Boxing Day-Terrigal Beach

 

Seasons Greetings to the small band of followers to this modest blog. Wherever you are I hope you are having a peaceful time.

Here in Terrigal, yesterday, Christmas Day, was hot. Today is even hotter and tomorrow is forecast to be hotter still.

Sadly there are massive bushfires raging in the Grampians National Park region of Victoria, down south. The forest vegetation is very dry, the temperatures are extreme, there are high winds and dry lightning has started multiple fires. So far no loss of life but thousands of square kms burnt out and sadly thousands, perhaps millions, of native animals lost.

The photo above was taken on New Years Day, 1989 on Terrigal Beach. The world windsurfing championships were being held in Terrigal that year. Today windsurfing is not nearly so popular and the  scene on the beach is much different.

This photo was taken with my Leica M6 with a 28mm Elmarit lens on colour negative film. The negative has badly degraded and is now unusable but many years ago I made a very large block mounted print which hung in my old house. I photographed that for the photo above.

For  comparison I have just taken the short stroll down to the beach and shot the same scene today-at 11.30am. Photo below. A big difference. The beach is much less crowded but that may be down to the difference in days as not all the visitors have arrived yet. Also it may be hotter today that on NYD 1989. Today people are much more sun conscious. The umbrellas have been replaced by cabanas and there are more hats being worn. This photo was taken with my Leica Q2 with its 28mm lens.

 

Not a surf carnival photo

Today  I really would have liked to have posted a colourful photo taken at the huge surf carnival being held on Terrigal beach today. There are hundreds of children taking part and there's the problem.

I do not want to be seen taking photos near children. There is so much sensitivity around the subject. It's easy to understand why but it's more difficult to understand why the literally dozens of people snapping away with their smartphones on the beach and Esplanade don't get a second glance.

Anyway it is what it is, so today's photo is not of the surf carnival, it's our big ball of fur, Holly.

Photo taken with my Leica Q2.

A new door

 

As part of the extensive renovations we've changed the back door. Here's the carpenter working on the new door on a very cold morning last Monday.

Cooling off

 I took this photo on 1st February when I was visiting a friend, Laura, in Kiama, south of Sydney. It was a very hot day -as I drove on the M7 west of Sydney earlier in the day the car was showing an external temperature of  35.6ºC. It was also very humid. Late in the afterrnoon we drove south to Gerringong and  I spotted these swimmers walking carefully across the slippery rock shelf to an ocean swimming pool to take a cooling dip.

An extraordinary place

 I first went to Lightning Ridge, the opal mining settlement, in 1982. It was the real Wild West then. Very basic with few facilities.  It does have facilities now but it still is the Wild West. I went into the scrub today down rough dirt roads to some opal mining areas away from Lightning Ridge-not in the Mini.

It really is a very unusual place with many unusual people. The bush pubs I called in at are just tin shacks in the scrub. The facilities are the other side of basic although there is a strong mobile phone signal. The mining areas are full of rusting cars and trucks and mining equipment and spoil heaps and hundreds of open mine shafts. And a tree full of bras. 

On a 1 to10 scale of weirdness. With 10 really weird Lightning Ridge and surrounds would easily score 11.

Some photos from the day and two of the opal miners I met.

Mo and Phoebe

 It's been a few weeks since I put up a cat photo so here are two. Firstly above, Mo, a very classy cat on a very classy chair. 

 Mo is solid muscle. I when I picked him up and I was surprised at his weight for his slim build. Mo is one very fit cat. 

In my first version of this photo I cropped it very tight to just Mo and a small part of the back of the chair so Mo was much more prominent but it works a lot better in this wider angle shot.

I have entered this photo into an I-Shot-It cat photo competition and I hope Mo may be in with a chance but you can never tell with photo competitions.

Now in total contrast below a photo of Phoebe, my grand old lady, taken on my iPhone as she was transported in for a hospital visit to see Val a few weeks ago. She was annoyed at not being let out of her carrying cage for a while and she put on her angry face.

 Currently she has a bladder infection and I am having to give her an antibiotic tablet twice a day for ten days. Today was the first day and it did not go well. I saw that angry face again. 

Poor Phoebe is shrinking away. In total contrast to Mo Phoebe looks big but she is all fur and under the fur there is very little body. When I pick her up she feels very light but she is still eating well and although she is finding jumping up onto chairs difficult she is doing very well for her very advanced years. However I fear that the inevitable is not too distant. I will be very distressed when I lose her but she has been an extraordinary cat and friend and I have been so fortunate that she has lived for so long.

Suddenly it's high summer

 If you are in lockdown in the northern hemisphere and the weather is bleak it's probably best if you don't read on.

The last few days the weather here on the east coast of Australia has been superb. Warm-27ºC- but not too hot with no wind and cloudless skies. And we're not in lockdown. In fact for quite a few days no new covid-19 cases have been found in Australia. We have not eliminated the virus but we have done extraordinarily well.

Tomorrow the forecast is for some really hot weather-34ºC -here in Terrigal. At this time last year bushfires were raging. So far there have been none but after a lot of rain over winter there is a lot of fuel again if hot weather dries everything out.

I feel so sorry for my poor wife confined to a hospital bed in this glorious weather. At least she can rest comfortably that I am keeping the house and garden in good order. This morning I was out weeding the front garden at 7.00am before it was too warm.

This afternoon I took a walk with my camera.  Terrigal has always been a popular beach destination but in the past three years it has become very popular and not just at weekends. The quiet retirement town has gone crazy and last weekend's opening of the North Connex motorway/tunnel has made it even easier for residents of Sydney's northwest and west to travel to Terrigal. The beach today was like it would be at Xmas. With international travel still not possible Xmas in Terrigal is going to be chaotic. Fortunately we live within easy walking distance of the beach.

Some photos from today's walk.

My garden in good shape

 

Terrigal Lagoon

Terrigal Lagoon 2

Terrigal Beach

You can put up as many warning signs as you want but boys and girls will still jump off the bridge into the lagoon.

On a morning walk

 The last few months have been difficult, very difficult. First the lockdown and travel restrictions due to the pandemic and then secondly Val's health. Instead of two exciting overseas trips we have had none. Indeed we would have been sailing on a small riverboat up into darkest Mynmar this very week if events had not intervened.

This forced confinement to base has not been easy but at least I am in Terrigal and even in the depths of winter my early morning cliff top walk at The Haven has been enjoyable . Now it's even better as spring has really sprung. The temperature has gone up and the gardens are suddenly bursting with colour.

Due to all the gloom my enthusiasm for taking photographs has waned, despite my having bought a  new camera in early July, as there have been many, more serious things to deal with . Today I decided that it was well past time to give it an outing and I took it with me on my early morning walk. I came across a flock, or is it a gaggle, of pelicans in their usual hangout at the end of the boat ramp at The Haven waiting for an early morning fisherman to return and descale and gut their fish.

This guy, or girl, stood still just long enough for me to take one frame. It is a sizeable crop but if I had edged another cm forward it would have been off I'm sure.