Retreat Reserve May 2011

View down creek to Sailors Bay shoreline

Back at school again

We are all back at school, bar migraines and the occasional injury at a skate park requiring a six hour visit to the emergency paedeatrics department at our local hospital. Thanks Alex, it was a useful and interesting Mother's Day activity. And as it turned out I could have done the first aid myself, but we would never have had the x-rays or the tetanus shot.
My school work is going well. I just wish that there was a High School attendance fairy that would sprinkle some school dust over my senior students so they made it to school on time everyday. I have started dropping into their second lesson home room to say hello and eyeball them, just so they know that their teacher for period one classes does exist. It is moving on to June, in Sydney and the days are turning windy and cold with the sun setting at ten past five. Even when the days start to get longer again from the end of June Sydney will still be cold all the way up to September. It takes a long time for the sun to return to the Bulwark. Everyone cheers when it does and daylight savings starts again, but that's not till October.
Getting to school sees me either commute by walk - bus - walk - train - walk, which takes just as long as driving to school. Or driving and leaving a little later and taking twenty right hand turns through inner city streets. The walking commute is the way to go health wise, and I have taken to wearing Tom's wind jacket everyday. This keeps the wind chill factor out of the layers of woollies underneath. The kids have warm tops for school and have already started leaving them in their classrooms instead of popping them into the school bag to bring home again. The cold is a great teacher though.

Harold Reid Reserve

This walk starts in Willis St, Castlecove. Things were going well until Tom sat on Alex's hand while they were climbing some rocks. Which is why Alex does not appear in these photos with a smiling face. Nevertheless we continued on our walk. There are fishing tackle refuse boxes at the fishing spots now. Which means there are less hooks and lines left in the water, that prove so fatal to marine animals like the sea turtle the scouts found last year. After the walk it was home for lunch then off to Freshwater Beach for a surf. The ocean off Sydney is still warm at this time of year. The Easter current was strong as usual but with the tide going out there were some good shore breaks to body board in. Easter buns and chocolate eggs have been eaten. There are three days of the school holidays left.

Tom at Balmoral Skate Park

From time to time Tom appears on the blog skating. As he has grown the skate ramps have become taller and steeper. He is still fairly risk free in his style. It has taken him several years to get to this skill level. Go Tom!

Walk

Castlehaven Reserve

Native fuschia
Coastal banksia

I have to go back and take a look at this tree again, however the colour!

Retreat Reserve

Birdsnest Tree Fern

The Retreat

Green waves of foliage
Moving against the southerly
Airstream coming into
The middle harbour from the
Heads across the cliffs
That shelters the entrance to Sydney.
A flight of white cockatoos
Scream across the canopy
Ramping it up to claim their space
From other birds.
Territories marked
Later sunshine and whip birds
Calling mating nesting
Retreat Reserve spring has sprung
The trails of secret fingers
Erupt in dead logs
Lining the trail that we make
As we run through the ferns down
To the sandy banks of the rocky shoreline
Nature on our doorstep
Intruding into the space of the native undergrowth
Its canopy protecting the forest floor from weeds
Running calling 'watch for vines'
My sure footed lads
Cascade through the trees
Their feet flying
Leading balance to their upper bodies
We rest at Retreat Beach
Gasping at the audacity of our
Silent agreement
To protect this wild place
From all else

Work in Progress

The beautiful tree ferns that surround us
The front door now needs a dark gloss, it floats within tall windows like a tangram

The front path


Asparagus fern free hillside, doing this was something of a balancing act. After a few false starts I seemed to get the hang of it and let go a bit letting my feet find the way to support me.

Painted deck

This is the colour the whole of the shared boundary side will be

Woodland Grey

View of the shared boundary garden planted by Peter and Lorraine our neighbours

Bush Care coaching by Richard Blacklock, Lilly Pilly Indigenous Landscapes. Next is the pond project, followed by more cliff gardening. And there is still six days of the Easter holidays to go.