Blowin' in the wind...

Three weeks ago I had the pleasure of attending the wedding of Mel and Steve. Mel is an old friend from the uni vegetarian group from several years ago who now resides on the other side of the country from me, but who I love keeping in contact with. She is a passionate vegan who is a lot of fun and a mad physicist.

The wedding was held in a beautiful old chapel in Albany which is about a 4-5 hour drive from the city where I’m living and I took the trip with a friend of Mel’s who I didn’t know prior to the event. It was heaps of fun looking at all the countryside and chatting. Although lots of people came from all over the world, which made the travelling for a mere 4-5hours seem effortless.

The wedding itself was beautiful and the happy couple looked gorgeous and Mel spent most of the ceremony in tears (but in a good way!) It was the only wedding I have ever been too where one of the prayers was for the couple to have “good sex”. Though in retrospect I think it really should be a standard. The reception was vegan (of course!) with stuffed mushrooms to die for. There was much dancing, lovely views over the bay and some beautiful heartfelt speeches (aww). I wish them both the best for their married life together.

Albany was the country town I studied for my end of high school Geography exams so despite only having been there once before I am somewhat familiar with the layout of the town and surrounding areas. However, towns change and grow and develop over time and it was interesting to see what was new. Like the Wind Farm.

Spent a few hours looking at the Wind Farm on the Sunday morning and I have to say that I was awed by its beauty and power. The farm consists of 12 turbines spread along the coastal cliffs with walkways and information points throughout. The views of the cliffs and ocean were fantastic (we were fortunate enough to spot a pod of dolphins riding the waves) as were the views of the Albany town site across the other side of the bay. The turbines themselves are magnificent to behold and are awesome to watch. The pathways mean you can walk right up and stand below one of them and they have designed it so that there are different vantage points to look at the others. There is so much controversy over power sources and many people consider wind farms to be an eyesore. Perhaps it is the geek winning out over the environmentalist in me but I found the Albany Wind Farm to be beautiful and graceful to look at. When you consider the other options such as smoke stacks or nuclear power plants I have to give wind power a big thumbs up.

Spent the Sunday taking a bit long coming back as we stopped off at a few of the towns to have a look around and stumbled across a little growers market. Bought some white nectarine and vanilla jam, fresh raspberries, organic nashi pears and zucchini all of which were very yummy.