Down in The Glen

Standing out on the hotel balcony (facing west) and taking photos, I decided Glen Innes wasn't so cold after all.  However, when we opened the front door into the side street to load the car, there was an icy blast blowing.  We loaded up in record time, although I did stop to photograph the unusual war memorial at the intersection.  A lamppost rather than one of the traditional shapes, it turned out to be a Boer War memorial.

We drove around town checking out the beautiful architecture of the shops, photographed the wisteria we had spotted on the way in the previous night (I think Glen Innes is the Wisteria Capital of Australia) popped up the hill to the standing stone circle, and then it was op shop opening time at the Salvos (Vinnies would not open for another hour).

It was quite a big shop with a separate furniture and bric-a-brac room out the back. Out there, I spotted a stuffed Ernie doll which was identical to the one my children just about wore out. It in turn had been a hand-me-down from my sister-in-law Fran's four children.

Jo found something truly wonderful here. A boxed set of silver fish knives and forks, tarnished but in excellent condition. I found a similar set for sale on ebay for $65, without the box.  That's a lot more than Jo paid!  Another treasure for sale there was an old dressing table mirror, with bevelled glass and petit-point stitching, one of the loveliest I have ever seen.  She said 'We had the matching comb and brush but I had to throw those out because we aren't allowed to sell anything that has been in contact with hair'.  I think you could have heard a pin drop, because we were all thinking the same thing and no-one knew what to say.

She then gave us directions to a Community op shop which we would later award Shop of the Day.  It was in a big metal shed a bit out of town.  People in Glen Innes must be big on silverware, because there was a glass case full of it in these unprepossessing surroundings.  It is also the only op shop where I have ever spotted an epergne.  I think I just bought one item of clothing there.  It's all a bit of a blur.  I do remember that the conversation between the volunteers was most entertaining.  One thing I had been looking for on this trip was a cheap salt/pepper shaker with the right size hole in the bottom and the bung intact, as I need one for my Rosenthal salt shaker.  I found just the thing, was removing the bung so I could measure the hole, when the bung flew across the room, never to be seen again. 

We knew we couldn't hang around waiting for Vinnies to open, as this was to be our longest distance day of travel, a day in which we would be tourists as much as shoppers, so it was next stop, Guyra. As we drove past all the Celtic location signs, we also spotted several items of old farm equipment sticks but didn't stop to photograph them.

Now I have always regarded Guyra as a less than-desirable-destination (translation: a bit of a dump*), so was surprised when Jo told us there was a great coffee shop there.  As we drove into town she said 'Maybe it was Uralla...'  Of the three coffee shops in Guyra, two had gone out of business but the other one was welcoming and warm. The tables, however, were big and square and we were so far away from each other, we just about had to shout.  There was a nice peach tree nearby to be fair.

* We parked in front of a stone with a plaque that announced a park honouring to the volunteers of Guyra who had contributed to the town in the past.  Said park was a grassy rectangle covered with parked cars. The only tree in it was planted to commemorate the centenary of federation in 2001.  It was providing shelter for one of the cars.  I rest my case.

On to Armidale, where there are surprisingly few op shops for a city of that size, but we only had time for one of them, as it turned out.   This was the Salvos, who had a wonderful window display of old Sally-Annie band uniforms, instruments and photos.  This was a good shop, with lots of everything, but I found the book section slightly disturbing.  Instead of sorting the books into some sort of sectional order, they were arranged according to size, in descending order from left to right, on each section of the shelf, and all jumbled in together. A volunteer with OCD perhaps?  It was also in this shop that Jo found one of the quirkiest items of the whole trip, a travelling strap-to-your-seat, fold-out pillow called 'Catchanap'.  I wonder how many they actually sold?

This was picnic day, and we turned towards the coast, along the Waterfall Way, towards our lunch destination.