Xmas week

It was great to welcome Duncan and Bianca home on Saturday before we headed to Bellingen on Sunday. Of course we went to Byron for the morning ritual first before setting out with our usual stop in Grafton for lunch....although in the old days it was for breakfast!
Bellingen is a quirky little place, a cross between Nimbin (alternative) and Bangalow ( trendily hip!). For such a small place it has a large variety of eating places, of which we tried a few. It has a population of around 3 000 and came to fame in the 1950s with the birth or the 'Sara quadruplets'. Other notable residents are Davis Heldgot who is honoroured by a sculpture in the park and George Negus. Michael was heard to make the comment that he could even live there...if he was interested in a plot of land to poke around on. He would have to have a reasonable amount of cash as the real estate certainly isn't cheap.

After checking in to The Federal Pub and stocking up with a few supplies we travelled out to Cate's place about 20 minutes out of town...if we had a 4 wheel drive it would be about 5 minutes plus a river crossing. It was great to be so close to the river as by the time we got there it was about 38 degrees so a quick dip in the creek was very welcome. All the family were looking well and the house is great for 2 interdependent families...each able to have their own space but close enough to help each other out. Cate prepared a tasty baked dinner as an early Christmas celebration. When we returned to the pub at 9.45 we couldn't get a drink, despite closing time being 10.00 so we visited the Bellingen Brewery where I was happy to see a Bird Exhibition displayed on the walls.

We spent Monday morning poking around in the large number of quirky shops and Bianca made a few last minute Xmas purchases, before lunching at Number 5...recommended by Cate as a good spot for Bianca, as she is vegetarian. Sitting at a table next to us was one of Duncan's Uni lecturers with his family so they had a bit of a chat.
In the afternoon, still very hot, we went back to Cate's and spent the afternoon laying around in the creek. The family, minus Bella and kids, came in to our pub for dinner as it was ' snitzel and parmie' night. I have never seen such an enormous meal, fortunately Michael and I had made the wise decision to share one!

Tuesday morning saw us try the recently re-opened Cedar Bar and Kitchen, a restaurant in an old church. We had eaten there a few years ago when we met up with Robert and Maria in Bellingen for a weekend. They have done a beautiful refurbishment of the building and the breakfast was delicious. On our way back to Ballina we detoured in to The Jetty to inspect Cate's premises. It is very well set up and looks to be a thriving business.
After arriving home we had time for a short rest before sprucing up for Sue's 60th birthday dinner. It was held at The Manor, where I had mine, and it again proved to be a winner. It was great that Sue had her three girls home to help her celebrate, Rachel from LA and Lauren and Sarah from Brisbane. Duncan and Bianca came along as ' faux' siblings and it also gave Duncan a chance to catch up with his old mate Nick, who happens to be Lauren's partner. It was a fun night but as I had a 'birding' appointment at 7am we didn't kick on to the Youngs afterwards.

While Michael slept on I headed out early to meet Rob and Robyn at their home in Lennox head at 7.00am. It turned out that Robyn had only recently had surgery so decided it was safer not to walk on the sand and rocks at our first stop, so Rob and I visited Flat Rock and the Spit near Missingham Bridge. It was high tide so the shore birds were gathered in a constricted area and we sighted 20 different varieties. I still find shorebirds a bit confusing but Rob has a keen interest so he was very good at identification. After going back to collect Robyn we went to the Heath behind Lake Ainsworth. Robyn is more of a photographer than a birdwatcher and was keen to get some shots of the variegated fairy wren. We also saw the red backed fairy wren and 8 other bird varieties taking my mornings total to 30+...not bad for a few hours. I had to be back mid morning so Michael could have the car. Rob and Robyn were a very nice couple who also like to travel a lot so I expect I will catch up when I return to Australia.

Top has little tern, ruddy turnstone (orange legs) , sanderlins. (I think)
second row...pied cormorant and little black cormorant, whimbrel, pied oyster catcher.

Rainbow bee eater, red backed fairy wren, Variegated fairy wren.Photos not mine.

