Last weekend before winter

It's been cool up here at Larnook today, cool and wet. Yesterday I drove to the university's Coffs Harbour campus for their graduation ceremony in the company of my colleague, Maree. It was a long day but enjoyable - sunny and warm day down there and we had a scrummy lunch at a surf club before heading home. Glen came over last night and brought his friend, Peter, who has cycled up from Sydney and is hoping to get up to Cairns. How impressive, hey. We had met Pete the night before when he joined us for dinner at the 20 000 Cows vegan restaurant and ashram in South Lismore. Last night was lots of fun - too much wine, some spa time, a great meal courtesy of Kyogle farmers' market and a couple of dvds. We even stayed up until after 1.00am.
So this morning we were a little sluggish, though Pete rose at about 7.30 so I took him down and gave him an inspection of our property before breakfast, which was Steve's special pancakes, fruit salad, mascapone cheese topped with a generous drizzle of camp maple syrup. Before the boys left we drove up to Billen Cliffs to show them the community that lives above us (often in the clouds).

Generous to a fault, Glen bought Steve and I these wallaby repellent devices that you attach to your car. When you reach 80kms the air blowing through them produces a sonic wave that is supposed to scare off wallabies within 2kms of your car. I have my doubts but I'm willing to try anything to reduce my wallaby death toll. The car by the way has now been repaired and the kind people at Progers Panel Beaters in Goonellebah even washed the car and cleaned and vacuumed the interior. Lovely stuff.

Oh and you might be interested in our rainfall this month. We recorded 350mm or 14 inches for the month of May.

Tom Cat does the (gruesome) trick

The recent deluge has persuaded the members of the local rodent community to seek drier hunting grounds in our house. This has not pleased Steve, in particular. I too am slightly unsettled by the sight of rats the size of a small fox terrier scampering across our loungeroom floor. We woke this morning to find mouse poo on the wooden venetians in our bedroom and the other morning we woke to find a beautiful avocado had been half eaten by a marauding rodent. I was also angered by the rats that have managed to chew through the once-rat proof metal lined bins I store the chook food in. Last Tuesday evening I went out and lifted the lid and stared face to face with five of the varmints.
Now we did first try and use traps. Those big, nasty, angry traps that take two hands to push down the wire trap part and whihc terrify me that I will have my fingers broken if I accidentally set one off. These were baited with peanut butter and rolled oats but the rats proved too clever, managing to eat most of the bait while still maintaining unbroken necks. So we had to go the posion option. Colleagues at work, and our friend, Glen, all advised one product: TomCat. So we've been using Tommy on and off now for the past few months, but this afternoon Steve set up numerous TomCat stations around the house. He's had enough. The downside of course of using TomCat is when the rats have died their ratty stench pervades the house. Hopefully it won't be as bad as it was for a few days during the summer, when I would have happily clogged my nostrils with plaster of paris to shut down the stink.

Last lot of flood pics...I promise

Steve and I went for a walk this morning down to the bridge. This was taken looking down towards our property from the bridge. Again, you can get a sense of the force of the water as its almost flattened these casuarinas and sugar cane.

The water has gouged out the vegetation on this bank and left nothing but bare soil. I guess some land slippage probably occurred too.

This is a tad worrying. This landslip is about 100 metres above the bridge on Martin's Road, the only access int our road is via this road. A school bus travels on this road twice daily.

And ust a couple of shots of us drying cd and dvd covers, magazines and the like.

Front garden coming along nicely

Just a comparison shot against the picture in the main banner at the top of the blog that was taken by the estate agent to promote the house before we bought it. We had seen the photo and liked the house and background but thought it was way too close to the road! Which of course turned out to be our driveway. This garden features some grass tress, cycads, lomandra and other natives. We hope to cement render the brick walls sometime this year.

