Snake Memo: Swamp Snake

Swamp snake, about 45-50cm long, DOR, on the road at Billen Cliffs, 26 January.  first swamp snake that I've seen in the valley.

What a difference a year makes...

Last year on this day the northern rivers region was in the grip of a mighty sub-cyclonic storm that caused much destruction; up-rooting trees, closing the Wollumbin walking track and the Barr Mountain walking track; and flooding local creeks and rivers. Our place was sheltered against the strong winds, and in fact we had no idea that we were in the midst of such damage, but 94.5mm of rain was dumped on us over most of the day. However, Julia (Shane), Hans, Steve and I made the most of it: baking chocolate chip cookies, watching movies, enjoying a drink or two in the hot tub....and playing a few rounds of nude bocce in the quieter precipitatory moments.
This time around it was quite different...the skies were sombre and heavy but only produced a measly 4mm. No winds, no flooding, no destruction today. Just a nice mild drizzly day to end a lovely three day break.  And, after Glen and Julia had left this morning, it was just me at home.
However,  there was one similarity to last year. A big carpet python made a meal of one of our girls last night and the same thing happened last year on the 25th January, possibly by the same snake. It has not moved very much all day and won't be able to leave the Chookery for a few days yet. It's of course way too big now to squeeze its way out of the holes in the wire mesh, so I will need to shepherd it out once it starts to get active again.

Early morning walk

I woke up yesterday morning around 6 in the big empty bed - Steve has headed south to visit family and friends scattered across Newcastle, Central Coast and Sydney - and argued with myself about whether I should get up and start my day or fall back to sleep. 'Active Kev' won you will be pleased to know. I hadn't walked up to Billen Cliffs for quite a few months, so that's where I headed. We've had some lovely cooler and wetter weather up here over the past week so the morning sky was grey and brooding and cool enough I put on a thin sloppy joe. I bid my usual 'good morning boys' to Baxter and Dexter, as I strode down McGuinness Road and eventually into Martins Road. Red necked wallabies love misty, wet mornings, and so they were out in abundance. For some reason I cannot stop myself from wishing them a good morning as well, so I had quite a chatty walk.

I inadvertently scared a few brown quail from their hiding places as I strolled along Martins Road - you would think by now they would have evolved into a species that was confident in its hiding abilities. They were all perfectly hidden until they exploded out of the grasses, flying off with a wingbeat audible in the still morning air. I reached the beginning of Billen Cliffs Community and decided to be superfit and walk up the VERY steep road until I reached another road to the left that would then take me back in a big loop to the entry to the community. I hadn't done this before on foot, so I was eager for adventure.  The steep road was not such an ordeal as it turned out and as I made my way into the other road my efforts were rewarded with a lovely view of a swamp wallaby looking back at me from the middle of the road, about 20 metres away. Swampies are solitary wallabies unlike the much more abundant red necks, and rather more shy as well. This one stayed looking at me, still munching on some grass, as it stood upright, for about 30 seconds before bounding up the slope and vanishing into the bushes.

I walked along the road, cheerily greeting only one other early morning walker, and sticky beaking at the different houses and their idiosyncratic designs and building styles, before I joined the road that took me back to the entry and then onwards back to Maryville@Larnook. These early morning walks really seem to energise me because I wrote out a big long list of things to do and spent the day doing them!

Up until about 5.00pm that is, when Glen arrived. We broke out a bottle of sparkling wine and adjourned to the hot tub to chat and laugh and and giggle and watch the sun set. Julia arrived an hour or so later and joined us in the tub. I had slow cooked a leg of lamb with baked veges followed by a Sarah Lee apple pie (crumble top)....washed down with litres of wine (or so it seemed). We didn't even get around to watching a movie.  Great night!