Christmas morning dawned wet and wild, but we still managed to enjoy the view over breakfast. Duncan thought he had made a wise choice buying Xmas jumpers after all! After breakfast Bianca headed off to have lunch with her mum and brother in Byron, while I introduced Duncan to the joy of Five Crowns card game. We had a very tasty baked lunch followed by Xmas pudding...and a rest. Duncan went to Byron in the afternoon while Michael and I took a wander along the beach, where I again saw the red backed fairy wren ....and of course I hadn't taken my camera. Despite such unpleasant weather for most of the day the full moon over the sea was quite spectacular.

Boxing Day could not have been more different than Xmas Day. It was a perfect day on the front deck and Bianca's family were impressed that we had turned on such great weather when they came for a lunch of leftovers. We had a fun-filled afternoon playing a 'murder' game ....the rules seemed to evolve as we played....then an hilarious game of Pictionary and Snappsie!
Sunday's weather had reverted to Xmas Day so Michael didn't even go for a swim....an indication of how foul it was. Pauline and Sue came for lunch followed by the christening of my new Trivial Pursuit, my Xmas gift from Duncan. David was at home wrestling with the server at the surgery, a problem that seems to arise every time he does an update.
Bianca spent the night in Byron with her mum so the three of us played Trivial Pursuit with Michael being the victor.
Monday was spent doing a few last minute must-dos before our early departure on Tuesday. We had dinner at the Shaws Bay Hotel where Bianca felt some sort of ownership...her last name is Shaw! After dinner we had a game of teams Trivial Pursuit with Duncan redeeming himself after last nights loss when he and Bianca beat us oldies...it seems to need a knowledge of the Mario brothers, and video games, in the Entertainment section.

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Xmas week 2

This week has been a constant stream of lunches and dinners catching up with a number of friends. I had planned to have a quiet day on Monday after a poor nights sleep but Chris was taking a trip to Murwillumbah to spend some winnings at the pro shop at the golf club, so I went along to keep her company. I hadn't been there for a couple of years and the golf club had great views to Mount Warning.

Kookaburra, Mount Warning, Lunch at The Wharf, Shrike?

Good news to receive contact from 2 different people regarding a bit of local birdwatching. A couple from Lennox offered to take me for a walk to a couple of different sites and after a bit of discussion re a suitable time we agreed on next Wednesday when we return from Bellingen. They are going to take me to both heathland and seashore so I am looking forward to that...haven't been able to convince any other family members to join me!

Visiting magpie, Little wattlebird, Kingfisher with breakfast!

Pam and I met in Lismore to buy a birthday present for Sue. I was rather taken by the 'controversial' Xmas tree downtown...apparently opinions varied from 'great way to recycle' to 'dreadful waste of money'! I rather liked it and thought it looked colourful both day and night.

I had been invited to a small dinner for one of the Lismore Heights Staff who was moving on to Wollongbar due to a drop in school numbers...I turned up to collect Jodie only to discover I was a week EARLY!
Wednesday and Thursday were spent catching up with friends and trying some recipes from the vegetarian cookbook in anticipation of Duncan and Biancas arrival at the weekend. I turned out a couple of delicious meals, testing one of them on Chris and Pam before a game of cards on Thursday night.
Friday was lunch again this time at the perfectly situated Lighthouse Cafe in superb weather. On the way I spied a kingfisher with a lizard dangling from its mouth. The week ended with what could become a regular outing, dinner at the Shaws Bay hotel.

Lighthouse Beach

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Xmas break in Australia part 1

I was very lucky with my Scoot flight home, getting 3 seats to myself so I was able to stretch out and even managed to get a bit of sleep. This was fortunate as I then had to wait at the airport for 2 hours for the Byron easy bus to take me to Ballina. By the time we got to Ballina I was the only one left on the bus so the driver delivered me to my front door.
I spent the rest of the day napping before Michael arrived home with a beautiful arrangement of Australian flowers, and then prepared a delicious piece of salmon and salad.

