We just finished our four week work stint and had yet another dinner at Montes. We nestled in one of the many niches there and two of us shared a Mexican Parmigana. After dinner we drove to Araluen to see the Beanie Festival. It had only opened a few minutes before, the grand opening following some speeches we missed while enjoying Pinot Grigio at Montes.

There were food stalls outside the centre, perched on the road, CWA, Argentinian pasties and other local foodies. For once I forego the food, and decided I should be a culture vulture as opposed to a vulture pure and simple. Many locals had come along for the evening. The exhibition boy goes for a few days before traveling interstate. There was a long queue of jostling cheery folk keen to see the felt and wool inventions on display.

Well we were none of us disappointed. The theme was ” Reach for the stars” and the theme was well and truly embraced. There were beanies birdlike, dalek beanies, Tharsis beanies, rainbow bee eater beanies, entire village beanies and so on. Gee, there are some very creative people out in the desert around Alice. I tried on a felt Beanie with fabric witchity grubs encircling the brow, Jen tried on a fabric creation of a white peacock. Daleks, flying saucers, stars and planets, birds and just people standing around admiring the sky- all of these themes were splendidly and colourfully conjured into head wear to delight the artistic sensibility of the wearer.

Enough scribbling, let’s look at some photos from the night.

Great aren’t they.

Most of these wonderful hats are made by Indigenous men and women to raise money for their communities and create wonderful art.

here is some more