The Curvy Yarra and Flying Foxes

I was beating my head a bit with some of my work and the afternoon looked sunny so I headed out for a solid walk to clear the coffers and get to new thoughts and get some exercise.  I had been wanting to explore the trails along the Yarra River near my house, and when I did some quick research, I realized the park with the colony of flying foxes I had visited on my last trip was really not that far.  This walk was AWESOME and exactly what I needed at the time!

Here is the route I took, nearly all along paths and trails, and like instant-wilderness in this pretty big city.

The walk led out of my neighborhood, across the Eastern Highway out of town, and immediately joined up with the Main Yarra Trail, a pedestrian/bike corridor running along the river.  It wound through some parks, right next to the Kew Billabong (an old river oxbow, essentially a floodplain wetland where the river has redirected and left it's old channel), then along the slow flat muddy river that is the Yarra!

The Yarra nearby my house, across which is a golf course. Lots of little birds hunting fish here, spotting divers was pretty common!

Along the main trail, heavily used by commuting cyclists, folks with knobbier tires had created fun offshoot mountain bike paths into the surrounding hills.  The trail ran through several open areas for dogs and peoples, near other housing areas, and finally to the Yarra Bend park where I left pavement for more of a hike.

A sign at the entrance to Yarra Bend park, formerly occupied by aboriginals. Wominjeka wurundjeri beek, indeed!

Yarra Bend park is a SWEET piece of nature within the city.  It is essentially a peninsular area bounded by the highway and a near 180-degree bend in the river.  Trails run around the perimater and up onto the highpoint, and I stuck to the perimeter to catch the river views.  The trail ran up and down from the river along a fairly steep ridge.  There were some great houses on the other side of the river, really cool architecture that is making me realize how similar this city really is to Portland, Oregon, with so much abundant nature mixed in with older Victorian architecture and newer modern and funky.

I believe this was a kingfisher, but I can be pretty terrible at bird-spotting and ID. 

Pretty scene at the bend with a park on the other side, a hillside barbecue restaurant, and rowboat rental.

Cool geology on the ridge trail, lots of upheaved sedimentary rock with crazy weathering and flaking.

It's hard to convey from pictures, but the trees here are really nice. Eucalypts often have smooth or peeling (stringy!) bark and when you can smell the leaves from time to time (maybe akin to cottonwood or kind of desert sage-y) it is AMAZING!

So the trail wound for a while along the river, under highway passes with cool graffiti (future blog post forthcoming!), and then along a really awesome section with a high wall up to my left and natural woods on the opposite side of the river.  REALLY nice walk on a sunny day.  I started rounding another bend and I knew I was getting close to the main attraction, the Flying Foxes!

Tree just FULL of roosting bats!

Nearly every tree in a quarter mile stretch of the river in the park here was full of bats.  It was AWESOME!

So there are signs to let you know you are approaching bat country and to let you know they are totally safe and non-confrontational (unless you find one on the ground which is a sign of disease and to be avoided).  Then you round a bend and see your first treeful and it is kind of AWESOME!  And then you keep walking and you realize every tree in the vicinity is FULL of them and you are about to walk directly underneath some of them!  WHOA!

HELLO!  From Un Downder!

Why you lookin' at me?  I'm NEKKID here!

There are SO MANY bats that it gets to be a bit unnerving even for me as they are hanging relatively low in the trees.  They are so funny to watch and listen to as there are many squabbles and chirping and chatting and a bit of screeching too.  They are mostly resting, but watching them move through the trees with their grip-hooks is super cool, and when one is occasionally inspired to flight, it is truly awesome to witness as they are pretty large flying mammals!  I thought it might smell pretty bad with so many concentrated animals, but it had a really pleasant eucalypty sweetness.  If that is gross, I am sorry, I am just a creepy bat-sniffer.

Bat flight is tricky to capture for an unskilled photog with a point-and-shoot on high zoomage.

Spotted some canoes once I came to the main park again and now I REALLY want to rent one while I am here and see the bats from the water!

Signage.  I love signage.

