Three days

We've just enjoyed three stunning days with dear family and friends. ....

... starting Friday when we headed off to Rosedale (early), leaving us plenty of time to check out the local wildlife (and my best picture ever of a Rainbow Lorikeet) just off the verandah of Judy and Jurgen's Rosedale property.......

.. before making our way to our much anticipated lunch date - at The River Restaurant on Church St in Moruya. The restaurant is in an unremarkable looking old timber cottage but the interior is light and bright with great views of the Moruya River and the mountains beyond. The food was fantastic - locally sourced French cooking - with very refined technique and fabulous local ingredients.

 My darling sister Maxie and I both chose the crab and celeriac risotto, fennel, champagne veloute for entree.

 And we both loved the pan fried salmon, crushed new potato, lobster veloute, Beurre cafe de Paris for mains (such a tough choice between that and the confit of duck (with polenta chips!!)

 We were all agreed on our choice of dessert: lime curd meringue tartlet with vanilla ice cream (sigh) - YUM!

 We loved our lunch at the River Moruya - and we're already planning a return visit - and all a very achievable day's outing from Canberra (especially when Rob is so prepared to do all the driving).

 The Moruya River on a cloudy Winter afternoon ....

 Ros arrived, as planned, on Friday night, although none of us was happy about the hour and a half delay on her flight from Melbourne (grrrr!). Although Ros could only stay for the weekend we were so happy to see her and made sure we saw as much of each other as we could, while she was here.

 Claire and the boys joined us for breakfast on Saturday morning - a lovely surprise - and we were treated to an almost hour long concert by Ollie who appreciated Rob's beautiful acoustic guitar enough to give us this impromptu extended performance. His playing is jaw dropping amazing - no doubt because of the hours he spends playing, although not always on an acoustic guitar. This boy is going far!

 We did coffee and lunch at Sonoma Braddon and then dinner at Maxie and Rod's on Saturday night. We talked non stop, facetimed with family (who had some amazing news), did more eating, and barely had enough time to watch a recent movie download. We had high hopes of "Aftermath" but eventually decided it was a bit melodramatic and a wasted opportunity of a movie (in our humble opinions).

We took Ros to the Conservatory Restaurant at Canberra's fabulous Arboretum for breakfast this morning - a great choice with its spectacular views, stunning building and great food!

 And we had enough time for a walk afterwards through the beautiful Himalayan cedar Forest ......

 and a drive up to the summit of Mt Ainslie to get a big picture view of Canberra and the Captain Cook Memorial Jet (just beside Commonwealth Bridge) - finally back in action after months under repair for "technical difficulties".

 Unfortunately Ros had to leave soon after lunch. Such a short space of time to enjoy each other's company but very much appreciated all the same! We loved having this chance for some sister (and close family) time together especially because Maxie is starting to feel well enough again to enjoy company and some good times after a pretty horrendous month of not being well at all!