Fractal Blog

The weather forecast being correct for once (cold-ish, cloudy, showers) we headed to Williamstown by car just to get out of the flat for a bit. The long lens came in handy shooting cormorants.

The water looked unbelievably clear. This time I felt it was unnecessary to gauge the temperature by actually wading in. In the local equivalent of October it has to be too cold. Not that some swimmers were deterred. We saw some up to their waist in water, wearing a sweater!

The owner of this canoe had asked us some minutes before this shot where all the beach shops were. We pointed him two kms either side of our current location. He asked 'Is it like St Kilda?' Well. 'Smaller', we said doubtfully. He promptly decided to paddle back to St Kilda (at least that's the general direction). I hope the helmsman of the huge container ship noticed the tiny canoe.

This seagull had found a soggy piece of rotten apple, and was making several attempts to eat its prize. There must be a scarcity of readily-available chips in this area.

Despite heavy overnight rain and an unpromising weather forecast, today was another lovely summer day in autumn, sunny and warm. For a change of scenery we decided to do the Capital City Trail, a bike path that forms a ring all around Melbourne. It goes through some suburban parkland, past the zoo, then follows the Yarra.

Winds were light-ish (unless we had a headwind), allowing opportunities to shoot reflections.

Dights Falls is about the half-way point. There is rarely that much water coming down.

The bike path goes right through a city farm. These odd-looking goats with their long floppy ears were feeding and enjoying the sunshine.

Almost home. 31km, max speed 29.8 km/h, 2 hours. (Somebody bought me a cycle computer for Christmas.)

On walking home from the pub tonight (well, it is Friday) we spotted these gorgeous reflections of Bolte Bridge in Victoria Harbour. Worth a shot, I thought.

It's Anzac Day today, a public holiday. Something to do with the war. The weather was uncharacteristically fantastic, especially for a bank holiday in autumn; in fact, today would have been considered a decent summer day in the UK: unbroken sunshine, light breeze, temperature in the mid-20s. So we wnet off to Lysterfield Lake Park again. I made a creditable attempt at some single track, then left the Obsessive Cyclist to his usual daredevil antics and found myself a nice spot to read a book and watch the sailing.

These little birds were quite curious, but also very shy. By sitting very still I managed to get a couple of shots (with my little camera - we left the long lens at home).

If it wasn't for the fact that it'll be dark in half an hour, autumn would be my favourite season here. For some reason entirely beyond me we're on winter time already, yet the weather is consistently warm and fairly sunny, and it still gets light at 6am.

Today we headed to Dandenong Ranges National Park. This is a huge protected native forest. Bikes not allowed as this is Lyrebird habitat. We didn't see any Lyrebirds but enjoyed the lush green forest, a result of some rain that has fallen recently.

We'd been looking forward to seeing the Sherbrooke Falls. These are they. Woefully underimpressed, us.

Ferns like this are a common sight in the forest.

The trees are enormous, and sufficiently high and dense to prevent The Geek getting a GPS fix on our location. Fortunately we didn't get lost. This time we'd taken a map, too, although it proved unnecessary.

This parrot was hiding in the ferns. This is what a long lens is for. Eventually I even got it to focus on the parrot.

On returning to the picnic area we saw dozens of parrots on the ground, being fed (against the pleading signs everywhere) by two girls. Eventually somebody walked straight through the middle of the birds, causing all of them to take flight at once.

Yesterday it was time to try out some proper single track again, an endeavour I have regarded with uncertainty after my epic crash. Some of us learn from experience. Still, I tried again (carefully avoiding almost all obstacles), and had an awesomely good ride. This picture was taken at the top of trail 1, in what is apparently "kangaroo city". I saw none this time, however, as described elsewhere, more obsessive cycling leads to more kangaroo viewings.

While the Prospective Mountain Bike Racer decided to hare around the tracks at incredible speeds, I found myself a cosy bench next to the lake and watched some kids sailing an optimist.

The weather continues to be really warm and summery for autumn, and we'd certainly had the best of the day. Towards the end of the afternoon these rain clouds were approaching.

Due to The Obsessive Cyclist not having had his fix of trails yesterday we had to go to Lysterfield Lake Park again today. Fortunately no race was taking up all the trails so the hills were available to climbing by bike. Having had quite enough cycling lately I elected to do the Tramline Walk on foot, on my lonesome and with my trusty long lens. This trolley was one of those used to cart mined granite out of the woods.