As Michael works in Mullumbimby on Thursday I was car-less so I strolled over to East Ballina to post some mail and catch up with Chris for a coffee.I enjoyed the stroll and after pottering around home for a while decided to walk over to town to see what the tourist centre had regarding birdwatching in the area...which turned out to be not much! I also sent off a request to the local bird-life group. I managed to see, and later identify, a variety of birds.

Masked lapwing, blue-faced honeyeater, rainbow lorikeet and osprey

Michael has developed the habit of walking before walk most mornings so I went with him on Friday morning...this meant I was up BEFORE the sun and actually got to see it rise. It was spectacular and probably a good idea as the day turned out to be extremely hot, about 38 degrees.

darter, pelican, dusky moorhen, little egret

After such an early start, by 11 o'clock I had to have a nana nap before going to Lismore for a haircut. Then it was back for dinner at The Shaws Bay Hotel where Pauline, David and Sue joined us. Pauline's neighbour, Gunter, was looking a bit lonely so he also had dinner with us. David was more than happy to converse with him about their adventures in the Sydney to Hobart Yacht Races in years past, while Michael shared a 'not overly impressed by the Beatles' moment with him. Apparently Gunter had seen them perform at the Star Club in Hamburg in 1962 and wasn't particularly impressed!

Saturday was a slowish day with a trip to Lismore. Since moving in to the unit Michael has bemoaned the fact that the railing sits at eye-height when we are eating. He has been hankering after a small, high table with a couple of stools so we are now the proud owners of such and he is very happy. 
In the evening we attended a local get together where we met many new residents of Shelly Beach area as well as catching up with a number of old friends/neighbours.
As usual Sunday morning meant a trip to Byron for the Bay swim for Michael while I took a walk. I saw a bit of wildlife, before we returned home for a delicious breakfast at the new table.

Lewin's Honeyeater

I spent the afternoon doing a few things I haven't done for quite a while!

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A Free weekend in Singapore

My first real weekend (ie Saturday/Sunday) in Singapore began very slowly with a 2 hour sit at the nail place where I had my Xmas toes done.

The afternoon was spent at the recently opened National Gallery of Singapore. Situated in Singapore’s Civic District, the Gallery consists of two national monuments, the former Supreme Court Building and City Hall, and has a combined floor area of 64,000 square metres, making it the largest visual arts venue and largest museum in Singapore. A total cost of S$532 million has gone into its development. The restoration is magnificent and the two buildings have been linked in interesting ways.

I ran in to Robert and Maria shortly after arriving there and together we meandered through looking at some of the great variety of artworks. There were a few pieces that Robert wanted to add his special sticker to..."this is an artistic wank!' One piece was a tall tube which spewed forth foam creating a constantly changing display around it!

We gradually made our way to the Roof Garden which has fantastic views overlooking Marina Bay. The area in front of the Gallery is the Padang and preparations were well underway for a Marathon on Sunday morning. While admiring the view we discovered Libby and Eric were doing the same...from the cool of the bar, so of course we joined them for a pre-dinner drink. 
From there we moved on to Chimes to meet with others who had also been to the gallery, including Deb who was a previous MAE staff member back for a short visit. As we left, this choral group were doing their best to entertain the crowds with Xmas carols, but in typical Singaporean fashion there was no attempt to turn off the music blaring from a number of bars and restaurants so you could not hear anything from the choir.

Some of us then moved on to a recently opened Nepalese restaurant in Little India. By the time we return from our break the walls will be adorned with pictures provided by Eric, including some from the trek we participated in, to Annapurna Base Camp.
On Saturday, Kathy and Deb, who is staying with us, went off to do their own thing and after a morning swim, I decided I had better get the rest of my Xmas shopping done. It didn't take me long to appreciate the fact that my normal weekend is on Monday/Tuesday...the crowds were horrendous. Then it started to rain so the congestion underground intensified to the point where I had to go up and just walk in the rain! I got a bit of shopping done before meeting Kathy and Deb at Somerset for dinner. I also encountered my first ever Santa Claus dressed in blue!

