturday. During my Half Moon Bay Book tour a couple of years ago I spoke at a high tea on the beautiful Seppeltsfield Winery Estate. I’m looking forward to showing Graham around the stunning winery.

This year RWA is celebrating it’s 25 th anniversary which is a wonderful achievement. The organisation, run by volunteers, has done so much to foster the careers of Romance writers, mine included. They collectively deserve a huge thank and I’m sure this year’s conference will be a wonderful uplifting celebration of the organisation’s success.

If you’re in the Adelaide area than make sure you pop in on Saturday afternoon for the ARRA Booksigning. There are over 60 authors attending and some of your favourites are guaranteed to be there. It’s a great chance to meet them, have books signed and soak up the atmosphere.

We’re off to the airport shortly, but I’ll be sharing photos of the wonderful weekend on social media.

And don’t forget you can now subscribe to this blog and to my newsletter. Follow the links on the home page

It seems I am my father’s daughter… I don’t know whether my fascination with ships started with Dad being an engineer on oil tankers or whether it’s a genetic thing, but the older I get the worse it gets!

I was delighted to find a bulk sugar carrier in Mourilyan Harbour when we sailed through the entrance. I was even more delighted to find that it was leaving and another tanker was arriving which would necessitate the second vessel being ‘swung’ to bring it into dock. Oh, and did I mention there was a tug boat? For my money they are the sexiest little boats on the water. They have this cocky look about them that says they can outmuscle anyone – ‘punching above their weight’ every single time!

To add to my enjoyment heading north to Cairns we crossed the path of a US GOV destroyer and then followed a tanker up the channel to Cairns. The dredge, The Brisbane, also managed to cut us off and then start dredging in front of us. I’ve had the best couple of days.

Here’s the action in Mourilyan Harbour in pictures – and a tiny video but don’t bother with the audio…

The directions to the tug – ‘Slip alongside and push slow and easy

For eighteen years I looked down on Hinchinbrook Island from the cockpit of my Dash 8 as we flew between Cairns and Townsville and I marvelled at its moods. Quite often the skies would be clear accept for the thunderstorm brewing over the craggy island. Under the care of Captain Lyle Cook I joined a group as we climbed to the crash site of a Liberator Bomber, lost during the Second World War, and felt the prehistoric tug of this ancient wilderness. The human footprint is so small as to be invisible.

We’ve sailed the Hinchinbrook Channel twice before but this is the first time we’ve stayed a few days and explored. We took the dinghy up some of the creeks, looking for elusive crocodiles and marvelling at the resilience of the mangroves. The marks from Cyclone Yasi and Larry are obvious in the tall stands of trees that have been flattened and are yet to regenerate, but the damage isn’t widespread.

There’s so much more to be discovered yet and we’ll be back – it’s the perfect setting for a very tense thriller!

A heron in search of a perch

Morning storm lingering over Hinchinbrook Island

Moonset from the Haycock Island anchorage in Hinchinbrook Channel.

Synchronised landings :)

Nothing like a double rainbow to make me smile :)

We have six days to make our way north to Blue Water Marina in time for the Cairns Tropical Writers Festival – I do hope the weather behaves! Check out all the details of the full programme at: CTWF Programme.

The Literary Dinner, starring Madga Szubanski in conversation with Helen Chryssides, is sold out, but there’s still space at most other sessions and a Festival Ticket will give you entry to loads of events without any additional cost. Come along and be inspired!

I’m looking forward to a busy couple days talking writing and books with readers and fellow writers. Saturday afternoon the focus is on romance and I very excited about interviewing good friend and international best selling author, Anna Campbell. The session after that I’m chairing a panel discussion with Anna, Barbara Hannay, Hettie Ashwin and Jacqueline George about romance writing and why it’s the best selling genre on the planet – by a very long way!

Thanks to Roz Pulley for her lovely article in the Cairns Post this morning – I’ve finally made it to ‘Cover Girl’, except I’m no longer in the ‘girl’ category! And I do love Russell’s photos. What a welcome home for us

I’ve been privileged to follow the career of Australian artist, Tanya Sarianti Ashworth for many years. Anyone who’s visited us will have seen her paintings gracing our walls and will have eaten from her beautiful ceramic bowls – even aboard Roobinesque!

I’m absolutely thrilled that Tanya’s latest work has been preselected for the Brisbane Art Prize 2016. I wish I could be there on the night to support Tanya, but unfortunately I’ll be in Adelaide at a conference. Details on the event are listed below so if you can go along I know all the artists would appreciate your support. 

Tanya’s very kindly dropped by today to talk about the meaning behind “Handle with Care.” So over to her