Adelaide

At Easter, we decided to go down to Adelaide, mainly to visit my brother, Alan. This is the non-family-related Adelaide pics...

Looks like a bus, smells like a bus - but slower.
Central Square - with a reminder of one of your previous queens.
Kim by the waterfall.
And me by a stature of a hairy bloke.
One of the old trams to Glenelg...
...the palindrome where the seagulls live.
And very pretty it is, too.
Adelaide's new mass transport system.
Likewise.
You just can't have enough duty-free opals.
The ship that isn't. It's a mock-up restaurant - presumably with pirates or somesuch.
Rocked up (down?) the coast to Brighton for lunch. Beach surprisingly denuded (snigger) of homosexuals.
Oh yeah, this was the car we hired - a Toyota Shitbox.
Lunch - really, really good fish & chips.
He thought so, too.
These guys were fishing.
Onward to Port Aledaide.
Where the boats come from.
We stayed at this place in town - the Directors Inn.
Sunset from the Scenic Hotel up in the hills.
And thence to Handhorf and all things German.
In case they get the urge to invade Poland.
All cutsey old buildings.
And FULL of tourists (not like us).
Dropped in to Mount Lofty (so called because Australians like to use the "bleedin' obvious" nomenclature system - it's a mountain, it's high).
On finals back into Sydney Airport. Around Botany somewhere.

Astro-Photography

I will put piccies of my various - normally abortive - attempts to emulate the Hubble Space Telescope from the comfort of my balcony here. Don't expect the Horsehead Nebula any time soon...

The Moon rising over the CBD.
About the best close-up of the Moon I can manage.

Red Moon. This was a lunar eclipse that went off at the end of August 2007. Happens once in a blue moon apparently.
Going...
Going...
Gone.
This is in Perth, and taken on the phone-camera, too.

Noni's Birthday 2007

Old people's birthdays. A chance for the family to get together and ask questions like; "How old are you, anyway?", "Are kids today worse than ever?", and "What was Napoleon like?".

When Kim's mum has a birthday, we all jump...

Larissa, Pete and Nicole.
Nicole & Noni.
Robyn, Noni & Glenn.
Kim & Noni.

Taronga Zoo

Taronga Zoo in Sydney is well worth a few hours of anyone's life. It is my second favorite zoo in the world (after Singapore Zoo Night Safari) and, as it is on the harbour, you get the added benefit of getting out on the water as part of the trip.

Let's get going. First up, as we're in Balmain and we have to go to Circular Quay, it makes sense to get a ferry. Hie thee, then, to East Balmain ferry terminal.
To get one of these babies.
To Circular Quay - which is like central station for the ferries.

Now get your combined ticket:

• Go to any one of the ferry ticket booths.
• Ask for a combined ferry / cable car / zoo entry ticket (about 40 bucks as of now).
• Check the departure boards to find out which wharf the next ferry to Taronga Zoo is leaving from.

And we're off. Can't leave Circular Quay without going past the Sydney Opera House.
Lots of kids out on the water today.
This is the approach to the zoo's ferry terminal. Up the hill are some of the zoo buildings and, on the left is the cable car - which is our next destination.
The zoo is on a hill. And the cable car goes to the top. Do I have to spell it out. Lazy people use the car to get to the top and then walk down again. That's me.

And you go over some of the animals, too.
A must-see is the free flight bird show. It was on at 3pm today so we hot-footed our way to catch it. Some of the zoo keepers show you some of the birds and what they can do and it really is worth getting to see.
This is the main presenter - sadly this was her last day.
That's some eagle - and it's not the biggest one they have.
This bird is looking at a tasty morsel of food in the girl's hand.

And there is an owl.
Meercats - always good for a laugh.
A tapir - they have really good camouflage.
The West-End Hotel on a Saturday night.
A penguin - who is probably a bit hot.
This is the old elephant house which has a distinct Indian feel to it. The new one - not long opened - is more Thai (on account of that's where the elephants came from).
I don't usually have to go out to see stuff like this - my clinically obese dog provides all the lying-around-like-a-slug that anyone would need.
Me in the morning.
Good for getting stuff off high shelves.
John Howard and George Bush at the Camp David talks on Middle Eastern strategy.
Little Howie FINALLY gets his rocks off.
Me in the morning.
He looks hot, too.
So THAT's where all the Nazi helmets went.

White Bay Visitors

There is a succession of visitors to White Bay. Apart from the regular bulk cargo ships that come in to drop stuff off, it is also where people are told to go when there is nowhere else. And go they do.

We get firework barge assemblies, impromptu oil terminals, refits and all sorts of other stuff.

This post will be updated as and when...

05-MAR-2007:
The Boadicea. Reg Grundy's boat apparently - and if you can't wave your wonga under the noses of the less well off, well, what's the point of having it. It's a bit James Bondy - having got a lift-up back where little boats (presumably all sporting rocket-launchers) can come out but, for all its opulence, it's not really my style. Why waste your money on something without a helipad?

12-MAR-2007:
The Esperanza (Spanish for 'Hope', apparently) is the Greenpeace ship that recently harassed that Japanese whaler. Looks like they dropped in to restock and get a bit of R&R. They assured the world that they really, really didn't have anything to do with that nasty fire on the whaler - and they probably have a point. Most likely culprit is karma.
20-MAR-2007:
.