My walk continued back towards the house, linking pathways between parks, parkways, and neighborhoods.  It was a KILLER 6 mile loop from my door and back and I will definitely be taking Kara on the loop when she is here!

Park along the trails where Charlie would be happy to know he could run FREE!!!

View of Melbourne CBD from park.

Bush Tucker

Bush tucker is just a word for food in the outback.  When I went to the evening market with friends, we honestly all eschewed more exotic fare to get some of Australia in our bellies, hitting up the Bush Tucker stand for kangaroo sandwiches and emu sausages.  I had had kangaroo on my last trip, so this was nothing new, but cooking with it myself at home was!

Kangaroo is available at pretty much any grocery store, with small but ubiquitous selection.  Kind of like lamb or turkey in America.  They typically have steaks, sausages, patties, or cubes available.  I went with the budget conscious sale meats and decided to do an Indian style simmer pot.

Accompanying veggies: Mushrooms, zuccini, onions, and capsicum (what they call peppers here).

Veggies sauteeing in my electric skillet.  This thing is old and works SO WELL.  

Microwave rice (which is very common here; not sure if it is in the States as I always cook mine at home in the pressure cooker, as we don't have a microwave) and accompanying Indian simmer sauce (Rogan Josh; never heard of it, but akin to a mild curry sauce)

Seared the kangaroo once the veggies were cooked tender then added the simmer sauce and got it bubbling!

Finished product.  VERY good!  Kangaroo is essentially just like steak but leaner and worked really well in a dish like this.  I ate it for the next two days afterwards!

Breakfast pictured because the eggs here seem fresher and the yolks brighter than typical store-bought in the States.  More expensive too, about $6 USD a dozen no matter what kind.

Spatula improvised from a takeaway lid when I realized I had none!

Scenes from an Australian City

So life has definitely settled in to a bit of a routine.  I have met with all of the people I will be working with, gotten nearly all of the data I need to apply my methods to to see if we produce similar results for watersheds here in Melbourne, and I have set in to fully working out the data and seeing what I can see from it.  I am spending long days in the box working hard but plan to get out a bit on the weekends.  I am happy to be here, happy to encounter all of the helpful Australians that I have, and happy to have this opportunity for focus at a time in my dissertation journey when I really need it.  The following are a bunch of pictures from various places around me and things I have done, but it's mostly been pretty tame.  I hope you enjoy the updates nonetheless!!!

Interesting little low-flow stream tributary to Glassy Creek just down the street from me at a park called Hay's Paddock.  Parks seem to be called Reserves or Paddocks in most places here and they are PLENTIFUL in this city!

Local eucalypt species in the park nearby.  It is interesting to see the difference these species make in the canopy and sometimes you can smell them and it is really nice!

The Yarra River, the big river that runs through the city from the mountains nearby into the bay.  It is pretty slow and low but has LOADS of trails alongside it, and boathouses too for rowers.

Breas is pretty prevalent here and this stuff makes AWESOME toast!

Tim Tams are an AWESOME Australian cookie, kind of like an Oreo in bar form covered in chocolate.  Not good for you, but really really good.  The standards are chocolate cookies, but these are a seasonal variety and were pretty great.

Science lesson #1: Rainbows still occur south of the equator, and this one reminded me of the Care Bears.  It has been patchy rain many of the days I have been here so I doubt it will be the last I see.

Typical semi-Victorian architecture here in Melbourne.  There are loads of older buildings but with more modern styles thrown in, though they seem to favor maintaining the old wherever possible.  I liked this one because I love Charlie boy and miss my lil pup!

Really cool unknown tree near a tram station.  Trams are like light rail and they have a super dense network of them here.  They are my prferred means of transport.

Mix of old and new at Camberwell junction very near the weekly flea market that was super cool.

Fellow program participant, Amelia, VERY excited to see Finding Dory last weekend, which we did in a cool older and well-preserved theatre.

View from the rooftop courtyard at the theatre where we waited to be let in to see the movie.

Funky details inside the theatre.

Typical breakfast porridge has been a go-to for me, with bananas and peaches.

View of the Melbourne CBD (Central Business District) from the Queen Victoria market.

