Australian Pilg Part 9 - A Morning Out

When I sat down to write this morning I noticed it was a lovely morning for a walk. So I dragged John away from his computer, packed a few snacks and we drove to McAlpin Reserve. 

The view out our living room window this morning.

McAlpin Reserve is only a few minutes drive from where we're staying here in Ringwood North. We walked there one Sunday afternoon several weeks ago. I was hoping it would be less busy than it was that other time but it turned out to be a very busy morning. John said it is some sort of holiday today.

You'd never know it by the photos I took but kids and parents were all over the play area like ants at a picnic. A number of them also came over to the pond to feed the ducks while we were there having our morning tea--mandarin oranges and gluten free biscuits (cookies). 

There were also a number of other adults of all ages walking on the paths, both with and without dogs. 

The lady on the path above is the only person I used my camera's magic eraser setting on to get the photo below. Most of the rest of the photos I just pointed my camera away from the people so it looks like a people free day despite being "busier than normal" as google maps said. It is a really beautiful reserve-- well designed and cared so it's no wonder it's so popular. 

After morning tea we walked around a little more in the Reserve and then took the path toward the Baringa Flora Sanctuary. It was just a few minutes walk away. 

Baringa Sanctuary has a bigger pond than McAlpin Reserve has but oddly the pond doesn't show up on Google maps at all. It was nice to see that no one else was there when we arrived. It was so peaceful to have the place to ourselves.

 

We were thrilled to see this mother duck with her ducklings. They came quite close to the bridge we were standing on.

After a few minutes I started getting a headache from the bright sun reflecting on the water. So we headed back to McAlpin Reserve where our car was parked and headed home. Thankfully my head stopped hurting after a few minutes back in the shade. 

This lycianthes rantonnetii aka blue potato bush caught my eye as we were leaving Burangi Flora Sanctuary.
My sister-in-law, Melissa, recently showed me how to use the search setting in my phone camera to find out the name of plants and flowers. I didn't do it at the time. But I used it just now by pointing my phone camera at the photo in my gallery on my laptop screen.

Australian Pilg Part 8 - Battling Covid and Family Visit

We can now say we've had covid. In my case I still do based on the test I took yesterday and the lingering symptoms. I thought I was done with it last week but I had a slight relapse. That and congestion in my ears and sinuses leading to dizziness...

Thankfully John at least is done with it. He got a negative test yesterday. That is especially good so he can help his Mum today after her scheduled eye injection. Doug and Melissa usually help her with those but since they are also battling the tail end of covid it was especially good that John tested negative in time to help (he was still testing positive on Saturday). I wish I could help too since I know my way around Mum's kitchen better than John does but it can't be helped. 

Covid has definitely taken a big bite out of our time here considering how many people we were hoping to see still. It has also taken a bite out of my blogging energy. 

We have just over a month left here in Australia before we return to Dallas. Two of those weeks will be in Tasmania. I very much hope my ear congestion clears up before our October 7 flight to Tasmania. 

The big C hit John the week before last while we were visiting Doug and Melissa, John's brother and sister-in-law, and their daughter Judy in the Gippsland area. 

Apart from John being sick we had a nice time. I think I'm glad we didn't know what it was at the time. It seemed like ignorance was bliss. Melissa took him to her doctor. We wondered if he was having allergies. The doctor said it might be partly that but was likely also a virus. She suggested he wear a mask to reduce the chance of spreading it but she didn't test for any particular virus. She prescribed an inhaler to help with his chest congestion and he also took some  over the counter things that Melissa suggested. 

The rest of us felt fine and we even all went for a hike one day while we were there. John said it helped him feel better. 

Friday morning we left and drove back to Ringwood. John had a challenge to stay awake on the drive. I also felt unusually tired and sleepy on the drive but felt alright otherwise.  I took a nap after we got home. By dinner time though I could tell I had not dodged John's 'wog' after all. My nose was running like the proverbial tap. By the next day I felt really miserable with chills, sore throat, headache, body aches and a very runny nose.  I also had trouble eating. A lot of foods tasted weird and made me feel nauseas. My preferred foods were dried toast, plain rice crackers, and tea. What was really miserable was being too ill to read much or watch anything for a couple of days. We learned that Melissa and Judy were also sick. Sunday morning John said that Melissa had covid and he had tested himself after I was asleep and he also had it. I took a test and, yes I had it too. Thankfully Sunday was not as bad as Saturday but I was still quite miserable. 

