Spring on the Quantocks

Changing seasons is weird. At home few days ago it was ripening sweet corn, apples and leaves starting to turn brown, and now it’s daffodils, primroses, little lambs and the trees just starting to show a touch of green.

Wild primroses
The hedges are full of them.

Daffodils are "wild" everywhere
This old farm is just up the lane from the B&B

I’m in the UK for niece Andrea’s wedding, but getting some R&R first here in Somerset, staying at Parsonage Farm in Over Stowey, a 17th century farmhouse that runs at a gentle pace, and offers deep peace and lots of lovely walking on the doorstep.

Parsonage Farm, Over Stowey
It's a tiny village; no shop or pub

I’ve had three days of walking all day, fueled by a fine cooked breakfast and topped off with dinner in one of the local pubs. The weather has been unusually kind for early April: dry and cool, but with quite a bit of sunshine.

A "combe" in the Quantock Hills
Designated the first Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty in Britain in the 1950s

Halsway House, near Bicknoller
One of many fine old houses. This one houses the National Centre for Traditional Music

Today I’m heading for Leeds and the wedding, then a few days with my sister Kate in Bolton before coming south again to Cornwall.

A short walk, not in the Hindu Kush

Just to show that Racing Ruth doesn't have a monopoly on walking adventures, I report on last weekend's excursion to the Central Highlands of Tasmania. Almost, but not quite, as luxurious as the SW Coastal Path, in that we camped at the Lake St Clair campground, thus getting the advantage of hot showers, good coffee, and a pub just down the road. But I did have to sleep in a tent on the hard ground!

Lake St Clair NP Visitor Centre

Lake St Clair, looking north to Mt Ida.

Lake St Clair is almost at the centre of Tasmania, and at the southern end of the Cradle Mt-Lake St Clair National Park. It is a good base for day walks, so I headed up there with a couple of friends from church rather early in Saturday morning (6.30!), early enough to get the tents set up and coffee drunk and still be on the track by mid-morning. It was a glorious day and our destination was Mt King William, a dolerite mountain just south of the Lyell Highway. Access is easy, thanks to a rough track that goes more than half way up, to service the fire-watching station at the summit.

Mt King William

Track to Mt King William

The views from the top were fabulous, though the wind humming in the fire tower spoiled the wilderness experience a bit.

Looking south east from Mt King William

Looking west from Mt King William

Mt King William summit
The igloo is base for a fire watcher in summer

We were back in good time for a shower before repairing to the Derwent Bridge Hotel at beer o'clock for a pre-prandial. Dinner was good; I had the game platter: wallaby steaks, possum sausages (really) and a quail kransky that was a bit salty.

It rained quite hard in the night, to the extent that we cancelled our proposed long walk on Sunday, and went instead to see The Wall, a wonderful project to construct a 100 metre long bas relief carved in huon pine illustrating various themes about life in the highlands. The cravings are stunning; I was reminded of the Elgin Marbles. I loaned some specimens of pouch young devils to the artist a few years ago and he has created the most exquisite life-sized carvings of them. Drop in next time you drive by Derwent Bridge; well worth it.

By now the weather had cleared, so we put the boots back on and walked a four circuit taking in Shadow Lake, which sits beneath Mt Rufus and Mt Hugel. The track is mostly through tall forest, but opens out into alpine woodland and moorland higher up.

Shadow Lake and Hugel's Little Horn

The knees and hips aren't what they were, but all in all it was a good weekend. And it will get me in shape for a bit of walking in the UK next week, as I am going there for my niece's wedding. Watch this space!

Friday the Thirteenth

Look, I'm not superstitious, but today has been BAD.

This is a picture-less blog, because we just can't bear to show you what our lovely new deck at the Boat Harbour shack looks like now.

The idea was to seal it. You know, add years to its life, bring out the natural features of the wood.... We consulted widely and bought a lot of (very expensive) materials to clean and seal the thing. The first process is to use an oxalic acid based bleach to clean the surface and "open the wood's pores" (it said that in the instructions). But this had to be removed before the paint went on, and the instructions clearly said to use a high pressure water cleaner. So I duly hired one from a place in Burnie that dealt in large orange machines that would have made Angus very excited.