Helped by HelpXchange

Steve and I were wondering how many backpackers we had hosted through HelpXchange (HelpX) so I did the math. Our first Helpers were Baptiste and Eduard, French guys, living in Canada. They stayed ten days with us and we still keep occasional contact. Baptiste is about to submit his PhD. They arrived in February 2009.  So, to the best of my counting ability and memory, we have hosted 53 helpers from 14 countries. How fabulous is that!  24 of the 53 have been French, followed by 7 Germans, 4 Spanish, 3 from Taiwan, 2 from the States, Singapore, Italy, Austria and Iceland, and the remainder from Belgium, Netherlands, Latvia and UK. Each and every one of our Helpers has enriched our lives in some way: through the sharing of their adventures, their perspectives on life, their recipes, their laughs, sometimes their sadnesses. They have lugged tonnes of mulch, pulled out kilos of weeds, looked  after our animals, mowed, planted, cut back, built, demolished, painted, cleaned and washed. Larnook would not be what it is today without their combined energy and efforts.  If you are a HelpXer and you are reading this, we thank you for helping to make Larnook what it is today.

Wollumbin/Mt Warning Walk

 Up until today I had not climbed up Wollumbin, but what a lovely walk it is, and I will be walking this track again. We left home at 8.30, and began our walk at 9.30. Even at this reasonably early start, the car park was full and it we had to park a fair way from the start of the track. This is Clem and Max, two French HelpXers who have been with us for a few days. The track has been closed for 10 months or so because it copped a hiding in the heavy storm. edge of cyclone that caused so much destruction in the northern rivers on Australia Day - the day we spent at home (we were flooded in) baking cookies, drinking in the spa and playing bocce in the rain, oblivious to the destruction all around us.

 And the effects of the storm were well and truly apparent with massive trees pushed over by the force of the winds. Imagine what noise must be created when a tree like this crashes through the canopy and on to the forest floor below.

 The start of the walk meanders through a lovely Bangalow palm forest before climbing. And climbing. And climbing. But the track is well done and the walk is relentlessly upwards but also very beautiful.

 About 400 metres or so from the summit you come face to face with this sign, although actually I didn't see it until we had come back down. I'm not sure how many people would really pay heed to it, anyway.

 The final leg of the track goes straight up what I guess might be an ancient volcanic flow of rock. A chain 'hand rail' is essential to help pull yourself up the steep terrain and it really is an arduous final few hundred metres. It took us just under two hours to get to the top so by this stage, 11.00am, the sun was high in the sky and it was quite hot.

 Once on the summit, at 1156 metres asl, you are spoiled for choice with three well designed viewing platform allowing almost 360 degree panoramas of the magnificent landscape below. We could see the beaches of Byron Bay and the sky scrapers of Surfers Paradise as well as the lush valleys and valley floors in between the rugged mountain ranges. Perfect.

 Looking back towards Larnook which is around and behind the very right of the photo (which is Blue Knob. The little bump to the left of Blue Know is Sphinx Rock.

And a selfie at the top: Max, me and Clem. All up it took us 4 hours which included about 20 minutes at the top. The walk coming down was less arduous though one of my knees would disagree. I found a lovely brown tree snake in the toilet block which was a nice way to end the walk. We stopped at Uki Market on the way back and we drove through Nimbin and we had a ten minute walk around town, politely declining the baked goods on offer. Back home and Max and I cooled off in the creek.

Woops - pics out of psynch

 For Malte's last night I felt it important to introduce him to Australian cuisine so I made this pavlova.  OK, OK, so I cheated and bought a pre-made base from Woolies but everything else I did.

And Malte liked it.

Major Project 2014 #2: Convert storage room into reptile room

 This room in the basement next to the gym is now being converted into my reptile room, where I will house all the reptiles I currently have in the study (and perhaps a couple more, hey Stevie). First thing to do after clearing it out and cleaning it up was to paint it.

 Meet Max, a HelpXer from Nancy in France. You can see he is very adept with the roller!

And this is Clem, another HelpXer, not surprisingly from Nancy, as well. I shall keep you posted on the transformation of this room over the coming weeks.

Malte's last night

 So after three and half weeks, it was time for Malte to move on to the next part of his adventure - Tasmania. But his last night with us was a great night - a beer or two in the spa just on sunset, with the sun low in the sky, lighting up the fabulous backdrop of Billen Cliffs.

We had a great meal, listened to some music, and then Malte had to pack. I drove him up to the Gold Coast airport and he jetted off for Tasmania where he hopes to find some work and more wonderful Australian adventures. Larnook is his Australian home now and we hope to have his smiling face back here sometime before he leaves for Germany in May.

