Canberra Birds

We saw these birds while walking around Canberra - the Green is a female King Parrot and the Red is an Eastern Rosella.

Canberra War Memorial

The red that you see are poppies inserted by people's names all along the wall. Poppies have only recently been adopted in Australia, as a sign of remembrance. Obviously we felt some Canadian pride at that! Also, I was interested that 2 whole panels were dedicated to Australian war dead in the service of the Royal Canadian Airforce in WWII. This is a bit mysterious to me since they had their own RAAF.

Canberra War Memorial

One thing is for sure, Australia has very impressive war memorials. Most every town has one - this is the National War Memorial in the Capital of Canberra. These were built primarily in remembrance of WWI and Gallipolli, but now encompass all the conflicts the Aussies have been a part of.

Road Trip #4 - Tidbinbilla, A.C.T.

And then we ran into a whole herd of Emus, they were just wandering around close to the road.

Road Trip #4 - Tidbinbilla, A.C.T.

These are Wallaroos. They are halfway in size between Kangaroos and Wallabies. There were a lot of them and they were pretty tame. I got to about 8 feet away before they decided to move away.

When we drove by the same spot about an hour later they were all gone - so we felt lucky to have had this chance encounter and get so close to them.

Road Trip #4 - Tidbinbilla, A.C.T.

It's funny, we saw these kangaroos and each time we've seen a group, they always have a dominant male (that's him on the move). Once you get within a certain distance the male moves around and watches but everyone else is lazy until you start to get a lot closer.

First Fleet Convicts

Last weekend Shirley and I went to The Hyde Park Barracks Museum in downtown Sydney. I'm sure everyone knows that Australia was started by the British as a place to transport convicts to. A very interesting place to see the history of the start of this great nation. In one room there were three computers screens set up where you could search the data base of all the convicts that were sent here, starting with the first fleet in 1788. Both Shirley and I started search our family names. I started with Langley and found two William Langley's. Next it was Marshall. Mom is there anything you want to tell us?....... Like why is there over 5 pages of Marshall's.........I'm just asking?

Bird of the Day

Today I give you a male Superb Lyrebird. What a showy tail!

Birds of the Day

This is a New Holland Honeyeater, I saw them often eating on flowers.

This is a Little Wattlebird. It shows a lot more colour in flight and seemed to chase off every other little bird in site

This regal guy is a Nankeen Kestrel. This guy hovered in place to look for food which I learned to be grasshoppers.

Easter Showbags

A whole exhibition hall dedicated to Showbags. What we would probably call lootbags - look at the limitless kinds you can get. Barbie, Action Figure, Princess, Cadbury chocolate and maybe best of all - a whole booth of AC/DC showbags!

Sydney Royal Easter Show

But then what's this?

Sydney Royal Easter Show

Pretty much see the usual stuff.....

Sydney Royal Easter Show

So we went to the Sydney Royal Easter Show this weekend. Remembering it's autumn here this is the Sydney equivalent of the Canadian National Exhibition.

Bird of the Day

This is an Azure Kingfisher. It was an unexpected find for me as I saw little out of the ordinary today.

Platypus

You know you can read about them, and see them on tv - but when you actually SEE one - it's incredible - webbed feet, bill like a duck but fur. Cool!

Birds of the Day

These are Double-Barred Finches. Very cute little guys that I saw alone or in pairs. If one was by itself, there wasn't another in sight. When I saw them in pairs, there where lots of pairs, at least 7 or 8 pairs in the tree!

Flowers and Birds

If you look closely at the whiteflowered bush there is a Rainbow Lorikeet feeding on one of the flowers. The pink flowered bush - I do not know what it is, but the flowers were stunning.

Balmain

Original Ferryman's cottage, close to the wharf.

Balmain

You can see the houses are picturesque and well preserved. This is a very expensive and trendy area of Sydney so many have been updated. Part of the reason, other than the historic values are that there are ferries that take only a few minutes to the Central Business District (CBD) of Sydney. The house with the magnolia in front is interesting because (speculating here) it very much looks like 3 original terrace homes combined into one. So you can see how narrow they were. This makes sense as Balmain was a worker's neighbourhood in the 1800's. Ferries have run from Balmain to "Sydney Town" since that time.

Balmain

Balmain is one of the oldest areas of Sydney after "The Rocks". A mix of Australian architecture - many in the sand coloured limestone typical of Sydney. Timber houses were uncommon as the native trees are extremely hard so not easily sawn down to planks. Easier to quarry stone - go figure.

Road Trip #3 - Jenolan Caves

This is a photo of the "graffiti" made in one of the caves by people using smoke from their candles. If you look carefully you can see the dates - 1889. This area was a picnic spot and has many broken stalactites as people took them as souvenirs.

Road Trip #3 - Jenolan Caves

Road Trip #3 - Jenolan Caves

Road Trip #3 - Jenolan Caves

The Jenolan Caves have been known since at least the 1860's. How they got to them I have no idea although apparently there was a bridle path by the 1880's out of Katoomba. To drive there is basically a one lane road hugging the mountains (getting to be an expert at these - at least this one had a guard rail!) complete with blind hairpin turns. Not for the faint of heart is how they advertise it. They are still discovering adjacent caves to this day.

The one with the stairs cut into the rock is the Cathedral Cave and was one of the first discovered. It is very large and hosts concerts, weddings and other events. Would be interested to see the bride cover the many narrow steps to get into it!