Visit from a Green Tree Frog

So this afternoon I decided I was going to “pop” into the city (aka drive 70+ km’s) as I wanted to look for some gifts to send to one of my blog link up partners.

I popped in the shower, got out wrapped my hair up in a towel, shook my other towel to make sure there were no bugs or spiders in it and got dry. Then I walked through the house, had a chat with the Aussie and then looked for something to wear. I sit down on the bed looked to the right, spot the green tree frog sat on my shoulder. Yep sat there like it’s the most normal thing in the world.

I of course screamed and knocked him or her off my shoulder before remembering that I actually like green tree frogs a lot (except when they pee on you – yep one did that when I was trying to take a photo once) and that if he stayed in the house he’d die because of the lack of water.

I tracked him down eventually and the Aussie rescued him and put him back on the shower rail outside where he sat there looking a bit shaken which is not surprising given his ordeal and let me take some pictures.

I love his expression in this photo, it’s very you just screamed at me and threw me on the ground, I appreciate the rescue and all that but do you have to take photos!?!

Ridiculous Girlie Moment

On Friday I had to drop of some photographs for a competition by 6pm, the journey would take about 45 minutes to an hour but as it would be rush hour I left work early at 4pm and headed off to the car. Got to the car drove about a metre and realised the strange juddering feeling when driving must have been a deflating tyre as it was now well and truly flat.

I am not great with the mechanical aspect of cars and before I left the UK the Aussie told me to ask my Dad to show me how to change a tyre. My response was very bad as I said it’s ok if the tyre blows you can change it for me. So of course I didn’t have much of a clue.

Now not only is that a pretty rubbish thing to say, we also live 70KM out of the city which incidentally was close to where I had to drop the photos off and drive back in to the city to pick him up again when he finished work. Luckily for me I did breakdown in the city and only a 5 minute drive from the Aussie’s office but imagine if it had happened 50KM away from the city and I would be stuck without a clue how to change the tyre.

The Aussie telling me it would be no good if I broke down in the middle of the outback and had no idea how to change the tyre came to haunt me well and truly. Though I did reassure him I knew how to check the oil levels (small things and all that!)

He came and met me and I sat down with him watching what he was doing and asking questions so I could make sure I knew what he was doing. I feel pretty happy I could change the tyre now if I needed to so can avoid this happening again.

Also luckily I was able to arrange to drop my photographs for the competition on Saturday morning so things worked out perfectly in the end, this time at least!.

It was definitely a good lesson for me.

Hectic Old Week

This weeks been a wee bit busy as I started my new job in Tuesday! I was only between jobs for a couple of weeks but it’s taking a few days to get adjusted to the new routine so have been quite tired in the evening.

I’m really enjoying being back in work, earning money (of course) and am very lucky to be working with some really lovely and supportive people.

I feel that I have been very lucky work wise over the years as I have enjoyed working with nearly all of my colleagues and have made good friends along the way.

Me and the Aussie did have a fun night out to the cinema this week and went to watch The Lego Movie! The cinema was of course full of kids with their parents as it’s a kids movie but I loved it!

The film was very very funny with plenty of jokes and story lines for the kids and adults so we were all literally laughing out loud. I would highly recommend going to watch it, they even have a 3D version.

On a more random point this is where I found a wasp had tried building a nest at the house! Not the best location I think you’d agree!

Museum and Gallery of the Northern Territory

Yesterday I paid a visit to the Museum and Gallery of the Northern Territory. I had been there before a couple of years ago so thought it was time for a return trip, plus it has free entry and air conditioning which is very appealing in the current weather!

The museum often has exhibitions that are worth having a look around and at the moment there is Wallace: the rEvolutionary man on from 9 November 2013 to 22 June 2014 and Exit Art: Contemporary Youth Art of Northern Territory Year 12 Students which is in the museum from 22 February 2014 until 8 June 2014.

There are also really interesting displays about Cyclone Tracy which happened on 24 December 1974 and caused much devastation in Darwin, creatures of the northern territory (including spiders yuck), Sweetheart the seriously giant crocodile and the Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Award Collection (you can view this work online as well here)

I found the Alfred Wallis exhibition to be very interesting. On the website for the museum it describes the exhibition as commemorating the 100th anniversary of eminent naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace’s passing, this exhibition will showcase Wallace’s exploration of the tropical jungles of Southeast Asia and New Guinea, and his ideas on Evolution by Natural Selection and biogeography. The exhibition includes specimens of butterflies, beetles and birds of paradise, as well as prints of drawings and maps by Wallace.

After spending a few hours at the museum I popped in to the Cornucopia Museum Cafe which is on site with gorgeous views of the coastline and had a very delicious slice of red velvet cake before going for a walk along the beach to walk the cake off!

Keep Calm and Carry on!

This morning I woke up at 2am feeling a bit hot and ready to grumble at the Aussie for turning the ceiling fan! Turns out he was also awake and that it was the electricity that had gone off and not the fan – good job I didn’t grumble I think poor guy!

To explain though we have an ongoing minor disagreement about my need for the ceiling fans, air conditioning etc to be on as often as I do. Whilst I have adjusted to the heat I just can’t sleep in 25 degree plus heat without the ceiling fan on and he cannot sleep with it on because of the sound and also because he gets too cold (though he does sleep!). Still if this is our only battle we’re doing pretty well I think.

Anyhow we have had a power cut now for about 7 hours and their expecting it to last up to a further 4 hours whilst they restore the problem. It’s affected the whole of Darwin right the way down to Katherine which is about 196 miles away according to google so it’s pretty widespread.

