In praise of Orange, NSW

 This has been a nostalgic trip for Andrew who grew up in Orange.  He left to go to university at age 16 and never lived there again.

The family house in Edward Street.

What used to be the corner store Eddy's is now a private dwelling.  It still looks like a corner store :-)

Orange East Public School.

Spring Creek Dam, near where the sawmill had been where Andrew's father and mother worked in their early years  in Australia.

Orange is a very nice town, full of old buildings.  The town council has heritage listed them all so there are very few modern buildings in the centre of town, thus retaining the character of the town.  This week's Weekend Australian magazine had an article on the stream of tree changers in Oz.  This is people, young and old, who are leaving the big city centres and relocating to regional areas.  Orange is apparently one of the ones attracting many of these people, often from Sydney.  They bring business opportunities, money, open new restaurants and cafes and generally keep the town thriving and economically vibrant.  Even Covid had little impact on Orange with only two people affected both of whom recovered.

The lovely grocery store cum cafe The Agrestic Grocer we went to for morning tea and where I bought a big jar of marinated olives.  

Our hostess Narelle who went to Andrew's school but a few years behind him. His sister Joan and Narelle were, and remain, best friends.  Not only did we meet up with Narelle whom we have known for a long time, but we also met up with two other people from Andrew's class at high school.

The beautifully decorated sour dough bread which Nikki could only admire from afar.  But it certainly looked good enough to eat and was very photogenic.

Last night we went to a wonderful restaurant Bodhi Vegetarian Restaurant.  We had tried to go to Mr Lim, a Korean restaurant but it was fully booked but I am glad we could not go there as the vegetarian option was really nice.  As well as the food, they had a great variety of teas to choose from and our choice was particularly flavoursome.

Before leaving we drove to the Pinnacle Lookout and climbed up high to get a lovely view over the surrounding countryside.