After a decided lack of success on the shopping front on Saturday it was time to bite the bullet on Sunday and just get it done. I met up with Maria and by the end of the day it was all done and dusted. We then met up with Deb and Kathy for dinner at Satays by the Bay for a tasty feed before staying on for the Xmas Light/music show at the Supertrees. The light display is truely stunning!

After a leisurely start on Monday morning, Pip, my new housemate, delivered her belongings and then we were off to Jamie's Italian at Vivo City to celebrate Robert's birthday.

After an afternoon nap I met up with Peter at the Excelsior Peninsula for a Xmas drink. Although this was where we stayed when we first arrived in Singapore I had not had the opportunity to visit the Sky Bar before. Again it is a spot with stunning views of the Singapore night skyline.

First thing Tuesday morning I decided it was time for a walk to Punggol along the PCN, something I hadn't done for a while. I saw a number of birds including the sooty-headed bulbul, magpie robin, water hen and olive backed sunbird. The highlight of the walk was definitely an encounter with a pair of otters frolicking on the river bank. They were not in the least worried by my presence and were having a wonderful time rolling around in the sun.
Disappointingly Belinda was not in the office at work so the lady in the furniture shop happily accepted a bunch of flowers, which she promised to hand over to Belinda when she arrived. Santa was still sparkling on the lawn outside the shopping centre.

Last Working Week

Our last Sunday of the year coincided with Helen's birthday and despite the early hour she appeared to be very happy with the addition to her Elephant Parade, a special one for the Singapore 50 celebrations called Raffles Landing.
The Parade was created in 2006 by Marc Spits and his son Mike. It was inspired by Marc Spits' visit to the elephant hospital in Thailand, the only one in the world, which constructs prosthetic legs for elephants that encounter landmines when logging in Myanmar. There he saw Mosha, a baby elephant who lost her foot when only seven months old and was the first elephant to receive a prosthetic limb. She is fitted with a new leg every year, and must then learn to walk all over again. 

At the end of the day we convened at Sque Bar at Clark Quay to celebrate the last full working week and to wish our work colleagues happy travelling as we will not see some of them again before we finish work on Thursday night. 

After a relatively quiet day on Monday, Kathy and I caught the bus to Tampines for an evening walk. By the time we arrived the skies had opened up but fortunately by the time we were ready to leave the McCafe the rain had stopped and we were able to complete a pleasant walk to Bedok Reservoir with a circuit of the Reservoir before finishing with dinner overlooking the water. 

Towards the end of dinner Helen and Jo were collected by their very obliging real estate agent to inspect a unit in the area for 2016. Shortly after we arrived home so did they, very happy to have found somewhere to live, after inspecting some very 'ínteresting' offerings over the last couple of weeks. So the "Lady Cave''  is officially no more! Unfortunately we celebrated their success with another bottle of wine, which made for a verrry slow Tuesday!
I did have to begin my day baking a pavlova to take to Robert and Maria's for dinner. We were joined by Craig and Melisa from Kovan Branch and it was a very convivial evening. What had begun as a sedate dinner ended hours later with an empty bottle of Limoncello...one which had been unopened at the start of the evening.

After meeting with Libby for a coffee it was off to work for the last 2 days. It was pretty quiet as many of the students have already started their holidays and there was a marked lack of enthusiasm...and not only on the children's side.
On Thursday morning I walked Bidadari with Libby and had a first sighting of a children's television program being filmed! The bank of photographers were a bit of a clue that perhaps there was an interesting bird in the vicinity, which turned out to be a mugimaki flycatcher (another first sighting)

We also saw both the female and male koel, the bird responsible for my wake up calls most mornings!

After farewelling Sally, who is returning to Australia after 12 months at Punggol I joined the Kovan staff, and Peter, at Joe's to round off our year at MAE. It felt rather flat finishing mid-week but I am ready for a relaxing holiday at home with Michael, family and friends.

Santa visits Punggol Plaza

Last couple of weeks

The week went by quietly with a bit of Xmas Shopping with Maria on Thursday and on Friday I went for A "birdie"walk at Tampines Eco Green which is an eco-friendly park that offers a sanctuary for flora and fauna and a place for nature recreation.