On the deck we coupled up the hoses, turned the machine on and started cleaning. It was certainly powerful, and sure nuff, you could see the dark stuff being blasted away. It was only later when we had put on the first coat of sealer, which goes onto the wet wood, that we realised that the power cleaner had actually stripped the wood surface off! Where this had happened the sealer, which had more pigment in than we really wanted, has been absorbed much more, so now we have a piebald deck, and the original smooth surface is distinctly furry in places. Jean says we should call it a suede finish and pretend that we meant it, but there's no disguising the fact that we've made a mess of it.

Put it down to experience, I suppose. And we will be able to recover the surface eventually with the help of a sander; but right now we are having a serious fit of the "if onlys". And it was hard work too!

Back in the Home Port

OK, yesterday's post was a fake, in the sense that I was home by then. I hope that doesn't offend blogetiquette!

And now I should just tell what remains of the trip. We arrived in Fremantle ( the port for Perth) on Thursday morning, but we didn't have to leave the ship immediately as they were having two nights in port, so we were able have one more day of luxury and indulgence.

But we spent the day in the charming town of Fremantle, mostly to meet with a colleague and discuss some projects, but there was time in the afternoon to wander the town a bit and to visit the excellent maritime museum.

Freo streescape
Nice day!

Freo: The Roundhouse
A small-scale Panopticon prison for the settlers, not the convicts

Freo: Bathers Beach
Sadly, I didn't have any (bathers, that is)

The museum (or at least the part that I visited) houses remains from several Dutch ships that wrecked on the WA coast in the 1600s. Most notorious was the Batavia, because over 100 of the survivors, stranded on an offshore island, were massacred by others from the ship while the captain was sailing a small boat to the the town of Batavia to get help. The mutineers were caught and executed on the island when the captain returned. The wreck was located some years ago and the remains of the hull was raised and is now preserved in the museum, along with many other items.

Fremantle Maritime Museum
The hull of the Batavia, and an ornamental archway that it was carrying

Our last night on the ship involved many farewells to passengers and crew. Since many of the them are serial cruisers we may meet again.

Fremantle harbour
View from the Rotterdam's dining room

On Friday we had to leave and travel with the plebs again on the three hour flight to Melbourne and the one hour flight (late!) to Hobart. But it was lovely to be home, and the ground has now stopped swaying under my feet.

Great Australian Bite

And what did we see....?
Crossing the Bight

Our second day crossing the Great Australian Bight. We are well out to sea, so that the casino can operate, and the weather and swell continue to be kind. Fewer birds out this way however, which is a shame, since I spent an hour this morning telling the customers how interesting seabirds are, and what they might see from the ship. But they didn’t seem to mind.

We continue to get insights into the lives of world cruisers. At dinner last night we sat with a group of folk, and someone happened to mention that they were x days into the cruise, at which all the others put their fingers in their ears and said la la la! The thought that the whole business might end some day is abhorrent, and it seems that many people spend the last week of the cruise in tears. A fair proportion of passengers are single, widows or widowers, and the tight community of the ship becomes very important to them. But woe betide them when it’s time to go home! No wonder so many come back again and again. Some have made literally dozens of world cruises, and at the present rate that’s $US50K a trip, at the very least.

These are the people that we rub shoulders with in the Crows Nest Bar every night, but they are all very social, and politely interested in what we do. We’ve had up to 200 at our lectures.

Niall at the Crow's Nest Bar
(That's my empty chair and beer)

And the food just goes on and on. Hardly anything has been a failure so far. There is usually a fish or seafood option in the half dozen choices for each of the three courses at dinner (that’s not including dessert), so that has been making my choices easy. And today there was Cajun catfish on the lunch buffet as well. Highlights? So many really, but I remember a chilled avocado soup very kindly. It is all beautifully presented, and the (largely Filipino) staff are all charming.

While our “lecture theatre’, which is also the cabaret room, might be a bit extravagant, most of the ship is very tastefully decorated. The stairways and public spaces are all adorned with a range of art works, from bronzes and casts of historic Dutch plaques to more modern works.

Wall plaque on the MS Rotterdam
A cast from somewhere in Holland

Bronze seal on the Rotterdam

They also have an excellent series of Holland America posters from between the wars that are very stylish. It’s a pity that they don’t sell reproductions in the shop, along with the branded clothing. Shopping on board, although diverse and abundant, is a fairly expensive exercise, even with our 10% event staff discount.

