A holiday for Colin

I'm on the move again! This time my trip is to a caravan park only a half day's drive from home. I felt so guilty about having a trip without my husband that I organised a week where we could holiday together. The trouble is, I enjoy going away and seeing and doing new things but hubby would far rather stay home and “potter”!

So we are at South Balina but before we picked up the key to our “superior cabin” we called in to the town of Ballina and walked along a path beside the sea.

At this stage Colin looked happy – he had spotted whales spouting way out to sea and the sun was warm on this mid winter day.

New concrete boulders had been added to the sea wall – we learned this when Colin stopped a local and asked about the white things that we could see out there.

I was busy taking photos of the banksia flowers, the blossoms are at their best at this time of the year, A noisy miner was enjoying the nectar from one of the heads of flowers (each of those thin whiskers is an individual flower) so I just had to include his picture!

We had seen a sign post to the lighthouse and our beach-side walk took us right to it. What a little lighthouse! With all the trees on the beach front and around the lawns of the lighthouse, it s a wonder that the light can be seen by any ships! My photo shows the only clear view of the sea that the lighthouse has.

To reach the place where we are staying tonight and for the next few days, we could either drive a long way before we could reach a bridge over the Richmond River or we could put the car on the ferry. Since I was the driver, I chose the ferry!

Here it is coming in to the Ballina side of the river.

And here is my smart little red road racer, enjoying a cruise on the river!

Once we had unpacked the car and boiled the kettle for a “cuppa” Colin was ready to sit down and relax – but I wanted to go for a walk. That worked! I took my camera and off I went!

I wont bore you with the pictures I took – I like them but they are just plants and trees and river and trawlers sailing out at sunset and that sort of thing. But I will show you This one.

I spotted these tiny flowers and they seemed to have little faces on them. They even look as if they two of them are blowing bubbles!

I was hoping that I would be treated to a spectacular sunset and sat myself down on the river bank and waited – but the clouds fizzled out and it was becoming very evident that all that would happen would be a glow. Realising that I might end up having to walk back along a gravel road in the dark I gave up waiting for the sunset and headed back towards the caravan park. Passing a boat ramp I was thrilled to realise I would get my photograph after all. This is what I captured.

Colin was just beginning to be concerned about my whereabouts when I walked through the door. Then it was time to prepare the evening meal – and the time when I realised that I had forgotten to bring a few essential things that we really needed for cooking! Sigh! Looks like we go shopping tomorrow before we go exploring – or maybe we can do it the other way around!

Link to more photos of Spring in Toowoomba

As promised, I have put my photos of the Gardens I visited into an album.
Here they are.

The Spring Gardens of Toowoomba 2011

Enjoy!
AJ

Playing with the camera

I enjoy writing this blog and when "work" gets in the way and I am too exhausted to write in an evening I start feeling as though I have let the blog down! Tonight the family has departed and the excitement that has gripped the place has relaxed and once again I can sit quietly at the computer and put up a few pictures.
No matter how busy I get I still manage to see things that insist on being the subject of a photograph. Like this fellow who posed so beautifully in the tree opposite the veranda.

 

f/9  1/250  270mm  ISO 640

White cockatoos have become quite numerous and in the mornings a flock of close on fifty of them fly over screeching loudly, at around five thirty. (It is quite bright at that time these summer mornings) They have destroyed every last one of our lemons long before they are even yellow so when they settle in the back yard I no longer chase them away - there is nothing edible left worth getting excited about! This year I will have to buy lemons and passion-fruit. When Colin announced that he was going to build me a vegetable garden I couldn't help but laugh. I have gone to great lengths to attract birds and animals to the garden so it would be a garden for the wildlife! What the wildlife doesn't eat the fruit flies and the grubs will!
At last I have put the Macro/wide lens converter onto my camera and had a little play with it. I really can get up nice and close to plants now - but of course this is not a true macro and I am still limited by the f/3.5 of the 18-55mm lens it screws onto. Here are a couple of shots I have taken with this extension lens.

 

f/9  1/320  55mm + macro lens ISO 640

So I can get in much closer to the subject and far from being a handicap, the aperture setting allows more of the curve of petals to be in focus. I am also delighted that the lens is as sharp as it is considering it is two extra pieces of glass in front of the 18-55mm lens, also no distortion.

