Raspberries & Waterfalls

We are well into our first week of the summer holidays and I can’t tell you how amazing it feels to know
we don’t have to go to work for another five weeks! Yippee! Since July, Ella has been in daycare full-time,
but we’ve dropped her down to two days a week for now. She loves going to daycare but equally I think
she has enjoyed having a bit more time with us at home over the last week. We have spent a lot of time
at the local pool, Brunswick Baths, as we’ve had some very hot (over 35 degree) days here in Melbourne.
On Wednesday it cooled off a little, so we decided to do something a little different, and headed north of
the city to Kinglake Raspberries to do some raspberry picking.

Andy was a bit skeptical about this idea, and I’ll admit I was not entirely sure Ella was old enough for fruit
picking. Andy also reminded me that this is the work that travellers on working holiday visas do so they
can extend their stay in Australia, ie, why would we do this for fun? But I remember going strawberry
picking as a kid and so it seemed like a fun family thing to do. In the end, we didn’t need to worry, as any
activity where Ella can eat unlimited fruit is a good activity in her eyes! There were rows and rows of ripe
juicy berries, and we did about 45 minutes of picking, getting just over 1kg of berries. I’m not sure how
much we actually
picked if you count the amount Ella ate… when we first arrived she was putting berries into her mouth
nearly as fast as I was picking them, and our basket seemed like it would never fill up. But we finally
convinced her to pick the “really, really red” ones and put them in her basket without eating them. At
$18/kg, they were a great price compared to the current price in the grocery store, which is $32/kg.

We then headed to the nearby Kinglake National Park, where there are many different walks,
picnic areas and camping sites. The closest picnic site to Kinglake Raspberries was at Masons Falls,
so we drove there to have the packed lunch we prepared at home:

After lunch, we did a 1.4km (return) walk to Masons Falls through the tall gumtrees and lush ferns.
This area was badly affected by the bushfires in 2009, but there has been a lot of regrowth of the forest
since then. The waterfall was pretty spectacular, my picture doesn't really do it justice!

The walk was very easy, but Ella was getting tired by then so Andy and I had to take turns carrying her.
By that I mean mostly Andy carried her, as she is getting way too heavy for me.  She is learning how to
be carried piggy-back style though, which is helpful.

We’ve been eating a lot of raspberries over the past few days, in our cereal, with yogurt and in smoothies.
I’ve also made raspberry chia seed jam, raspberry and white chocolate muffins, and
raspberry chocolate brownies. All three are great recipes.