Christmas in Sydney 2009

We left the horrendous heat of Perth behind when we went to Sydney for Christmas.

The remains of a Western Australian cyclone had moved across the country and dropped gallons of rain on dry New South Wales farmland. Sydney, however, protected by the Blue Mountains only received cool drizzle. But this suited us all.

This strange dog sitting with Doug is a hairless Dachsund called Mechant (French for naughty). He belongs to Matt and they have a love/hate relationship: sometimes they love each other, sometimes they hate each other. Mechant loves Doug.

No, they aren't rats under the table. They're dogs.

Christmas Eve we had a BBQ. (As you do.)

Doug had made his place so comfy and Christmassy.

Buzz Lightyear. (tee hee)

Buzz put up some solar lanterns.

What a great Christmas present!

We played a very entertaining board game called "Cranium".

It puts the imagination and spelling skills to the test.

Matt and Doug won, of course, but it was nothing to do with being able to spell!

This is Matt's other dog, Mickey, on floor cleaning duty.

The men, comparing bellies. I think Gerard wins, hands down.

King Street Wharf.

Boxing Day Doug had bought us tickets to have lunch on a cruiser on the harbour and watch the start of the Sydney to Hobart yacht race.

Wine and champagne was free, so we got stuck in!

Going under the Harbour Bridge. (Doug's going to climb it next year Matt's Xmas gift.)

It's a spectacular sight when all the spinnakers are raised and they start racing towards the heads.

Sunday Glenn went to America and I came home.

I returned to 40degC and the air con broken. tut!

And all the repair men are on holiday, of course.

A silver lining

It has been ten months since the bush fire (Feb 2009) on our block.

This is what it looked like immediately after.

The zamias and grass trees were the most resilient as they are built to withstand fire.

Despite the flames and heat green centres remained.

This photo below was taken in July 09.

The photo below was taken last week, 9th Dec 2009.

There is a carpet of green shoots from the huge variety of native shrubs and plants that covered the ground before the fire. Few spring flowers appeared this year but there is no doubt they will be back next Spring - probably stronger than ever.

By October the majority of the grass trees had grown a flower stalk.

We had never seen so many produce a stalk at the same time and believe it must have been a result of the fire.

When they flowered they were constantly covered in bees from the two hives on our block.

What we missed out on with Spring flowers we gained in orchids.

We have never seen such a variety of orchids on the block.
Below: Blue Fairy orchids

Little Pink Fairy orchids

Bunny orchids

Jug orchids

Leaping spider orchid Calendenia attigens

Cyanicula ixioides

Yellow China Orchid

These only occur after a bush fire so quite rare.

Cyanicula gemmata

Sun Orchid

Snail orchid

Microtis Mignonette

White China Orchid

These also only occur after a fire.

Isn't this wonderful?

From a blackened and seemingly dead tree bursts bright vigorous growth.

Most of the burned Wandu have bright green shoots erupting from charcoal-like bark.

It's an uplifting sight after such devastation.

Sun Orchid

I was just hanging out the washing when I looked down and saw the sun orchid near the washing line that has been in bud for weeks has finally opened. Glorious! It must have known the temperature is going to climb to 35degC today!!

WA Orchid Society

We were privileged to have people from the WA Orchid Society visit our block recently in search of interesting orchids. Each year they scour areas of bushland that have had a fire go through during the summer months as it creates the right conditions for rare orchids to bloom.

Above is a rabbit orchid - we have not seen on our block before. It is tiny and may have been there but we were unaware of their presence.

This a Blue China Orchid.

Russell

Tiptoe through the bluebells. How long will he be "cute" for, I wonder.

Already he has walked across my laptop keyboard and altered something that took me some time to un-alter!

Joining us in bed came to an abrupt end when we realised we were losing sleep!

A few thwacks and he got the message.

However, he appears to have got 'control' in the lounge room!