Really cool Irish pub (The Drunken Poet) near the market where I met people from my program one night.

Really stellar pic of the night market, held only during the winter, and featuring a bunch of different food options and mulled wine.  I think we pretty much all got the Kangaroo sandwich and it was GREAT!

After walking through the rain to do some shopping, I stopped at the Roast Kitchen for a traditional roast meal.  Pork roast with skin cracklins, the best mashed potatoes I have ever had, butternut squash, peas, carrots, sweet potatoes and GRAVY!  I will be returning as it is not too far from home.

My Big Sur

So I have been settled in Melbourne for a little over a week now.  I am staying in a small cabin-like place in the backyard of a house in Kew East, a suburb just east of Melbourne (see map).  I rented it in airbnb and the owner rents out the house as well.  He stays there sometimes but is about to take a winter holiday to Europe as he has a lot of family in Sweden.  His Dad was in the environmental field and he clued me into some of the work that has been done in the city.  They are really trying hard to rebuild healthy environments for wildlife and fish in the city here, and the work his Dad did laid some of that foundation!

Map of my location in Kew East in relation to Melbourne city with the Yarra River running through

Many Australian seem to take month long or longer holidays once a year with international travel being very common.  Southeast Asia is not very far, but many folks have told me of pretty big trips to the States as well.  Australia is pretty large though it can sometimes seem smaller on maps, and is essentially as big as the continental US, so while international travel is quite common, locals have also not yet made it to all regions of Australia itself, much like in the States.  I have only a few States I have yet to get to, and while I had hoped I might see ALL of Australia, this is just not a reality in a country this large!

My cabin in the 'burbs

View of the main house from inside my cabin

The suburb I live in is pretty quiet and actually reminds me a lot of the suburb Sellwood in Portland where Kara and I lived for our second year there.  Quiet residential streets with busy shops and nice restaurants at intersections of main roads.  Just nearby I have a grocery store and an intersection with several decent restaurants for take-away (take-out).  Chinese and Thai cuisine is common here due to proximity to those countries and not unlike America, though I will say the quality is a bit better here, which makes sense.  Menus are not as extensive but the dishes they do serve seem to be less homogenous and a bit tastier!  There are also loads of Italian places in this city, and I learned that after World War II, they opened up the gates to immigration and many Italians headed this way, as well as Greeks, though I have yet to find those influences in town, but I remember them from my previous trip.  We did have a grilled Greek cheese and figs appetizer at dinner the other night that was AWESOME though, and this was at a traditional Aussie pub.

One-room shack.

North-facing windows bring in a LOT of sunlight.  The weather was sunny for a few days when I first arrived but we are seeing Portland levels of clouds and gray and sprinkles now.

Futon bed, decently comfortable, but I miss my own!

I have a great wifi connection in my cabin and have been able to get quite a bit of work done so far.  It is weird to be isolated in a backyard in Australia and doing the same work I did at home, but the lack of distractions (GOOD distractions, Kara and Charlie) has been good for my progress.  I will be meeting with people at University of Melbourne and Monash University to collaborate though I will get the bulk of my work done in the cabin, so Kara has dubbed it my "Big Sur" because Jack Kerouac sought out isolation in a cabin there in the 50's to get away and get work done, though he did succumb to a bit of madness which I hope to stave off!

Mini but completely adequate kitchen with microwave, electric teapot, toaster, and fridge.

Bathroom with shower.

Though my place is small, it has really everything I need.  I am living much like I did when I lived in a cabin in Sequoia National Park, conserving dishes, utilizing small spaces, planning meals I can cook easily, etc.  It is pretty fun and I enjoy it.  Getting around the city is really easy with a dense network of buses, trams (light rail) and trains.  I had considered getting a bike and selling it at the end of summer but I feel like I can get around just fine with transport that I don't want to add that hassle.  I enjoy long walks anyway, and plan to get out on some along the trails by the river soon!

All for now, I will write about my work so far next.  I am off this morning to meet some friends and go to a large Sunday flea market then see "Finding Dory" at the movies as we felt we had to since it is based in the oceans of Australia.  Cheers!

