Month: January 2011

Every picture tells a story

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We are lucky to share the island with fairy or little penguins. They live in burrows down by the coves and right now their babies are in the burrows all day. The parents leave before dawn to fish all day then return after dark. Some walk quite a way up the hills to their burrows. We saw them one night. They have several landing areas where they come on to the road from the beach. They’re not too hard to find because they leave penguin poo wherever they walk Plus it smells like guano, that distinct aroma of partially digested fish..

P1010084.JPG P1010085.JPG

This is an especially popular hopping off point. They wait as if there is a crossing guard and then hop onto the road and waddle home.

Cars on Deal Island?

This sign welcomes visitors to the Kent Group of islands. It outlines how much people who arrive by car have to pay. We’re 30 miles offshore. The only car we have seen is our 3 cylinder Diahatsu.

Maybe they are all parked on the other side of the island.

It was a beautiful day for a change. All the local visitors left but we met some new people who anchored yesterday on the other side of the island. They are friends with people we met a few days ago. The world keeps getting smaller. But Orion remains upside down. The other night at the barbecue, Tim heard an explanation that Orion is carrying a pot? The hunter with a sword and pot? I don’t think so.

East cove at sea level

We saw the Clouds of Magellen and a satellite on New Year’s Eve

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We had a number of people visit from boats anchored in the cove closest to our house. PC310088.JPG I was doubtful a barbecue would take place because the wind was “fresh”. The sky was the clearest it has been and the weather was mild, it was 100f in Melbourne during the day. But the party happened and we went down to the cove. While we were looking at the stars, we saw a satellite pass overhead. We have seen the Southern Cross and the Milky Way but Tim mentioned that there were clouds in the same place over a couple of nights. They looked like another galaxy. It turns out they are. We saw the clouds of Magellen, which are galaxies orbiting our galaxy. The mind boggles.

.Joey trying to go home

  Then today, when I left the compound to walk to Winter Cove, I saw the smallest wallaby Joey yet. it was tiny and gangly. I watched for a while but needed to pass and it clambered into its pouch. At Winter Cove, I found a small skull, seagull or tern is my best guess. The day went from seeing objects at the limit of the naked eye’s visibility to small creatures along the tracks

We’ve become Wallaby wranglers and we are getting pretty good at it. We had about four wallabies in the outer circle of gates and over a few days, we managed to get all but two out. Wallaby near the water tank

Then, I went to get drinking water and found one in the inner compound, right next to the house. They chew on the grass, which is good, but leave wallaby poop around, which isn’t so good. We used some amazing teamwork and got it out the front gate.

It was a beautiful day to take a walk and I went to Winter Cove, about 4 kms from house. The only problem was these new little flies have arrived. They don’t bite or anything but are “in your face”.

I got to the beach and saw the catamaran anchored nicely and found a small bird skull.

P1010109.JPG Smallest skull