Some of our fruit trees on the change

A persimmon tree in all its autumnal glory

Our pear tree on the turn

Orange tree laden with fruit

Nature...a harsh mistress

This pic was taken about 3.00pm Saturday and shows the creek at its peak yesterday. The creek actually rose another 5 metres above this on Thursday and you can get a sense of the force of the surge by the flattened grasses (metre high usually) and the tobacco bushes. All of the casuraina trees you can see are usually on land. Compare this pic with the shot 3 pics below that was taken about 9am yesterday morning.

We've had more rain over the past 24 hrs and the bridge went under again today, so we are now flooded in, rather than out, which is a much nicer feeling. The bridge should be in the middle of this pic. You can see a car on the left hand side which has had to stop because it's unable to cross.If you go back to the earlier posts on the creek revegetation you'll see some pics taken from similar spots. That will show you just how much land is underwater at the moment. The flood has caused me to rethink the creek revegetation strategy. I might not be able to do too many plantings in the flood zone unfortunately, not only does the prolonged submersion affect the plants but the force of the surge down the creek pushes over what is growing as you can see with the 2 metre high wild tobacco bushes that had looked a picture last week and I was going to use them as a canopy to underplant rainforest species. Back to the drawing board.

This was taken earlier this morning. The creek had risen well above the two casuarina trees by 3.00pm

You can get a sense of the force of the creek as it surged across tis grass, bending over a 2metre fig tree we planted a couple of weeks ago and leaving muddy sand behind.

The clean up continues and the chooks had to be fed

Today was quite wet, rained most of the day, though we only recorded 12.5mm. One of the first jobs of the morning was to feed the chooks.

Then we rescued the poor Madagascan Palm which had been blown off the deck and had its pot smashed from underneath it. It's now recovering under cover.

Wet weather calls for appropriate clothing.

Another house...another flood

OK, so it's nothing like the flood that got us in Newcastle in June 2007, but still, we were hoping not to have to go through this again. The basement flooded and this was where we were keeping about a dozen boxes we were yet to unpack. Some contained photo albums, old magazines, cds and dvds. We spent much of today (Saturday) vacuuming up the water, disinfecting the floor and trying to save things by drying them out.

Doesn't Steve look hot in gum boots

Now at home

We decided to chance it and see how far we could get home, so we left Glen's place at 4.00pm and luckily the creek that had been blocking the Tuntable Creek Rd had dropped so we could safely cross. The force of our creek was easily seen by the debris that still litters the bridge and the trees that are bent over. We sustained some damage - mos notably the basement flooded and that was where we were storing boxes of stuff we had yet to unpack, including cds, dvds, phot albums, mags, videos, etc. So that was unfortunate. Most should be covered by insurance bit there is some stuff that isn't replaceable.
The creek rose about 6 metres and took with it three trays of Lomandra tubes, a dozen lilly pillies, some red cedars and some other stuff which is also disappointing. I'll post some pics tomorrow of how it has reshaped the land by the creek and given us a sandy beach.
The Madagascan Palm did topple over, but the plant is intact but the pot has broken, so we'll need to repot it tomorrow.
Thanks to those who phoned or texted to see how we were going and thanks to Glen for his generous hosting of us as we whined about wanting to get back home. Well I was whining anyway.

What a night

The rain intensified around 4.30 yesterday and so there was no way we could even contemplate getting home so we bunked down with Glen again. Another friend of his, Mark, had also arrived from Sydney and we were sitting in the lounge room having a quiet bevie around 6.45 when the power went out. And stayed out until about 10.30 this morning. We managed to bbq some chops and sausages for dins and washed these down with a few glasses of wine.
Right now we have the wireless on and the ABC is in disaster-information mode so it's all very exciting. The uni has closed and is now operating as an evacuation centre (I hope I don't go to work on Monday and find a family of four in my office) and all schools are closed in the region. Lismore CBD and suburbs south and north have been evacuated and the Wilson's River is expecting to peak at 10.4metres in a couple of hours and maybe breach the levee bank. The winds were very strong last night causing lots of trees to fall down.
Anton phoned me and apparently our creek has now dropped below the bridge but unfortunately there's no way to get there at the moment - all the roads from Dunoon to our area are blocked by flooded creeks.
If we don't get any more rain then there might be a slight chance of getting back this afternoon but we might just wait and try tomorrow morning.
Just checked the Bureau of Met's page and we've had 9 inches of rain in the past 30 hours.
3.19pm: both our routes from here (Dunoon) to our place at Larnook are still cut by floodwaters, so looks like we won't be back home until tomorrow.

