Summer means tie-dye, hot chips and sunburn. It means afternoon rain storms and sleepless nights under mosquito nets. Salt-stringy hair and pale denim. And best of all, road trips.
I did a couple down to the coast during this summer, and discovered some amazing little shops on the way. Firstly there was Winch Books in Bungendore – your genuine, old-school, ramshackle book shop. Think Black Books but with charming (rather than terrifying) staff. I found some great old poetry books, and I’m sure there were some fantastic hidden treasures there – hidden being the operative word, because you’d definitely need to look for them!
Up the road was a leather shop, so enticing it managed to draw in even my strictest animal-loving vegetarian friends. There were cute shoulder bags in the shape of elephants and frogs, and then there were keyrings made out of actual frogs – well, cane toads. I kid you not. There were also new and vintage leather bags, fox tails, kangaroo skins, cow skins, tooled leather bags and wallets, and for some reason, a bunch of bowler and top hats – overall the perfect mix of quirky and cute.
Then about 40 minutes away in Braidwood we visited a shop a friend had told me about called Hoola Hoop, which sells vintage and rockabilly-style clothes and accessories. It was looking kinda sparse – possibly because the tourists had bought it all up – but there was still some fun stuff there, with brands like Heartbreaker and Hot Couture. If you don't fancy the drive, you can also do online purchases from their website.
