Had great fun amusing myself on the long drive down, by searching for the perfect tree that matches a story I want to write so I could take a photograph of it (if found). There were lots of interesting looking trees, but nothing that caused me to get excited or think, 'That's it!'
But at least my searching helped pass the time away: it can be very boring driving along the highway for approximately nine hours on your own.
And now I am arrived at my country destination.
As I write this post, my mum has gone off to work for a few hours and I am sitting on her front porch overlooking a golf course. All I can see are trees, and bushes and manicured golf lawns. But none of this inspires me to learn how to play the game.
I'm enjoying this idyllic setting, everything from the visual feast of nature's beauty, to its auditory sound effects, to the clean, fresh smells.
I'm under the shade of the front verandah. It is a bright, sunny afternoon, with lots of fluffy white cloud cover. The temperature is a comfortable thirty one degrees (Celsius). At the edge of the verandah is a garden bed of flowering shrubs, both native plants and English garden. The grassy lawn is littered with shrubs and small trees one of which is adorned with bird baths and bird feeders, then there is a wide golf green followed by in the distance by a thick row of well established trees, followed by yet another golf green. Barely visible from my position beyond that last golf green is one last row of massive gum and Australian native trees lining the edges along the banks of the Murray River. The place is both beautiful and peaceful.
Up close, Mum's pretty garden bed is alive with colour and activity. Pansies in bright pinks, rubies, and purples nestle in ceramic pots while native shrubs, for which I don't know that names but are similar in looks to bottlebrushes are in shades of orange, and peach and apricot are bunched side by side all along the front of the cottage, and around its sides.. Everywhere else that I look, is every imaginable hue of green, green and more luscious green.
Tiny little red nose finches barely the size of my thumb are bathing in the bird bath, splashing themselves with water, dipping their beaks for a drink. Earlier this morning, at least a dozen were hopping along the ground pecking at tiny insects and flittering away wherever the nearby Cockatoo's squawked up a loud commotion.
The bees that were feasting two per flowerhead in the bottlebrush-type bush are still gathering nectar three hours later. A crazy blowfly just buzzed straight past me and stunned itself when it smashed into the clear plastic blind on the verandah's side where the rain usually comes in as it tried to travel to the side garden.
A Kookaburra sits in one of the bared branches of the closest gum tree, and just had caused to find something highly amusing; it's laugh is quite infectious. This close, he (or she) is really loud, even though the branches of a shrub is blocking my view of him sitting on a low branch.
Occasionally, golfers whiz past along the closest green in their canopied golf carts. A lot of the golfers have found their balls in the sand bunker today, or in the row of trees, so the humans have come closer than what I've previously seen them. But they don't stay for long; within seconds of having sent their ball soaring through the air again, they are back into their motorised carts and tearing up the course off to find their ball.
I'm enjoying how the breeze flares up out of nowhere and then dies away again, as though someone has just taken a giant breath and then decided to exhale until they can expel no more. I'm loving the coolness and freshness and marvel how within all the 'whoosing' you can also hear the rustling and rattling of the leaves.
I am going to enjoy my week long stay!
Update. I went back outside with my camera to try to take photo's of the finches, but when I got back they were gone. I took a few photo's of the view, and was surprised when I realised that the Kookaburra had come in closer than I first though
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