 

f/9 1/160 55mm+macro lens ISO 640

I don't know if you have ever looked closely at the flowers of a crepe myrtle, it looks like a mass of fluffy petals making up a fairly large head of flowers. Click on this picture and see just one of those fluffy petals! This is a lens I can enjoy using!
AJ

Splendour in the garden

Each morning before Christmas I would look out the window and urge my little tree to flower in time for December 25th - and it did! Mind you it was such terrible weather than no one, other than me, bothered to look out of the window to admire it!

As you can tell from the bleak looking sky this picture (taken this morning) was also taken on a non sunny day - but at least the rain had stopped!  I rolled up my trouser legs to the knees and donned my heavy sneakers to venture out onto the lawn to take a few photos to share.

I have possibly left deep impressions in the lawn where I walked! The ground is absolutely sodden and although I walked slowly and carefully the mud squelched up and I discovered splashes of mud on the knee and thigh of my pink pants!

My tree must be roughly the height of my big son by now so once it has reached its potential - which I think is 20 meters - it will be an amazing sight to see if it gets this proportion of blooms on it. They are so bright and showy. I was afraid that the torrential rain that has battered us over the last few days would have ruined the flowers so it was with much relief that I found the flowers intact.
Another young tree is also making a colourful show.

This tree is a Tibouchina Austenville and has been grown from a cutting - a gift from a friend who thought it was going to be a white flowering Tibouchina. We have another tree (this same purple) that is near the house and has been cut back many many times but it is not flowering or even close to flowering at the moment. Funny that we should have so many different Tibouchina trees and they all flower at different times. Incidentally, if you are curious about the tall spikes of pink and purple flowers near the flowering eucalyptus, they are one genus of the bromilliads. I forget the name of it. The leaves are quite dangerous when I do the weeding, I always come inside covered with blood from them - they have the most evil downward pointing spikes along the edges. Colin bought me some elbow length gardening gloves to wear when near them - but I never remember to put those ones on! I do wear gloves when gardening.
AJ

Garden growth

A big round ball caught my attention this morning. I looked out of the window that overlooks the swimming pool and there below me was this big golden orb. Out came the camera (of course!) and without even checking the ISO I went into action.
Why did I mention the ISO? Because it was still set for the dim light in which I used the camera yesterday! Grr!
Anyway, the camera is more intelligent than I am and the photos came out fine! The focus was set to manual - I sometimes cannot get the right thing in focus when I rely on the auto focus - and thanks to the decent sized viewfinder on my Nikon D90 I seem to be able to get the focus accurate in Manual mode.

f/20  1/125  ISO 640    78mm

Obviously I am looking down on this plant from above. We have a two story home with a veranda on three sides on the upper floor. The birds are seen on the side veranda. This shot was from the back veranda, which is only narrow enough to walk along comfortably. All the leaves on the plant - it is one of the Cycads - have white fringing on them. This has been caused by the grub of a small grey moth. We spray when we see the moths but obviously don't stop them all!

f/20     1/125    ISO 640      300mm

The second shot was taken from the same place on the veranda (using the 70-300mm lens) and shows the wonderful patterning created by the petals on this flower. For that is what the ball is. It is the flower of the female cycad or Sago Palm.

f/16    1/80    ISO 640    50mm

Now I have managed to get into the swimming pool yard without being followed by the dogs! You can now see just how large this plant has grown. Many years ago I sent away to a seed specialist for the seeds for this cycad, an envelope with four huge seeds (you can see some under the leaves) arrived in the post (remember those days when mail came in an envelope?) so this large plant came from a seed that I planted and nurtured.
Many of the seeds do fall to the ground (and germinate) and many stay anchored to the plant - and many of them germinate on the trunk of the plant.
The flower will open and seeds will have been formed under the protection of those woody petals so they will be revealed. Then new leaves will sprout from the centre of the core of the flower and force the seeds to the outside of the plant. Then the seeds will fall to the ground. That is how the trunk is formed too.

f/6.3    1/80   ISO 640   50mm

This last shot was taken with the swimming pool behind me to show how some of the seeds have germinated on the trunk of the parent plant. We have to cut them off before they get too big and put them into pots to give away (or we would soon have a forest) or the plant would become far to large and untidy.
Do click on each of the photos to see them in more detail. That way you will be able to see the shape, size and colour of the seeds too.
AJ

Shapes and form

I have been spending a little time tidying up the photos that were taken on my recent trip to Coober Pedy and places in-between and today was working on some taken in and around Broken Hill. Broken Hill is in New South Wales and rushed into life when a boundary rider discovered that a broken hill was made up of the ore that contains silver. That broken hill has been mined into oblivion but it gave its name to the town that grew because of the minerals it contained.