It was funny looking online at Facebook at 2am this morning until I drifted back off to sleep (turns out I can sleep without the ceiling fan after all ssssh!) and seeing all the complaint messages on the page for the power company but also understandable if your used to sleeping in air conditioning especially with young children who won’t settle because their hot.

The main problem for us was that our water works off a pump which runs of the electric which made having a shower tricky. However I was shown the shower which is literally a hose pipe linked to a shower head attached to a tree.

It was surprisingly pleasant even if the water wasn’t heated (which was handy given the hot sleep we had just had). I did worry about getting lost on the block as it was a bit of a windy path to get there but made it back in one piece!

I then got the news our office is shut until the power is back so am currently sat in the car at the beach watching the world go by which is a nice way to spend the morning.

Sailing and other Weekend Pursuits – Part 1

We were invited to go sailing on the Aussie’s friends boat again this weekend and jumped at the chance as we had such a good time last time.

This time we motored over to a beach across the bay called Mica Beach. The beach is called Mica because it has lots of pieces of mica on the beach which is also known as silica gel.

I haven’t taken a picture of the mica at the moment but they are very pretty and almost look like a mirror.

We had a walk on the beach which was totally deserted before hopping back on the boat to go for a sail.

This was our view from the beach

After that the wind came out to play and the sails went up and off we went towards Fannie Bay and then back towards Mandurah.

I really like being out on the water but don’t have a clue about how the boats work (but hoping to do a sailing course at some point) so always worry I’ll get in the way. This time though the Aussie handed me the ropes to steer the boat and told me to head for a point on the horizon!

Bearing in mind this was his friends boat I was a bit anxious to start with but once I remembered where port and starboard are and got the hang of keeping the sails up in the wind it was good fun and we moved quite fast.

I also got to manoeuvre us around some tinnies and a buoy or two which was a bit nerve wracking!!!

I thought my time steering was up as we got in to the bay where the jetty is but I steered it again this time via the rudder as we motored along so that everyone else could put the sails away. That was weird as the controls were opposite for the direction you wanted to go.

As there was a queue to get on the jetty and I had to get away to my next weekend pursuit we then transferred to another boat called Neptune at sea which came complete with a Captain who looked like he could have been Neptune himself!

It was quite a busy weekend so I’ll discuss the other pursuits in my next post.

Loo Dash Blues

I thought today I’d give you a bit of an insight in to rural outback living and what better place to start than with the toilet!

So I am living on a plot of land which is about 20 hectares big (yeah all I know is that means a lot of trees!) and as we’re literally smack bang in the middle of the outback there isn’t the usual plumbing system in place or available which means that we don’t have a system in place to have a flushing toilet.

After the Bush Fire in 2013

When I visited the Aussie in Darwin before there was a bush fire on the land the day I arrived and the toilet literally burned down so we had to have a rather delightful portable toilet.

The New Toilet

When I arrived this time in August 2013 the Aussie had literally built a toilet which is a long drop and has a toilet seat but of course no flush!

It’s not generally too bad unless you have to dash their in the middle of the night or when its poring with rain because as you can see the toilet has no roof so you get soaked!

On my night time visits I have of course encountered cane toads (one particular pervy toad would sit outside the toilet and refuse to move just staring at the loo!), spiders and their webs which I always walk through on my walk through the bush/grass and end up with random bits of web stuck to my arms and mosquito/midge bites.

Here is a spider that was randomly literally hanging out in the toilet for a few days. Its called a St Andrews Spider because of the way it hangs in its web and looks like the cross for St Andrew on the flag.

The Aussie jokes that when I am in the UK I won’t like ordinary toilets but I reassure him that I absolutely will forget my outback ways when it comes to the dunny!!!

Why does it always rain on me?

Seems to be the question of the day/week and possibly month at the moment.

As I said yesterday it’s the wet season which means that we’re getting lots and lots of rain every day due to the monsoon over the Northern Territory. When it was the build up to the wet season I couldn’t wait for the rain too come as it was so hot and humid and now its raining and a nicer temperature I want the rain to stop! Go figure.

(I lost my flip flops (or thongs as their called here) about 4 times in the mud when trying to take these pictures)

At the moment the rain has stopped but looking at the radar for Darwin on the Australian Bureau of Meteorology website (BOM for short) we are going to get a little bit more at least today.

This means that not only is the land soaked, sometimes up to your ankles (where are your wellies when you need them), but the roads also flood where there are creeks because the water around us is tidal (picture below is from the flood here a few weeks ago when we got stuck the wrong side of the creek until the water went down) making it tricky to get around.

Luckily at the moment none of the roads around our house or how we get to work are flooded and fingers crossed we won’t have to worry about that again.

Today’s rain related problem was that all of our clothes for the last week was either on the line and wet after several days of trying to dry them or in the washing machine wet because we were waiting for the other lot to dry. Not so good if your clothes for work are in the pile.

We paid a visit to the local laundromat which was about 40km’s away (nothing is close when you live in the outback!) and of course as we drove nearer and nearer those not so beautiful grey clouds got closer and closer so that we had to make a mad dash from the car to the shop to avoid getting soaked.

Visiting a laundromat is not too interesting in itself (sorry!), we’ve all been there and done that, but what made me laugh was the sheer volume of signs telling you what you can’t do so I had to take a photo (of course).

You find this kind of sineage a lot around Darwin and it seems like we all need instructions on even the simple things like just how to get through life sometimes.

The Aussie pointed out that it would be much nicer and kinder to give us a list of things to do to optimise your visit to the laundromat instead of the demands that were all over the wall and I think he’s right – are signs like those above treating us like children who don’t know better or is this the best way of making sure we do survive modern life?

Luckily we managed to follow all the rules and not insert bent coins or the like and have clothes to wear to work tomorrow!

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