It has various natural habitats such as open grasslands, freshwater wetlands and a secondary rainforest, so we saw a good selection of birds. The highlight was definitely the brown-throated sunbird. The photo on the left is from the internet and the others are Eric's. Considering how quickly this little bird flits from spot to spot he was very lucky to catch it at all. We also saw the blue-tailed bee eater, sooty headed bulbul and a water hen.

After work on Sunday night we headed in to Outram Park to farewell Bev. She has been in Singapore with MAE for a number of years and has decided it is time to return to Australia. We serenaded her with a special rendition of 'Way Out West" as she has been the leader at Jurong and often reminds us how far she has to travel in order to socialise. I expect we will catch up with her back in Australia as she takes up a job with the Immigration Dept in Canberra in the new year. A good night was had by all and a few of us managed to front up the next morning for the Monday walk.

The walk was from Vivo City to Fort Siloso on Sentosa Island. It was a first visit for me and was very interesting although extremely hot.
In the 19th century, Singapore became an important sea trading port for the British. To defend the island from sea invasion, Fort Siloso was one of three forts that were built on Sentosa Island.
During World War II, the Japanese troops invaded Singapore from the north through peninsula Malaya and the guns in Fort Siloso were turned landwards to support the ground troops.

Today, it is the only preserved coastal fort in Singapore, and is an historical attraction with a rich memorabilia of pre-WWII and WWII-era guns and remains of fortified military structures and tunnels.

The rest of my weekend passed quietly with a trip to the movies to see the latest James Bond "Spectre"on Tuesday evening. 

The Circus

After a day of recovery I met up with Libby, Eric, Peter and Yuan Yuan at Satays by the Bay before the Cirque du Solei performance, 'Totem'.  Wandering through Gardens by the Bay on the way to the venue always provides some stunning picture moments and tonight was no exception.
Cirque du Soleil describes Totem's theme as the evolution of humanity from its primordial, amphibian state toward the aspiration of flight, taking inspiration from many of humanity's founding myths. The staging, costumes and performances were amazing and it was hard to believe that the human form can bend in some of the directions we witnessed! One of my favourites were the girls on the unicycles. While keeping upright they balanced a metal bowl on one foot and flicked it through the air where it was caught by another girl...on her head!

The bottom gymnast on the left is actually bent over backwards!

After such a mind blowing show we decided to end the evening with a nightcap at a bar in Marina Bay Sands.

I was kept busy through the rest of the week with Parent Teacher Meetings and some work I had offerred to help Jo with. This turned out to be a much bigger job than anticipated so she came over on Friday to clarify a few things. 

I ended the weekend with dinner at Saturday's with Libby and Eric.

Monday's walk was Clementi to Haw Par Villa, through the very pretty West Coast Park, and we even managed to (almost) avoid the rain.

As we had all been through the Villa and no one really wanted to revisit it we caught the train back to Bishan for lunch.
Last week Libby had seen a ruddy kingfisher in Bidadari, a natural area near their place. Next year it will be removed to make way for more housing which is rather sad, as it is a stopping point for many migratory birds. The ruddy kingfisher is one such bird. On Tuesday morning Libby and I went looking for it and we were very lucky to spy it shortly after entering the park. We saw a number of other species but the kingfisher was the highlight of the day.

The one on the left is Libby's (just to prove we saw it)!

Mum bought me back a flower tea from her recent trip to Hong Kong so I decided to test it out. I wasn't keen on the tea itself but the "pod"turns into a flower which you can display for a number of days.

After such a pleasant walk I headed home and spent the afternoon being domestic before preparing for the Punggol/Kovan Xmas Dinner. We had a delicious meal at the Mandarin Oriental, with good company and a sensible amount to drink! We had a secret Santa where you could steal gifts from each other if you saw something you really liked. I did begin with a set of headphones but alas it didn't last. Still I ended up with a practical gift of a luggage tag and a 2016 diary...very happy!