Having seen a video made by a friend of a rather special garden that had been created in the desert that is where our travels took us. Within this "Living Desert" area is a hill on which stand some huge carved rocks. There is quite a story behind the symposium of the carvings but I was more interested in the way these rocky shapes fitted into the landscape than in why and how they came to be here!

When I take my photos I am not merely taking a record of what I see, I try to create an image that I feel is balanced and tells some sort of "story".
Composition is not always with the memory of the photographic "rules" and yet my main subject does seem to fall in that golden rule of thirds.

f/18 1/80 ISO 800   24mm

When these photos were taken it was starting to rain - in fact a few of my shot have a rain drop blurring the picture - so determined was I to get what I wanted I was prepared to defy the elements. Just as well really because the next day we could not return to the sculptures because the road was closed - the rain had made the track impassible.

f/7.1  1/125  ISO 800  35mm

This second shot is not of a sculpture but of some of the rocks that had been delivered when the symposium was taking place. They may have been arranged or they may have been dropped from a tip truck and landed in the fashion - but I found the stones very ornamental and the light and shadow (even though there was no sun and therefore no shadows) very artistic. I loved the colour of the rocks and the way they contrasted so acutely with the landscape beyond.
My next sculpture also fits into the golden rule. The shot of the random rocks were more centred but still make a balance picture - maybe it is the leaning rock on the left side that has an anchoring effect.

f/10  1/125  ISO 800  26mm

This photo has the weight on the right side. I tend to use the "lean" of the main subject to direct me where to position it in the picture. If I had this sculpture positioned on the left of the picture it would look as if it was trying to get out of the frame.
Wanting to experiment a little I crouched down for the next shot.

f/10   1/125   ISO 800  48mm

The desert does not look like a desert at all and I wanted to use some of this unusual growth and colour and throw the shapes into the background without removing them. The plants that are around the sculptures are natives of this area but they have been deliberately planted here to showcase the native plants of the Broken Hill area. You will notice with the above picture that although the focus is on the plants that thought has been given to the placement of the sculptures behind. The shot would look rather bland if those stone pillars were centred.
Another thing you will notice is that the ISO is very high for these photographs. It is only with Photoshop tweaking that they are as bright as they are! It was really dark when we were up on this hill and I needed to compensate for that dullness so that I was able to get a wide depth of field for some of my shots. Without the high ISO none of that desert in the background would have been visible in the first three shots because with a low ISO my aperture would have been so open that only part of the sculpture would have been in focus.
I hope you find my ramblings of interest.
AJ



Back o Bourke

When someone wants to express that they have travelled deep into the outback of Australia they say they have been “back o Bourke”. Bourke is quite a long way west – so I think we have been quite a bit back o Bourke in the past two weeks!
Today we visited Bourke – which has a most striking mural to welcome drivers entering the town.

Two “swaggies” (the name given to Depression days wandering tramps who would do odd jobs in exchange for food) with their packs (matilda's) on their shoulders striding off into the great desert away from civilization (through the farm gate).

Last year a special exhibition display was opened called “Back o Bourke”

We parked the car and paid our dues to wander through the three buildings housing the displays. In the first was an audio visual display which was very well done, then through an interesting dryland garden into the next building in which there were more audio visuals but no audio! We had been told there were headphones but we couldn't find any! So that part of the display fell a bit flat – instead I read out the bush poetry that was all around the walls and entertained Colin with my own audio! (He couldn't be bothered reading the poems for himself).

Outside again and into another building. This had all sorts of things to read up on the walls. We watched a rather clever presentation of a paddle-steamer making its way up the Darling River and listened to the commentary that informed the listeners of how goods were loaded and many other things too. Finally we followed the path that lead to the exit and found ourselves in the cafe! We nearly bought an ice-cream but realised in time that it would be melted into liquid the moment we stepped outside. When we did get out we found we had half a kilometer to walk to get to where the car was parked! Fancy the tour ending up so far away from where you start! We told ourselves that the walk would “do us good”!

Unfortunately we were unable to partake in a riverboat ride – there is a paddle-steamer that runs every afternoon. The river is so high that the paddle-steamer cannot fit under the cables and power lines that criss-cross the river! They do not think the paddle-steamer will be able to negotiate the river until well into November. We seem to be encountering many things on this trip that we cannot do!

To make up for that disappointment we took a short detour off the road and followed a sign to see some “carved trees”. We had no idea what these would be and curiosity drew us on. When we came up to a sign saying “road closed” our hearts dropped but we turned down a track and found that we had come the right way after all.