"You're wet, " Rif Raf says to Janet. "Yes....it's raining."

Righto then...here's the latest creek height trace from our creek, but recorded at a station a little closer to our place, and as you can see there has been some serious movement upwards. What this actually means is that we have been flooded out. Lismore hadn't received a great deal of rain yesterday, so the creek rising over our bridge was the last thing on our minds as we drove merrily home, right up to when we almost ran into the back of the cars parked in front of it, not being able to cross. Ooowah! As you can see from the pic below the flooding didn't stop some of the Billen community from crossing over.

Just joking....though the swirling foamy waters depicted in this pic are similar to what we saw at our creek. After a quick phone call to our friend Glen, we drove all the way back down the valley to Lismore, got Glen's housekey from him at his Donut King shop (where he was staying back while a contractor repaired his floor) and then drove up to his place at Dunoon, via the Modanville takeaway to but pizza and hamburgers.

The rain is now torrential, we've spoken to one of our neighbours who told us the creek is at least 1.5metres above the bridge, so we won't be returning home for a couple of days I'd say. being flooded in was going to be an adventure - being flooded out is less so. I'm most concerned about the plantings I have done along the creek as they would all be under about 2 metres of water at the moment. Hmm then there's the lovely Madagascan Palm featured in a post below which may now have been snapped in half by the strong winds, the basement that might have flooded and the chooks that need feeding. Life in the country.

This is 'steady'?

Well if you believe the new NBN weather man (just what happened to Gary Youngberry?), we are in for a weather wallopping, somehing akin to Armageddon, over the next couple of days. This could mean we are flooded in. Or out. So if we do get the predicted 100mm (4 inches) today then I think we might batten down the hatches and stay at home tomorrow. It is eerily quiet and calm right at the moment, (8.29am) though we did get 11mm of rain last night, and apparently the winds in Lismore were huge.
I checked the Bureau of Met's page when I got to work and Leycester Creek, which is the creek that forms part of our boundary, was described as 'steady'. Hmmm how anyone can call that dancing line 'steady' I don't know. There seems to be a definite trend upwards to my googlie eyes. Anyway, we are stocking up on essentials at Woolies this afternoon. That means chocolate. And lots of of it. Oh and some punnets of live crickets for the goannas.

Our first fire

Unfortunately the flash has washed out the colour of the flames but you get the picture. It's been quite cool up here today, and the rain looks like it has set in (about time, so far this month we have only had 15.5mm), so we decided that it was cool enough to light the fire. I've ben gathering pinecones for a while now, which are terrific 'natural' firestarters, and we also have some firewood that the previous owners left us, so the fire has been crackling away, warming the lower part of the house quite nicely. Here's Steve realizing he'd forgotten to place a marshmallow on the end of his poker.
Shane had made some delicious pesto using our basil and it was waiting for us when we got home, so we snacked on that for a while. Yummo.

We did quite a bit this weekend: Steve painted the entry area, I made a new garden, our new leather sofa which we'd impulsively bought up at Pacific Fair on the Gold Coast a couple of months ago was delivered, our friends, Stewart and Matt (yes we do have other friends than Glen and Shane) came around for a roast pork dinner on Saturday night and on Friday night we hung a lot of our art on the walls, which has really made the place feel much more like home.

Sunday afternoon and a bit of burning off

Shane come down just before lunch on Sunday and spent the afternoon and much of today working on our creek reveg project. Late yesterday afternoon he set fire to the two big piles of old weeds and privet bush that he and the boys had removed a few weeks ago. I think we are going to have to have a bonfire in the next month or so. Big fires like this are so enthralling. While Shane was hard at work with the weeds, Steve and I went up to the Billen Cliffs community to visit Anton and his wife, Abby and their two kids, who live just 6 minutes away from us. Anton was a student of mine between 1991-1993 and I bumped into him at the Rural Buying Service in Lismore just before Xmas. He told me he had moved up here a couple of years ago, was living literally five minutes away from me and worked in HR at Lismore Council.