Holland America posters from the Rotterdam

Next stop Fremantle, and soon it will be all over. Already the ship feels like home and we will feel some pangs as we leave and it sails away without us.

Melbourne to Adelaide

The cruise down to Melbourne was OK, despite some squally cool weather and a little swell (not enough to trouble my stomach). The best bit was passing between the north of Flinders Island and Wilsons Promontary, with all the associated small islands at the entry to Bass Strait. We were in the Crows Nest Bar (where the barmen Henry and Nestor now know our names and which beer we drink), which has a 180 degree view as we headed into the sunset. Would have been perfect without the ominous smoke to the north.

Entering Bass Strait: Hogan Island?

Woke in Melbourne to see the Spirit of Tasmania ferry on the other side of the wharf, and made a tram trip into the city for a little shopping and gallery browsing. Then out across Port Phillip Bay in the evening, pasing through the heads with its tide race just before dark. That produced the last bit of detectable movement, since the water has been very smooth on our way to Adelaide.

The Melbourne Sailaway

That's what they call it: "Join us in the xxxx Bar for the sailaway"

Smokey sky over Port Phillip Bay

Yesterday, as we cruised past the south coast of Victoria and South Australia, there were whales about (Fin whales, according to our Dutch captain). I saw several spouting in the distance, and then two obligingly came up less than half a kilometre away as I was having my morning calorie-burning thrash around the deck. Some dolphins too, and lots of albatrosses.

The Deck 3 walkaround
Decks freshly swabbed, but few walkers on a morning in port

Yesterday was Valentine's Day on board, which meant a huge quantity of decorations, cheesy music in the bars and menus on which every item was named "romantically". I guess if you are serving the full four month sentence, that sort of thing breaks the monotony. I was talking to a couple yesterday who said they no longer had any idea what day of the week it was.

Niall has given the first of our lectures, so we have had a look at our clients. They seemed to enjoy it, but I don't get to give my first one until the day after tomorrow.

Niall's first lecture

The cabaret room isn't quite our usual style

And this morning we woke to find ourselves in Adelaide, or rather at Outer Harbour, which is a full 45 minutes on the train to the city centre. After the moderate indifference of Sydney and Melbourne to our arrival and departure it was nice to see lots of volunteer guides here. And welcoming music, though Australian bush ballads might have been more appreciated later in the day by those (like us) who hadn't left the bar until well after midnight.

The Rotterdam at Outer Harbour, Adelaide

Adelaide serenade
These guys were singing Click go the Shears etc at 8.00 am!

Adelaide was warm and sunny, and the art gallery and museum made a pleasant excursion. Now we are back on board, but the "sailaway" isn't until 10.00 tonight so we shall not see Adelaide either coming in or going out.

Three days at sea to get to Perth across the Great Australian Bight. I'll blog there if I can.

At Sea (Why does that remind me of The Goon Show?)

As I write the northern islands of the Furneaux Group are appearing on the port side (so nautical: that’s the left as you face the sharp end), which means that we are entering Bass Strait after a night and a day of very gentle cruising from Sydney, on our way to Melbourne.

Leaving Sydney Harbour

And we have had the day off! The entertainment manager said that they have learned from bitter experience not to schedule guest lecturers on the first day out of port since they sometimes don’t turn up. And we have competition on this cruise in the shape of Gaynor and Jane (from Sydney Uni and University of Western Sydney respectively) who will be speaking on aboriginal matters and the Australian political scene. Of course we will go and see what they are like, but how can they compete with crayfish and cave spiders??

MS Rotterdam
Flagship of the Holland America Line, and a few weeks into a three month world cruise

This ship, the MS Rotterdam, is virtually identical to the MS Statendam that Jean and I sailed on last year, and so far it has been very comfortable, at least after we convinced them to re-arrange the beds out of the double configuration!

The Cabin: before

The Cabin: after (phew)

View from cabin in port

View from cabin most of the time

It has been a working day (PhD thesis to examine), interspersed by food (so much food) and stiff walks around the promenade deck (3.5 circuits = 1 mile), where I can look out for birds: so far shearwaters, possibly two species of albatrosses, gannets and one petrel.

But it’s nearly beer o’clock, and we must climb up from deck two to the Crows Nest bar for our pre-prandial. We pay for booze (at half the going rate), but everything else is free. What a life.

Cash for crayfish

At last! Something to blog.

