Pottery, Travels.

G'Day,
I have been away over the last 4 days and just got back tonight. I took my car with Kath Edie and Milton as passengers. On the way home we went down through Nowra, then south to stay the night on the beach at Mollymook, then on to show off one of my favourite places, the beach at Tomakin just below Bateman's bay where we fossicked amongst the rocks at the northern end of the beach. Then back home through Canberra.
I went to a post reduction Raku lustre workshop at fitzroy falls in the southern highlands of N.S.W. I took a soul healing bush walk in a green, cool, moist forest. I went out for meals and on the way home I put my feet in the ocean. Lovely!
I wanted to share my pictures with everyone to show off what a nice trip I had. The first picture is taken from Cambewarra lookout. It shows the view from the escarpment looking south along the shoalhaven coast. The town below is Nowra.
Looking south from Cambewarra lookout again.
Milton, Liz and I went for a bushwalk along the tracks at Fitzroy Falls on friday evening. This picture is of an area on the walk near twin falls called the grotto. I can imagine seeing a mythical critter peeking out from behind this lovely old twisty, mossy tree. No! that is my friend Liz in the background.Lol.
I was a bit naughty and climbed over the baricade at the grotto to take the this picture from behind the waterfall.
A little cascade in the grotto down at eye level. The water was tea coloured.
Part of the walking track. A cool, green, damp, silent,mystical, sacred place with big fern trees in the under story on the forest floor.
Opps sorry, this pic is out of place here. It is at the lookout again. The plant was a plectranthus I think, as it is the same as one I have at home but it is a giant sized version. This one was about 6 ft tall. Mine is maybe the dwarf version.
Milton on the walking track at Fitzroy falls, the Twin falls area. Getting there was fine, but going back was all up hill. Puff Puff.
This is the little cascade shown in the earlier pic, from a more sensible position.
Wonderful mossy rocks and twisted trees in the grotto.
Also taken from the grotto. The water dissapearing down over the bigger falls.
This was behind, and underneath the waterfall in the grotto.I couldn't resist climbing in there.
Here is a big freshly dug wombat hole. Look at all that clay. If you can enlarge this I think the wombat is home. You can see its eyes and nose showing up in the dark. I didn't know it was there until I looked at the photo.
Looking down one of the Twin Falls. It was a long way down, you couldn't see the bottom from here.
The valley. There are lots of waterfalls draining into the river that runs along the bottom of here. Big wild bush.
This is the waterfall looking down from above the grotto.
Liz. Picture taken of taking pictures.
Right!. Here is what we went to Fitzroy Falls for. Pottery. I loved this big platter. It is by our tutor for the workshop. Neil Boughton. Not in my price range.But I did buy a small blue vase of his to take home.
More of Neil's big beautiful pots. These show the results from the Raku Lustre process he is famous for. Apart from making great pots, he is a nice bloke.
This is another one of his pots. This one is not raku. It has rams head handles.
This is a close up of a wildflower near the cottages where our group stayed. I think it might be called "Devil in a Bush", but I am not sure. If you know tell me what it is.
This was a grevillea growing near the cottages in the bush.
Kasee and Edie relaxing at the workshop.
Liz at the B.B.Q. on saturday night.
Brian, Di, Mia and Connor, at the B.B.Q.
Cooking tea. Friday night. Potters are naturally fire bugs I reckon.
Edie and Milton, saturday night.
Here is a step by step look at the Raku Lustre process, Neil Boughton style. This is the first step in the firing process. This is Milton painting the glaze onto his pot.
And Kath, my good friend and birthday buddy, deep in concentration glazing her pots. I really like the pictures taken when the victim doesn't know they are the victim.
Mia doing her glazing. Behind her is Connor and Milton. Note the little wooden marquettes on the rafter behind her. Neil uses them as profile examples for his pots.
Sharon and Di.
Glazed pots in a cold kiln.
Opps! this one is out of order too. They show Di's pots after firing. She is glazing one of these in the picture two up from here.
Our tutor Neil decorating one of his pots. At the moment he is decorating things with octopus patterns, which is what is going onto this pot.
The pots are buried in a big vat of dampened sawdust to further smoke and add to the reduction effect from the in kiln reduction.
Neil lighting the gasses escaping from the kiln while it is reducing. Looks great fun doesn't it. See the face on the wall in terracotta. It is his self portrait and quite a good likeness.
Glazed, unfired pots drying on top of the hot kiln before going in to be fired. Note my two chooks, you will see them finished later in this post.
Kasse's pots. A good example of the results we got with the raku lustres.
Sharon's Raku crackle glazed Budda.
Here are my finished chookies. Great lustres. I like shiny.
Some more of my pots. I didn't like the last one here before it was fired so I did it as my first experiment and was very pleased at the results.

Sharon's lovely little dishes and spheres.
These are my wood inspired pots. They were glazed in the turquoise, copper glaze. Here you can see the effects of the reduction and how the process changes copper in the glaze to metalic reds. The green bits on the rims are where the colour hasn't been changed so much.
The same pots from a different angle.
Milton's gold dish with the leaf and Mia's round dish. Showing lots of metalic lustre.
The square plate and little dishes were done by Sharon.