So we finally managed to visit him yesterday. It turns out that be basically lives on the other side of a ridgeline we can see clearly from our place and that our little creek that flows into our bigger creek actually forms one of his boundaries, so we are kinda connected. He cleaerly loves living on his 5 acres, he's extendning his house, he's built a composting toilet, grows lots of plants, and he's just installed a solar system that supplies all of his energy needs. He also gave us 3 pasionfruit plants, some tree ferns and a few other plants and some avos (avocados). Hopefully the will come and visit us in the not too distant future.

Making a new garden

The weekend was perfect up here, so after we'd been to Kyogle for our fruit and veges I got stuck into shovelling the big heap of soil we'd had delivered and barrowing it over to the stand of pines where I wanted to create a new garden for azealeas and rhododendrons. By the way, that beautiful tree behind me is a longan tree which is a close relative of the lychee and produces very similar, sweet fruit around April. On a hot summer's day one fo the coolest places on the ranch is underneath that tree.

After several hours lugging the soil over, I built up the garden area. I could have done with twice as much soil, but we already spent $350.00 on this lot.

Once I'd raked the soil and got my levels, I then spent most of Sunday morning carting wheelbarrow loads of pine mulch to lay over the soil and around the plants that we've already got growing there.

This is how it looked by midday Sunday. Nowe we just need to go to a nursery and buy some more plants to fill it up.

There's now a nice little pathway in between the avenue of pines, where we'll place a garden seat. Over time the garden on both sides will be thick and interesting with all kinds of interesting plants. The structure at the back is our chookery where our gorgeous girls live.

Clothes on a line with a view

The mundane act of hanging clothes on the line to dry becomes an aesthetic pleasure when you get to peg them out with the Billen Cliffs as a backdrop, don't you think?

Nature yields some secrets

Our spectacular Madagascan Palm, which Steve bought as a 30cm high pot plant in Cabramatta about 7 or 8 years ago, and which now stands about 3.5m high flowered for the first time this month. It's actually a relative of the frangipani group of plants and this relationship can be seen in the very frangipani-like flower. Unfortunately, the flower is without the heady scent of a fangipani.

The plant sits in its pot on the deck we built for the spa and enjoys a view to the north west. However, we will have to move it soon to a spot where it won't get damaged by the frosts that we will most likely experience over winter.

This was a great find. I'd noticed a male satin bower bird a few times flying in the overgrown garden of our neighbour, Marissabelle, on our fenceline. I was down near this area on Saturday afternoon and heard him displaying so I crept over to where he was calling from and sure enough I spotted his bower of lurve, replete with a variety of blue objects. This bower bird is now going to have the most spectacular of bowers - Since Saturday I've left a couple of broken pegs, a bottle top and some blue plastic just near the bower on our side of the fence and he's accepted all my gifts which he's used to trick up the bower. Wait till I find where Steve keeps his sequinned material. he's going to be one popular bird.

Closed for Eurovision

Apologies to anyone who might be wanting to read the latest updates which I usually post on Sunday night, but we are watching Eurovision - of course. Hopefully the blog will resume full transmission tomorrow evening.

Update: I disagree, I'm sorry. Norway shouldn't have won. He was cute, and he did have two midgets and a man dressed in green, but he still shouldn't have won. The view from Maryville@Larnook was either Sweden or Germany. Although he was clearly not German. But when has that been a problem in Eurovision. And what was Britain thinking wheeling out Andrew Lloyd Webber??