I did not know about the aborigines carving trees for their ceremonies so to read the boards describing where they were found and what they had been used for was a delight. These relics of a lost civilization are here in the middle of no-where and we were fortunate enough to be able to see them.

The carvings are quite masterful and nothing like the primitive art we have seen on the walls of cliffs and overhangs, nor like the painting that the aborigines are creating these days.

For me this was a real highlight of today.

Finally a photograph to show you the reason I wanted to head "out west".

The wildflowers after the rains - and the bush and the greenery are something like we may not see for many years to come. Australia is a land of extremes and most of the time the interior of this country is barren of plants except for the hardiest of trees and salt bush plants. This year the country looks amazing. The yellow in this picture is from millions of wild mustard flowers. They are very common but at the moment look stunning - back in our farming days our house cow once had a wonderful feed of mustard flowers and we were unable to drink her milk for quite a while!

AJ

Dusty outback roads

Today was our first full day of travel on unsealed roads. The stretch between Coober Pedy and William Creek must have been very exciting to drive along three days ago, as soon as it was “open”. The ground looks as if it was not only slippery but very soft too. We stopped to take pictures of the state of the road and I am sharing one of them. Apparently if anyone drives down a road that is officially “closed” they are met at the end of the track by the police and there is a fine of one thousand dollars for every tyre that is on the road.

Our journey was not a fast one – after all we are on holiday and my purpose for being on this trip is to take photographs. At one of the creeks – which is now dry as a bone – I wandered down to see what it looked like (we had stopped for a cup of tea and all I had in my hand was my tea mug), when I stopped under one of the oddly shaped trees and looked up I soon retreated to the vehicle to get my camera. I changed the lens so I could zoom in because what I saw were two budgerigar. I spent a little time taking more photos while several four wheel drives with camper trailers zipped past and all gave cheery waves. No doubt grateful that they had no-one in their vehicle that was as photo-mad as me! The birds were not afraid of my proximity. I thought they would have gone by the time I returned with the camera but they were exactly where I had first seen them.

I walked a little further along the sandy creek bed after I had exhausted all the shot angles with them and found a bird feeding her youngster. Again they did not seem to mind me being below them and pointing a big black camera in their direction – the food exchange just continued as energetically as before I had reached them.

Budgies are native to Australia and are always green with yellow heads. This is their normal colouring. The blues and whites and different colours are created by breeders of tame birds. We used to have hundreds of Budgerigars when we lived on the farm but the sprays that were developed to kill the grasses that grew among the wheat was responsible for their disappearance. The spray was residual which meant that the grass seeds were unable to germinate and the grasses did not grow – good for wheat farmers but bad for the birds that used to exist on their seeds.

Apart from the budgerigars and ground larks that were quite numerous, we saw no more wildlife today. It is amazing that you can travel so many hundred kilometers and not see one emu, one kangaroo or one lizard or snake. There was plenty of colour: lots of greenery and plenty of colourful wildflowers.

We have a hazard light that tells us our new fuel filter is choked up. We must have some very dirty fuel in our tank. This has so distressed us that we will try to find somewhere that has the filter we need (we hope that we can actually get there without the motor seizing up) and then we shall head home as directly as we can. We did not drive out to Lake Eyre as we had wanted too – we could have been stranded out there and that frightened both of us. Nothing is worth taking that sort of risk for.

AJ

Opals in our sights

We enjoyed our short night in Woomera, it was quiet and we enjoyed a super meal (home cooked!). I was content because I had given my Nikon a good workout through the day. Colin was not so happy – we seem to be having more and more things go awry with the vehicle and he seems unable to sort out the problems. The trailer brakes did not get fixed after all – he had forgotten to purchase two washers! And the fuel filter needed to be replaced and we did not have one – and today is Sunday. Before we left Woomera we did a tour of the town and enjoyed wandering around the collection of rockets and rocket junk that is a memorial to all the activity that was here in the 1980s – not only by the British, I found out, but USA too. Both Colin and I took many photos of the exhibits before we hopped into the vehicle to drive the 250+ km to Coober Pedy.

There were many reasons to stop the vehicle (No! Only one, really! Joan wanted to take photos!) and each time we stopped we seemed to be meeting with the same tour group. When we arrived at Coober Pedy and were shown to our underground accommodation we looked up to see this same little bus and trailer pull into the car park behind us!