Channon Markets and Protestors' Falls

 Always looking for an excuse to wander around The Channon Market, we took Malte and Francesco there last Sunday. No sooner had we walked through the gate than we looked up in this gum tree and saw this fella having a snooze. It was the first time that either had seen a koala in the wild so it was a great start to the day. The Markets were there colourful, crazy, best.

 We headed into Nightcap Range National Park, along Terania Creek, to enjoy the cool of the rainforest walk up to Protestors's Falls. Obligatory group shot.

 Malte "I'm the King of the World" Neumann.

 Malte and I walked behind the falls for this nice shot. It's been very dry up here - we are parched and aching for some good rain of 100mm or more, so there's not a lot of water coming down the Falls at the moment.

After our walk, we walked up to a picnic area in the car park. Malte went ahead because he was keen to go to the 'public toilet' when all of a sudden I heard "Kevin, Kevin, come quick...I think it's a crocodile?"....two big fat lace monitors or tree goannas which were quite obvious the lords of the picnic area were sunning themselves in the afternoon sun. One of them wandered right up to us in the hope, no doubt, of a tasty morsel.

Italian Feast

 Francesco, who we met through another friend of ours, Don, spent a week with us last week. Francesco is couch-surfing his way around Australia and so we were delighted he stay with us for a while. Francesco is also a very good cook and he had been filling our bellies with some amazing Italian specialties all week. So we asked him whether he would be happy to cook an Italian Feast for us and he kindly agreed to this. So Glen, Julia and The Ladies from Upper Cawongla, Mel and EB came down and joined Steve, Malte and me to enjoy Francesco's cooking. Julia brought down probably the best batch of his Thai style pumpkin soup he has ever made to add a little Asian fusion to the night.

 Mel doing some twerking in the kitchen.

 EB and Julia with Francesco and Steve looking on.

Glen, Malte, Steve and me doing our shark faces, and Francesco, well contorting his face rather incredibly!  It was a great night!  Since we've moved to Larnook we host so many dinner parties - there have been so many fabulous dinner parties enjoyed around our big mango wood table.

Major Project #1 2014: Renovating the entry garden

 This garden at the front of the house was the first garden we designed, to use the term loosely, but after 5 or so years, it was time to renovate. The Lomandra had grown too bog and had blocked out all the other plants such that it had become simply a mass of Lomandra. Now Lomandra are nice looking plants and we do have a lot of them, but we decided the garden needed renovating, so out they had to come. Now this was a more difficult exercise than I had anticipated because some of the plants were quite large and well established.

 The garden became a major project for Malte and he poured lots of sweat but hopefully no tears into the task of cutting back, then digging out each Lomandra plant and replanting it carefully in The Big Bush Garden. One of the plants proved too difficult to remove by hand so Steve attached a chain around it and tugged it out with the car.

 With some of the Lomandra gone you can see how much space we have to work with.

And here it is, almost stripped back to where I can start re-contouring and planting and mulching. There's still a few plants that are still to be removed but these should go over the next couple of days. I shall of course keep you updated on the progress with pics.  This garden is now going to be called Malte's Garden.

Another 40+C day

OK, so first an apology. It's been about two weeks since I last blogged, and so much has happened in that time. We had a house full of wonderful friends over the period between Xmas and New Year and so it's been a bit difficult to get some time to myself to blog.  Hopefully the multitude of posts that follow will make up for my tardiness in getting back to bloggy-business. You also need to meet Malte, who has been staying with us since a few days before Xmas. Malte is a HelpXer from near Hamburg in Germany and he has fitted in very well to life at Larnook. Being surrounded by all our friends over a couple of weeks could have been a bit overwhelming for many people (myself included) but Malte just seems to have loved it. And it will probably come as no surprise to you that our friends have felt the same about him. He is a lovely guy who has worked really hard.
So on Sunday afternoon, when the temperature hit 42 degrees for the second day running, we abandoned our ambition to cool off in our creek, and instead spontaneously (we don't do much of the spontaneous stuff anymore) decided to head to the coast and spend a few hours at Brunswick Heads, a small coastal village 15 or so minutes north of Byron Bay. On the way we stopped at the lookout about 15 minutes from our place to show Malte Wollumbin/Mt Warning and its spectacular caldera.

