More Winter Celebrating

The Winter Festival continued for two weeks with the night time events just being one part of it.  During the daytime there is the ferris wheel, house of mirrors and the big attraction of the ice skating.

When Mum and I were up the street during the festival I decided to take her up to the festival and we watched the ice skating for a while.  I asked her if she was feeling brave.  The up shot of this was that we parked her wheely walker and hopped on the ferris wheel.

At the age of eighty eight, this was Mum's first ever ride on a ferris wheel.  Dad had always taken us on the ride when we were little.

Mick reckoned she looks terrified, but Mum assured him that she wasn't.  I'm so pleased that we did this.

The following Saturday we went back in to the "Brew and Bite" evening event.  The weather was good and the crowds were out.  It was great to see.  We enjoyed catching up with friends who also ventured out.

We had a dragon in the fountain this time.

There were a few musicians to keep us entertained.

We watched a bit of the general ice skating.  The first year most people were fumbling their way around.  You can notice an increase in skills each year.  

Then the professionals came out and showed us how it's done.

The big old trees in the park were all lit up.

The Carillon is always the centre piece of Kings Parade.

This time there were lots of interesting market stall.

Yes, another ferris wheel photo.

More great entertainment.

Looking towards all the food and beverage stalls.  We start the evening each time with a glass of mulled wine from Renzaglia Wines, who were our next door neighbours when we lived out of town.  It is a delicious, warming way to start the night.  We didn't get around to buying anything to eat until about eight o'clock and many of the food vans had sold out.  That was a wonderful result for them.  We went to the local Chinese restaurant and enjoyed a tasty meal.

And now it is all over for another year.  My workplace is quite near the parks and on Monday it was a little sad seeing the attractions being dismantled.  

I think the event is going from strength to strength and can't wait for next year to come around so that we can get rugged up and do it all again.