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It has been about a week and a half since I got covid and I am still recovering. I am going to close this post with a few photos from our visit with Doug et al. Sorry to end so abruptly but I am feeling like I need to stop. My energy level for this is small.

Doug, Melissa and Judy waving goodbye as we left Friday morning

One of many fungi on the hike

John and I in front of an enormous tree on the hike

tiny wildflowers

The center of a magnolia flower in their back garden

Doug on the hike

Melissa photographing birds in their back garden.

This one and the next were of the glow from the late afternoon sun the day we arrived

I was hoping to include more photos but I want to get this posted. As it is I have weeks of things from our time in Melbourne I haven't posted about at all yet.

Aussie Pilgrimage Part 7 - Gardens Galore and more

It's hard to believe we've been in Melbourne for nearly a month. 

John is in Papua New Guinea (PNG) this week to meet with a group who are using his literacy software. (he was when I started writing this!)

Yesterday our Aussie Pastor, Peter Yip, from Glen Hill Community Church, and his wife Roslyn (Ros) took me to lunch at a place called Beasley's Nursery and Tea House. It's in Warrandyte, a suburb of Melbourne about a 15 minute drive from where we're staying in Ringwood, North.

I love how Aussies have cafes in interesting places, usually with really good food made fresh to order. I even saw one once in a large hardware store, though I think that one just served fancy bakery items and coffees. It was small but they had a few tables to sit at, not just vending machines like the big box hardware stores have in our area in Dallas.

After lunch we took a wander through the nursery. I couldn't resist taking photos. (Some of the plants were inside a greenhouse, in case you are wondering.) 

These miniature cacti reminded Ros and I of buildings. My Mother-in-law (MIL) later said the bottom right one looks like a dog. What do you see?   

One of several carnivorous plants for sale. Wikipedia says these in the center are a type of pitcher plant.
They had venus fly traps too. Ros said her son had one when he was young and used to spend a lot of time watching it and feeding it, because she said, "we were poor". I thought, maybe he was better off than kids now who spend all their time looking at their phones.

Another carnivorous plant.

I didn't get the name of this. Sorry.

Violas

I thought the honey bee violas in the back were an interesting color 

Chinese lantern

Sorry no idea what this one is called either. But it's really amazing looking, isn't it?
I thought being a nursery I would get the names for everything. But there were so many things to see and the labels were not always obvious. 
Later note: I discovered that it is a Parrots Beak Lotus Vine

Pansies

I love daisies. I've never seen fluffy ones like these English white daisies before.

Ferns do well here.  One of several kinds they had. 

Another carnivorous plant. Note the large brown pitcher like things hanging from tendrils. That's where the bugs, or whatever, get trapped.

enlarged from the above picture

Trailing Kalanchoe

A bonsai

This is called 'string of pearls'

Euphorbia, martini, I just looked up euphorbia and was surprised how many different kinds there are. A few that I've seen and wondered about. So now I know what they are too.

After we were done at Beasley's, Pastor Peter and Ros took me to my MIL's to stay with her for a couple of days. 

One day when the weather was nice she and I went for a walk around the grounds where she lives at Weary Dunlop Retirement Village in Wheeler's Hill.*

The gardeners do a beautiful job there. We took a lot of photos--of course :-).

The gardener said this is a hellebore or 'winter rose'. This is the underside of the flower. I turned it upside down for the photo. The flower looked kind of like an umbrella from the top.

Many of the residents also like to garden

Mum next to the bowling green she can see from her balcony.

The hedge on the right gets its color partly from its purple leaves and partly from its interesting bright pink flowers.  The next photo is a close up.

This area is used by residents that want to grow veggies. Not much growing here in the winter of course.

A resident found a way to make this bush bloom year round!
(yes, the light pink roses are silk :-)

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It is now Monday the next week from when I started this post. John is back from PNG and we hope to visit his brother and family for a few days, leaving tomorrow. That is as long as we are both well. John got sick just after he got back. He is still recovering. We are hoping he'll be completely over it and I won't get it. (it may just be from something he ate in PNG.)

Yesterday he felt well enough to speak at Edge Church in East Doncaster. It was good to also catch up with old friends that attend there, especially since we had to cancel our 'at home' the day before due to John's illness.  (several people who planned to come to the 'at home' happen to attend there.) I wish I had thought to take photos with them!

Here he is being introduced by a fellow Wycliffe member John Tan. 

John Tan and his wife Remy attend Edge Church. He works in computer support at the Wycliffe center here in the Melbourne area. They took us out to lunch after church.

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*note: For my American readers, Weary Dunlop was a WWII hero.