The Drought is Broken - Almost

After all that rain the garden is going to need some attention. Weeds having been popping up everywhere. Our dam levels are at around 50% but we are going to keep the water restrictions for some time.

Enjoyed your pics of the Med Suzy, made a pleasant sunny change to the grey old days we have had fr the last couple of weeks. There is certainly ancient history every where you go in Europe. Nothing old here our history only goes back just over 200 years. The only ancient things are the aboriginal rock paintings found in caves and the like, they can go back thousands of years.

Here is the mango tree and a fine speciman it is how it survives this far south is surprising. We had a quite heavy morning frosts a couple of weeks back. There were heavy falls of snow up in the Blue Mountains which are about an hours drive west from us.

Looks like the MangoCam is not a goer, the camera crew have chickened out. They are scared stiff of the Brown's next door, who are getting a bit agitated about all the camera stuff, think they are being a perved on. The bloke who wrote that song "Mrs Brown you have a lovely daughter" seriously needed his eyes tested. It was one of the Beetles I think.

Was hoping to enlist Warren but the brown snake and blue tongued lizard experience knocked the stuffing out of him. He is convinced that there are tarantula spiders up the tree. A good guess, but they more than likely what are called huntsman spider, size of a saucer and perefectly harmless. They have a funny habit of hanging around over doorheads, scares the pup out of you it does.

Here are few more shots of the mango tree, it's laugh getting the fruit down. Yues gets this long stick and keeps giving them a prod till they fall. She then ducks for cover they splat on her head. I don't like them, reckon they taste like swampwater. Till next time, bye for now.

Sailing round the Med

Just a little note to say Ive updated my blog (link to the left) with photos and some text about our trip round the Med if anyone wants a nosey.

Here are the final pics from my trip to South America. I thought these two showed the very great contrast in the country. Venezuela is quite a dangerous place: Armed robbery is very common and there is a lot of strong political tension. It was very difficult to get money out of banks and the capital Caracas is a dirty, scary city.

In contrast the countryside is completely magical. This is a picture of the hightest waterfall in the world, Salto Angel. To get there I travelled in a Cessna for over an hour, then for 6 hours up river in a motorised canoe, then an hour's walk. It was very impressive. Another trip I took was along the Rio Caura into the jungle and some isolated villages.

The other photo is of Caracas, the view from my hotel room. Although it does have a bad reputation and it is quite tense in the towns, I did like Venezuela a lot.

Cartagena de Indias

Cartagena, in Colombia, was the first city I visited on the Northern Caribbean coast of the South American continent and, after 5 months in the Andes, it was so different to anywhere else I had been. It is very hot and the sea is incredibly blue. The people are different, being the most amazing mix of African, European, West and East Indian. The music and spanish language here are also very different. It is a much more laid back place, people spend most of the time outside and the siestas are much longer. It is a very pretty city, with old colonial buildings and tons of bougainvilia flowers along narrow cobbled streets. I stayed in a beautiful posada owned by a woman whose English father opened it years ago. There I had the most wonderful breakfasts, which lasted me all day, served on Portmeirion pottery!

I visited some beautiful places in Colombia and was only there for 10 days. It would definitely be worth another visit!

Christmas Past

It was around 9:30am, Yues had just put the turkey in the oven and reckoned it was time to have a wee dram. Next thing you know there was this great altercation taking place on the breakfast bar. Christmas can be the worst time for family get togethers. How these two came an item I do not know. They are poles apart!

Middle of the world

Well I had to do it, didn't I? The compulsory Equator picture with one foot in each hemisphere. This was in a small town in Ecuador, through which the Equator passes. There is an obelisk a couple of streets away which marks where they used to think the equator was, but found out later that it was in the wrong place. The Inca weren't far off either; there is a large rock on top of a hill nearby where they calculated the Equator to be. This blue and yellow line can be seen in a few places in Ecuador and also crosses highways, so you usually know which hemisphere you are in, and therefore also whether you are in winter or summer and which way round your water is going to go down the plughole!

Strawberry pig

Did anyone ever see a strawberry shaped like a pig???