I wonder if they stopped, as we did, to run down into the scraggy brush and take photos of a most colourful and pretty succulent. I was quite surprised at the appearance of the flowers – I expected to find “pig-face” you know, that purple mesembryanthemum that grows in the sand at the edge of the beach. To find such a perfect little flower with yellow and white in the centre was a real treat.

We had stopped for a lunch on the side of the road when the phone rang – it was our son ringing from Broken Hill to tell us that we HAD to call in to one of the places in Coober Pedy and we were given a name to ask for. Apparently he had called to tell this fellow that we were coming and he insisted on us staying with him. Well, we did as we were told and we are this evening sitting outside our underground hideaway having eaten our meal (cooked on our own gas stove) and done the washing up! I also managed to take a Coober Pedy sunset shot too! Not as spectacular as last night's Woomera sunset because there were very few clouds to catch the light. Aren't we lucky to have a son who seems to know all the right people? We have been told to join in with one of the tours that starts at ten in the morning. Bed and opal mine tour all for being Firie's mum and dad!

We actually arrived here at two so we were able to explore the town on foot a little – we had to go on foot, on the way in the indicators stopped working! Something else to cause Colin to panic! Our explorations took us to a service station where we were able to get another fuse and another useful thing – Colin talked to anyone who had a Nissan Patrol and found out where we would be able to get a fuel filter in the morning.

I couldn't resist taking this photo of a couple of aboriginal men sitting on the pavement with their collection of dogs lounging nearby. This is a fairly typical scene in outback towns.

You will be happy to know that the brakes on the trailer were fixed this afternoon. Two out of three problems sorted!

Steven arrives in Cobber Pedy tomorrow afternoon so we will be able to say hello to him in person instead of by phone!

Friday as predicted.

The rain thundered down through the night and we were warm and cosy in our little caravan park cabin while a few hardy souls just across the lane-way from us were cowering under canvas after setting up their camper trailers. After showering and taking note of the conditions outside I persuaded Colin to come with me to the Living Desert Park again – but with raincoats and umbrella “just in case”. It was much brighter and it looked as if we might have a window of opportunity to go and see the wildflower garden part of the park.
To get to this area we had to drive past the entrance to the area we had visited yesterday when we went up to the Sculpture Symposium site. This morning there was a “road closed” sign on the entrance. The way in to the flower area is sealed and there are no gates so on we drove.
Fantastic! Not another person in the place so I could enjoy this park as if it were there just for me!
We donned our rain jackets and I slung the camera case over my shoulder so that I would have somewhere to stow the camera if the rain started. I also put on a pair of walking sneakers with heavy tread on the soles. We had barely reached the shelter in which there was a display of pictures when the clouds released their load! Down it came.

I took a photo back to where we had left the car in the sealed car park and when I looked around at the pictures in the shelter, there was a photo taken from almost the same place when the country looked like it did the last time Colin and I saw it back in the 70's – dry.

I took a photo of this picture so that I could show you two things – how the conditions change when rain comes and also how the park was started – with plantings and waterings. You can see the trickle irrigation water lines on the ground.
The rain did ease and although it was still falling lightly we set off up the slope and enjoyed the sight of a landscape that was quite unique.

The sky and weather were not really suitable for photography but still I managed to take a few, this is a colourful one of more Sturt Desert Peas among other native plants.
We returned to the Information Office to take back the key to the Reserve and were reimbursed our $20. I had not realised that the $20 was a bond and was quite surprised to be given money! Stepping outside the rain was falling again and from the shelter of the overhanging roof I took a photo of the wonderful red bottle brush and, across the road, a display of early mining equipment.

You can see how wet it was!
After shopping for parts for the broken brakes on the trailer we returned to our cabin and almost immediately the rain fell in earnest and the wind rose to gale force. It looked as if we were to be trapped indoors for the afternoon.
But that wasn't the case, as soon as the rain stopped I bullied Colin into the vehicle again and we drove up to the top of the “lode” to see the Miner's Memorial up close. I managed to get some interesting shots from the car as we drove up to the restaurant and information office – but getting out of the car and into that building was an adventure in itself! The wind was incredible up on the top of that rise! I nearly lost hold of the car door as I opened it – fortunately didn't! And then struggled against the wind to open the heavy door to the building!

I could not stand upright outside to take any shots of the town that was laid out below us so I took this shot of the rain clouds over Broken Hill from the window of the restaurant. We felt that we deserved a coffee and enjoyed one that was made by someone else for a change! I did enjoy it – and managed to feel a lot warmer as a result – I think the top temperature today is only 17 degrees.

