Smoke and WIIW

Well it seems I am only managing a couple of posts a week at the moment...sigh.

Life and work have both been very busy.

At the moment we are existing in a cloud of smoke, thick enough that we lose sight of our mountain views.
Why?
The tail end of winter is burn-off season in Northern NSW.

Every year at this time farmers have traditionally burnt their paddocks (we pretty much call any parcel of fenced land a paddock in Oz. Be it 1/2 an acre or 10,000 acres).
The traditional reason is twofold
 - to encourage a flush of "green-pick" for livestock as spring arrives.
- and to reduce the danger of bush-fires in summer.

The practice had fallen off somewhat in recent decades, but following the 2009 Black Saturday Fires it has resurged with a vengeance.

Now my WIIW has nothing at all to do with the previous, so what on Earth do you think this might be.

Winter Day WIIW

Well we staggered home from Brisbane just before midnight the other night.
It is about 5 – 6 hours’ drive from here and we were delayed in getting away.

So back to last week’s  WIIW

There were three guesses.
Susan guessed: “An out-of-focus shot of the side railing on a bridge?”
No, but  your guess is probably the closest. It is a structure similar to an old timber bridge. 60%
Marcy guessed: “or distant raised highway? Or cracks in a wall...? Honestly, nothing comes to me. But I'll be curious to find out!”
Well your shot-gun approach has missed the mark, 30%
Finally Misha guessed: “I also think it's a raised highway.”
I can see why you guessed that, but no 30%

Meet Coffs Harbour Jetty.

I took this on my lunch break last Monday (please forgive the dodgy quality I only had my phone)

Despite it being winter down this way it was a glorious day so I went for a stroll in my break.
My new office is about five minutes’ walk from the vantage point where I took these.

Coffs Harbour is about a 90 minute drive from our mountain hideaway. Not too bad for a bush commute time!

The jetty was completed in 1892 and in the early days formed the main link between Coffs and Sydney.
In the nineteenth century and early twentieth century the only practical means of transport along the NSW coast was by sea. The north coast railway line, between Sydney and Brisbane, was not begun until 1905 and was not finished until 1932 with the building of the bridge over the Clarence River at Grafton.

This piccie from Wikipedia shows the Jetty in its heyday.
The ship the SS Fitzroy did a weekly run between Coffs and Sydney between 1912 and 1921 when it sunk in a storm with the loss of 31 lives of the 35 people aboard.


These days of course people fly between Coffs and Sydney (or drive if they don’t mind 6-8 hours in a car). So the Jetty is nothing but a tourist attraction and a handy place to cast a fishing line.
This last piccie shows  the whole harbour. The modern marina and fishing fleet harbour is on the left side between the mainland and Muttonbird Island.

WIIW

Well I have managed to manage WIIW this week.

But we are off to Brisbane in the morning so I will keep this short.

SO what on Earth do you think this might be?
 

Reflection

Still burning the candle at both ends.
So here is a quick piccy of the day.
(I will do my best to get up a WIIW tomorrow)

Folly in the Gardens

My piccie of the day is a classical style folly in the Fitzroy Gardens, Melbourne

I took this when Deb and I had a picnic there a couple of years ago...

Sun & Sand

Well this week it was my birthday, so to celebrate Deb and I had an easy day today.

Just over an hour away from our mountain hideaway is the Mid-North Coast of NSW, (our daughter E lives further north at Yamba which is on the bottom end of the North Coast).

After a lazy breakfast we headed east  to the coast and found this spot just north of Valla Beach

 Not bad for a winter's day is it?

It was a pleasant 20⁰C (70⁰F) which is lovely for winter but is considered way too cold for swimming in Oz. So we settled for a stroll along the sand.

I have to say looking at the waves  I can't wait for summer!

By the way, what looks like an island in the distance is nothing of the sort. It is the mountains at Trial Bay/Arakoon  about 45 km (28 miles) down the coast.

The last thing we did before we headed home was have a bit of a poke around a series of rock pools, we didn't find much as the tide was coming in and the more interesting rock-shelf was covered by waves

Clouds

Well life has been rather busy so I have been neglecting this poor blog.

Deb and I have been busy in the day jobs and working on the cottage (hopefully I'll have a moment to do an update today.

Anyway I thought I would quickly post a couple of piccies of "our mountains".

These were taken a few days ago, I love being between layers of cloud...