It's a beautiful trail. Cyclists not allowed. I saw no kangaroos, nor any humans on the trail, except a lone cyclist who shoudn't have been there -- but then, Aussies have the same regards for rules as the average Brit, i.e. they ignore them. I did see a small thin reptile out of the corner of my eye. I nearly picked up a stick to poke the hollow log it went into, so I could get a photograph. Then I remembered that this is Australia, and that the shape I'd seen could just as well have been a small snake. Clue: the probability of the snake, if it was one, being poisonous would have been so close to 1 as to be indistinguishable. So I left it well alone.

This bird got caught by my long lens. It wouldn't sit still for very long but at least I got a bit of wild life.

I went further along the track but turned back when, having tried (and failed) to photograph a spider's web from all sides, I couldn't remember which direction of the trail I had come from. I worked out laboriously that the sun currently was (probably) in the North, hence I should keep it behind me to get back. Mental note to self: Next time, along with water, take a map. Or borrow The Geek's GPS.

Having successfully returned to Lysterfield Lake, it was almost deserted despite the glorious sunny weather. The smoke in the background is a bush fire.

Talking of weather, I'm writing this sitting outside on the balcony at 10:30pm. It's been a lovely long weekend; the weather couldn't have been better. I think I prefer autumn here to summer.

It being Easter Sunday, with the whole country shut again, we proceeded to Lysterfield Lake Park for some mountain biking. Fat chance. Some race was taking place, and they used every bit of single trail in the entire park. Not pleased. So we stuck to the management tracks and spotted several wild kangaroos. This one obligingly posed for the camera. Neat.

On the way back from Lysterfield Lake Park, slightly earlier than planned due to the unavailability of tracks, we decided to make a bee-line for the bay and the adjacent cycle track. The weather this Easter is just too nice to be indoors -- 26C and sunny, at the Southern equivalent of October. This is Sandringham Marina.

Brighton Beach. It was late afternoon hence nearly deserted.

Melbourne CBD as seen from Sandringham Marina. The blimp flies over the city frequently. Missed a shot where the blimp briefly went between us and the sun, causing a cloud in a cloudless sky.

Another example of the modern art in evidence everywhere around Melbourne.

The plan was to go to the market for meat, drive to Lysterfield Lake Park for some mountain-biking, then stop at Chadstone for the rest of the food. Small problem: When trying to buy our usual morning coffee in the coffee shop downstairs it was closed. So was the market. As are all the "24-hr" supermarkets. We're firmly expecting all restaurants and pubs to be shut as well. Must check out the larder for any left-overs, then. In many ways, Australia is still stuck in the 1970s. It hadn't occurred to us that the country might be shut on a bank holiday. None of our Aussie colleagues mentioned it either.

In case you're wondering, today's picture is of no relevance to all this whatever. It's yesterday's moon rise, and I thought it was pretty. That's all.

It was my birthday yesterday so there were many presents to admire. Including an 8GB iPod nano. Shiny! Then we decided to investigate Bunyip State Park. It's huge. Available trails look mostly like this.

Odd flowers like these abound.

And we found a nest of giant ants. This one was carrying an enormous stick back to its nest.

The concept of "road" in Bunyip State Park looks mostly like this. Having no map we followed it on the assumption that "the electricity poles must lead to civilization eventually". When the "road" became less straight and showed absolutely no sign of nearing civilization we turned around to take the same way out that we came in. After all the nearest "civilization" might well be Sydney.

The Designated Driver then had the excellent idea of finding a cellar door in the Yarra Valley to sample some wines. I did so with enthusiasm, safe in the knowledge that I didn't have to drive. And we bought a case of wine. Cute logo, isn't it?

It has rained a lot recently, so from time to time puddles appear in the right position to take artistic photographs, like this one.

It's some kind of charity march today; tens of thousands of runners blocking the entire city. I wanted to do some shopping but it turned out that we're fenced out of the CBD -- nobody can get through, not even on foot, except runners. So I gave up. I wonder how much money businesses in the the city lose today? Welcome to Melbourne, the world's most liveable city. Unless a fun run is taking place.