I've just had a rapid trip up to the north of the State to earn a little money from a burrowing crayfish. We have several crayfish on the threatened species list here and someone recently raised an objection to new subdivision in Devonport on the grounds that one of these species was living there. So the Commonwealth government recruited Niall Doran and I to go up and check it out. This is just slightly incestuous since it was Niall and I who got the thing Listed in the first place, but since there are not too many crayfish experts to go around we got the job.

So off to sunny Devonport on Thursday and we spent a sweaty and prickly day scrambling through thickets of tea tree and cutting grass (with a few brambles thrown in for good measure, but thankfully no snakes) looking for crayfish burrows. And sure nuff they were there. Mercifully we didn't have to dig any up because this is the only species in the area. We're pretty sure that the subdivision can go ahead if they are careful about where they put the houses, and it was encouraging to meet the developer on site on Friday and hear that he had already devised some plans to do just that.

Crayfish burrow.
Not spectacular, but important!

We had some other jobs to do in the north west so we were able to stay overnight at Boat Harbour and have an expense account dinner at Jolly Roger's on the beach on a glorious evening (oysters au naturel, pesto-baked trevalla, strawberry creme brulee and a bottle of Ninth Island pinot grigio, all thanks to what we saved on accommodation).

On Friday we went to visit a couple who live way out in the bush south of Rocky Cape. They are very keen to have a student use their property for work on the giant freshwater crayfish that live in their creek. They have a wonderful house and garden and four small fluffy dogs who thoroughly enjoy the bush.

Unexpected house and garden.
This was literally miles from anywhere

And this is their own private creek

A giant freshwater crayfish
Quite large, but they get bigger!

Niall Doran is the main driver of The Bookend Trust, which aims to gather funds to support students working on environmental problems. He and will be spending 10 days on a ship full of rich Americans shortly, giving them a few lectures and subtly suggesting that they part with some cash in a good cause. We sail from Sydney to Perth, via Melbourne and Adelaide on the Holland America Line ship Rotterdam).

Watch this space. Internet time is exorbitant on the ship, but I'll try to blog when we are ashore.

Aftermath

The windy weather didn't last long, and at this rate neither will the remains. Disposing of garden waste is always a problem, but we deal with ours mostly with an electric muncher. So the nectarine and the other branches are disappearing as I write into the maw of the chipper, and the product goes on the garden to mulch the vegies.

Jeannie and the muncher

Wasted nectarines!
Too early to ripen. Boo hoo.

But there are still the peaches.
If the wattlebirds don't get them all.

Now I'm sure you have all noted that it's Jeannie dealing with the fearsome machine. True, but what you haven't seen is me doing manly work with the chainsaw to reduce the larger branches to lengths small enough to go in the stove later on.

(I'll bet you think I carve the meat too...... wrong).

Stormy Day

We don't get much severe weather here (nothing to compare to Texas), but today would rank amongst the most horrid.

When deep depressions pass south of Tasmania in the summer they generate savage winds as the cold front approaches, and those winds come from the north or north west, so they bring hot air from the mainland. That was the case today, and by late morning wind gusts of up to 200 kph had been recorded!

Stormy Derwent River, from our window.

Probably not quite up to that here, but enough to snap off our poor old nectarine tree. I was working at the window just above, but never heard it go, because the windows were rattling so much. The tree has produced huge crops of fruit for about 30 years, but that looks like the end of it, and the fruit was a month away from being ripe.

Death of a nectarine!

There wasn't much holding it up.

No other serious damage here, though my runner beans have taken a bashing, but we shall wait to hear the story from elsewhere in the state. Certainly there was a horrible cloud of dust blowing out of the drought-ridden pastures in the southern inland.

Dust clouds over the Derwent.
Better than smoke, I suppose.

As I write (2.30 pm) the pre-frontal trough has passed and the winds have eased. I happened to leave the car in the road because Jean was out when I got home, Just as well, since a branch came off the neighbour's tree where the car usually sits!

And I spoke too soon! A wander round the garden revealed several branches off trees and a section of fence more or less laid flat.

Debris from various trees

Later..... we heard on the news tonight that there had been quite a lot of structural damage in our area, including a tree through the roof of Illawarra Primary School, a couple of kilometres away in Blackmans Bay. And the Midlands Highway was cut by a bushfire at Epping Forest.

So we do get some weather.