 Malte and me and aforesaid mountain and caldera. Note my sensible hat for sensibly keeping the harsh sun from burning my head.

 Once we got to Brunny we headed across the old wooden footbridge that takes you across the river to the beach. The water was beautiful although it did have quite a strong pull to the right. Steve enjoying himself in the waves.

 Malte at the beach. No other words are needed.

 View across the beach from the breakwall just as the sun was beginning to sink.

Us getting excited that we were going to watch Jaws when we got home. 

It's over 40 degrees - let's clean the garage out

 So I wake up Friday morning and think, 'what big project can we do today that takes advantage of the plus 40 degree temperature that has been forecast? I know, we'll completely gut and clean the garage'. And so we did. The temp peaked at 42 on Friday but I reckon it was hotter than that inside the garage. Oh and we also began the three day process of cleaning out the fish pond.

 Once we got everything - and I mean everything - out of the garage and then swept it down, we let Malte have some fun with the high pressure hose. He enjoyed blasting away the dirt and grime.

 It's very therapeutic!

 Here's some of the stuff, much of which is destined for the skip which arrived this morning (Monday).

And now a nice clean garage!  Look how orderly our tools are arranged.  You can just see the back of Rita the Ride-On, but Roger hadn't been parked inside just yet. 

Cooling off in the creek

 We've had some hot days up here lately so we've been spending a bit of time in the creek to cool off. Steve, Michael, Malte, Grant, Keith and Liam.  Keith spent a couple of days with us just after new years on his way up to Gold Coast and Brisbane.

 The creek was lovely and refreshing and we were all confident of not standing on anything nasty like an eel as we all had our little nylon booties on.

 A nice pic of Keith lolling on the lilo and Michael bobbing up and down next to it.

Malte, Grant and Steve.  Kelly sacrificed a creek swim to prep for his amazing risotto which we all enjoyed later that evening followed by Grant's bread and butter pudding.  As you can imagine, we have been eating quite well.

2013 Rainfall Details

I know you all eagerly await these:

January: 301
February: 396.5
March: 205
April: 140.5
May: 76.5
June: 110
July: 115
August: 2
September: 34
October: 41.5
November: 182.5
December: 33.5

Total: 1638 mm

2012: 1573
2011: 1776.5
2010: 1687
2009: 1500

Happy New Year!

 Happy New Year to all the Mutterings Readers!  I hope that 2014 will be a fabulous year for you and that you will still pop by the blog from time to time. We celebrated at home this year - the tickets for the Tropical Fruits paprty this year were more expensive than a Mardi Gras ticket, so we thought we could make our own fun. And fun we did. Grant and Kelly had arrived a few days after Xmas, which has become a wonderful Larnook tradition and Michael arrived soon after with Justin, joining Steve, me, Liam and Malte. Julia came over for it as did our friends Elizabeth and Mel, who live in Upper Cawongla (as distinct from Julia, who resides in Lower Cawongla), as well as E and M's two friends from Sydney.

 A very bad night time pic of Kelly, Melissa and Elizabeth. Oh what fun we did have. We played bocce on the lawn, a game of hide and seek inside the house (this is getting to be a favourite), drank too much champagne cocktail, had some spa time...we didn't hit bed until 2.45.

So a big happy new year to all our friends and family!

Big Storm

While we didn't get any rain out of this storm, it looked mighty impressive as the sky darkened to inky black. We were just on the edge of the storm front. Kyogle was directly in its path but it faled to produce the large hail that had been forecast.

Waking the Barr Mountain track

 I took Liam and Malte up to Border Ranges National Park just after Xmas to walk the newly re-opened Barr Mountain track, which had been closed for much of the year following the savage battering the region received by the cyclone-like storm that hit on Australia Day. 

 It was lovely to be surounded, well immered in, really, the bright greens of sub-tropical rainforest. We were lucky to hear about four or five cat birds wailing to each other.

 Liam and Malte at the lookout.

 I was hoping we'd find a few snakes sunning themselves on the sunlit floor of the rainforest where there were breaks in the canopy, but alas, this was not to be. However, we did see a number of these Murray's skinks, basking on logs and they were quite willing to be photographed.

A selfie with the  boys.