Tender Centre Floozies

Something odd happens to us every second Friday after work. We are strangely drawn to the very ordinary looking warehouse that houses Lismore Tender Centre on Casino Rd, South Lismore. The fact that we have to drive past it on our way home probably adds to its accessibility as well. Then, once we've grabbed our tender centre pen, yellow tender form and clipboard, a strange irrationality envelops us and we start making bids on crap. Sometimes outrageous bids on outrageous crap. And sometimes we are the highest bidder. Which means we have to then pay for the outrageous crap and bring it home.
Take last fortnight. We successfully bid on a lawn mower. We started it when we got it home and all seemed good. Then, last Friday afternoon I started using it and it was then that I noticed it hemoraghing oil out of its oil tank. All over the motor, creating great bluey grey clouds of smoke. "Never again will we tender for something with a motor at the tender centre" we both said loudly and forecefully.
So what did we tender for today Yet another lawn mower, oh and three outdoor wooden seats and a wardrobe! Stay tuned.

Update: We missed out on the three garden seats and the lawn mower, but we were the highest bidder for the wardrobe. The vendor has yet to be contacted, which means that we didn't reach the reserve price, and so they will probably come back with a price they want. Which of course will be higher than $200.00. We are not going to budge. Really. Honest.

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day to Elaine from Steve and I, and also to all the other wonderful mums who read the blog. Hope you all had a great day!

OK so we like our food...

We do seem to eat quite well up here....this was breakfast this morning...bacon from the butchers at Kyogle, our eggs, poached, gently bathed in Hollandaise sauce on a whole grain muffin, with bbqed tomato, basil and some rocket on the side. Apart from the bacon and muffin, everything else was grown here.

Bye Bye Andrej and Ollie

Hmmm I still can't get the hang of uploading pics in the right order. Anyway...we can't speak more highly of Bickford's Mango Tea for a thirst quenching drink on a hot day. We buy bottles of the stuff from the grocery store at Kyogle, which, it seems, is one of the few places that stock it. We can't get it in Lismore...we can get Bickfords Lemon Cordial but not mango tea. Anyway, the reason it's here is because Andrej and Ollie, the two German back packers who have been staying with us for the past two weeks, really loved the stuff.

The boys have worked very hard, often working all day. On their last night, which was last Thursday, Andrej cooked spaghetti bolognaise which was very tasty and....

I taught Ollie how to make a banana and pasionfruit yogurt cake which has become something of a staple here at Maryville. The cake turned out to be delicious. The boys hicthhiked to Nimbin on Friday and then their plan was to head to Byron Bay for a few days before making their way to Sydney. They fly home on the 2oth. Like our other Help-Xers, they made a big contribution to our place and we hope they keep an eye on the blog from time to time.

Our next project

We had to have three of our radiata pines cut down because they were too close to the power line that connects our house to the power. So last week they were converted into these two big mounds of wood chip.

Our plan is to underplant this grove of pines with azealeas and rhododendrons and use the woodchips to mulch it all. Most of the azealeas will be transplanted from around the house to this site. We need to get a big load of soil first to build up the planting areas. Stay tuned.

Some more spa shots

This pic was taken by Andrej using time delay on his camera. The boys worked hard pretty much all day and then had a spa pretty much every night.

Here's Shane, Ollie and me enjoying a spa and a beer.

Kimba makes a friend

Many of you reading this blog will have met Kimba the woma python, either back when we lived in Newcastle when Kimba was a snappy youngster or more recently up here at Larnook. He's growing quite nicely tho he's become quite finicky with his food and seems to only eat weaner rats, which he usually eats in a snack of three or four. Here he is making friends with Ollie. And who could blame him.

I hadn't realised that Kimba likes to watch a bit of TV occasionally. Here he is watching his favourite show.

Some interoriors and a nice outside shot by Steve

Looking out from the back verandah over our lawn and across to our other paddock in the morning.

Steve is now home from his holiday to Newcastle, Central Coast and Sydney..woo hoo....a few friends asked to see some more interior shots of the house so here are some....the pic above is of part of our informal living area with our big dining table...we are yet to paint the walls of this room

Informal living/lounge, again, walls have yet to be painted. We'll probably be lighting the wood fire in the next month or so I suspect.

The new kitchen, tho still haven't got our splashback - but hopefully that will be installed in the next couple of months.