Colin is now fixing the brakes on the trailer and replacing the windscreen wiper blades that must be dried up – the old ones made such a noise! He is quite happy now doing HIS thing!
AJ

From Cobar to Broken Hill

There had been a fair bit of rain overnight at Cobar but it had cleared by the time we packed the vehicle and trailer again. Our night in the motel had worked wonders for Colin, he had not slept the night before and was able to catch up – he was asleep from the time we unpacked in the afternoon until seven in the morning with a few moments awake to have a meal!

It was a glorious run through the most incredible scenery I have ever seen – I had left home determined to see the desert in bloom and here it was; even better than I had hoped.
I will not bore you with too many flower photos – but I could! I had a wonderful time and the Nikon was dug out of hiding and the Samsung relegated to quick snaps! The first blue photo is of the Paterson's Curse – a rather toxic weed that is not good for sheep and cattle – but it creates a most dramatic and eye catching display. This area of desert country had rains – very heavy rains – early in the year and as a result it no longer looks like a desert. There has been so much follow-up rain that the grass and wildflowers have continued to grow.

I didn't manage to get any photos of them but the area is alive with feral goats. We saw plenty of them and they all look very healthy. They were in all goat colours – from one colour to multi-colour. No wonder there was an advert on the place-mat in the Bowls Club where we had our evening meal for a goat buyer!

It was a huge distance between Cobar and Broken Hill and even though we used the sub-tank on the Nissan four wheel drive we still needed to use one of the jerrycans of diesel to make the distance. Since I was out of the vehicle I couldn't resist recording the event!

We arrived at Broken Hill just after three in the afternoon and booked ourselves into one of the caravan parks – in a cabin – for two nights. Heavy rain was forecast for Friday. We went down to the Information Centre and asked about the Living Desert Park and a very helpful lady urged us to take a key and go straight away because rain was expected later in the afternoon and we might be able to get an hour in before it started. The key could be kept until midday tomorrow so if it was fine in the morning we could go out there again.

Oh, am I glad we went out there! The scenery on the way is stunning and once in the park it is even more beautiful. The rock and hill formations are so glorious and the flowers. Swoon! There are two gates to unlock and pass through and after the first we were brought to a long standstill by the sight of a most amazing display of Sturt Desert Peas.

Rather than give you a close up shot of the flowers I am sharing a shot that shows the way the plant grows and spreads across the ground. The sky was very overcast all the time we were in the park so the shine does not really show on the bulbous black part of the flower – they are so glossy that the sunlight gives them a real sparkle.

I could have spent hours taking photographs along the track that led up to a sculpture park – a rather long story that I will not share here. Instead just one photograph I took. Again I would have loved to have spent a long time here but the heavens opened and I had to make a hasty retreat with the camera shielded as best as I could!

The rain is still falling. We are hoping that we will be able to explore more of Broken Hill tomorrow – but if the rain is as heavy as expected then we shall be exploring indoors! We have a broken trailer to get parts for! The brakes jammed on and we had to remove them.
AJ

Day one of our trip to Central Australia

Well! We are at last on our way to see the wonders of Central Australia.

When we left home it was drizzling rain and it made us all the more determined to reach the sun and blue skies of the interior. It took us a little longer to pack the vehicle than it should have done but eventually we were on our way with two very forlorn dogs gazing after us from the inside of the gate. They certainly know how to make us feel guilty about leaving them behind!

The first photo I am showing was taken through the windscreen as we drove through the ranges on Cunningham highway. As soon as we came down the other side the skies began clearing and only minutes later there was our blue sky!
The rain that has swept through Queensland this year has turned the country into such a beautiful landscape. There is so much grass around that the cattle barely have to move!

And colour! I know that Western Australia is the place for wild flowers but Queensland is making a supreme effort at the moment. There are acres of yellow flowers – don't know what they are but they are everywhere through the trees and by the roadside.

There are also sweeps of purple and blue. At our afternoon stop I was able to take a few pictures of the blue flowers – they are like little stars! Very pretty!

When we were driving into Narabri I searched the GPS for camp sites and it brought us to a lovely quiet place far enough from the highway not to hear it – the name of the park is Blue Sky Caravan Park! We have taken an unpowered site but I think next time we will pay the extra for power – I am running this laptop from an inverter that is hooked up to the deep-cycle battery that powers the fridge and that is not all that satisfactory!
The amenity block is rather a long way away from our camp area so I shall go over and have a shower this evening – but in day clothes – I am not wandering that far in my night attire!!!! Had phone calls from both our sons – perhaps they think their aging parents “can't do it”!
AJ