Australian Parliament

View of Canberra from atop Mt. Ainsley again; straight down the open lane and then across the lake is the Parliament building, built into the hill that existed there.

The last thing we did in Canberra for our orientation was to take a tour of the Australian Parliament building.  This is a pretty unique building that officially opened in 1988 during the Australian bicentennial when all members of Parliament packed up their things in the morning and walked up the hill from the old Parliament to the new.  The building was carved down into the hilltop so that elected officials could never be considered to be ruling from "above".  Canberra was very much a designed city much like DC, with the man-made lake and symmetric spokes leading out from Parliament towards the rest of the city, the war memorial, and Mt. Ainsley in the background.

View from the front of the Parliament building looking at the old Parliament and Mt. Ainsley in the background.

The foyer (which I failed to snap a pic of) featured all marble from various parts of Australia (including some from Italy where the architect hailed from) and there were many marble columns, brown at the base and grey at the top representing the eucalyptus trees that are ever-present across the country.  The foyer led into a very large space for functions and featured a tapestry representing Australia's forests, woven in pieces across the country, and brought together to form one of the largest in the world.  It truly was massive.

Tapestry of Australia's bush forest.

Australia follows parliamentary procedure in their government (which I know not of the details), with a bicameral legislation broken into the House of Representatives and the Senate, which they modeled after ours.  Though Congress was not in session when we were there, it is open to the public whenever it is, and Kara and I may try to attend for a bit when she is here because the idea of looking in on government in motion live as it is happening seems very interesting.  Not that I have ever watched one lick of CSPAN, but witnessing it live seems very cool!

The House of Representatives chamber with our excellent tour guide, a former rugby player.

Official objects of parliamentary procedure; speaking is timed and limited very strictly. No filibustering allowed!

The decor in the House chamber is all green, representing once again the Australian forests, and it fades from dark to light as you move upwards as do the eucalypt species here.  The Senate is similarly styled, but in deep reds (though they seem a bit faded with age) representing the desert and geologic hues.  There are some traditional symbolic artifacts that accompany the parliamentary system like staffs, maces, and ornate boxes holding various religious books for oaths and such.  In the Senate chamber, the Australian coat-of-arms can be seen featuring the kangaroo and the emu, both animals that cannot walk backwards, a symbolism of Australia's wishes to always look to the future.  In the Senate, you can also see a chair behind the main position where the Senate President (akin to our Majority Leader) sits.  This chair is for the Governor General, the Australian representative of the English Parliament, and is appointed by the Queen of England except for when she visits and performs this role herself!

Senate House in red desert colors

Detail of Senate seating with coat-of-arms and the Queen's seat. Prince Phillip takes the smaller chair.

Politics in Australia is currently pretty interesting as the Prime Minister has called for a double dissolution of the two branches of representatives.  This is a seldom occurrence that can be enacted when there is gridlock in the government and nothing is getting done.  It has only happened a few times before and basically all seats of Parliament come up for election at the same time with leading vote-getters taking long terms and those with less of a win taking the shorter term to maintain a staggered election cycle.  If only for us in America!  It is interesting that the American election campaign is reported on television here and everyone seems thankful that there campaign here has not been going on nearly as long as ours!  Even so, I have heard very little disdain for what is happening in the States, merely sympathy!  The election here is at the beginning of July and it will be pretty intriguing to see what comes of it.

Interesting portrait of a former Prime Minister.  A large number of the official portraits are on display which are put up after a Prime Minister has left office.  This fellow apparently had a very hard time in leading the Houses of Parliament to get anything done and was unceremoniously removed from office.  When asked to sit for his portrait, he refused and forced the government to use an already famous painting that had been done of him in a non-traditional manner to be put up.  With no recourse, they have displayed it and it is funny to see amidst all of the others that are very austere.

So after the tour of Parliament we were all dropped at the airport to carry on to our respective cities of study.  I am now happily settled in Melbourne and am taking this weekend to catch my breath and begin my work anew.  Pics of my research outpost cabin will come soon!  Cheers!

View from on top of the grassed hill that is the Australian Parliament House

Massive Australian flag spire on top of the building.