The annual Manjimup Cherry Harmony Festival has been launched in West Australia's deep south west.OK, there were no cherries, but there were blossoms, not much, because we left the launch a bit late in the season, but there were cherries, lovely cheeky little green buds - and hundreds of them.
Which means this year's crop with be a bumper, all other things working climatically in favour.
Among the big announcements: the New Zealand Central Otago town of Cromwell will send us the New Zealand Cherry Stone Spitting Champion.
This is no idle threat.
Them New Zealanders can spit. Expecially those raised in the high country on fresh fruit and veg.
The Cromwell Promotions Group is organising the Big Spit on the south island and they only have two requirements for entry: the spitter has a current valid passport and is ready to leave on a jet plane.
Why?
Because the Manjimup spit-off is the very next week: December 16th.
And when in Manjimup there will be no idle spitting.
The pips will fly to determine the winner of the GlobeVista Australasian Cherry Pip Spitting Championship.
Yes, it's another TransTasman rivalry and it all begin in Manjimup: Big Timber Country, Big Caulie Country and Big Broccoli Country.
What's more, I have been in contact with folk in the town of Ficksburg, in South Africa's Eastern Free State, home of a 39 year old cherry festival, about an even bigger spit-off next year. Ficksburg is nestled at the foot of Imperani Mountain and on the banks of the Caledon River, right up against the border with Lesotho. (Goodle it and check it out.)
Who would have thought the simple and primitive art of chery pit spitting could reach such a wide audience.
Saliva has long been thought of as having healing properties, in the future, it could bring nations together.
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