Travelog for: Cassiopeia

On her way back home from the airport, Bec took me to her sister's house so I could stay for a couple of days.

We knocked on the door and were greeted by a madly barking thing and Stef (who has promised to keep me up high and safe while I'm at her house so the barking thing can't get me!!!)



I was invited in and wondered what I my next adventure will be?

Today is Mother's Day! (in Australia)




(Sorry for the delay - missed uploading the photo!)

I hitched a ride today in Stef's tote bag with the mail to see where she goes during the day.



I found out that Stef goes to work which is very close to the city



You can see the Sydney Harbour Bridge in the distance and the ANZAC Bridge, which leads to places like Glebe, Prymont and Darling Harbour.

Seeing that I was with Stef, I decided that I would help out with some of the duties that she does as the Administration Officer. Though I found it a bit of a challenge to type and answer the phone with flippers.

Had so much fun yesterday decided to go back to work with Stef. For Lunch Stef took me to Leichhardt.

Leichhardt is known as "Little Italy" due to the large population of Italians that immigrated after World War 2. However, it is name after Ludwig Leichhardt, a famous German Botanist and Outback Explorer.

While there we stop at Pioneer Memorial Park, which in 1941 converted from the Balmain Cemetery.



Also while we were we stop at the War Memorial Monument, which was Erected by the citizens in grateful remembrance of the Men of Leichhardt who gave their lives during the 1914 -1919.

Kalli and I got a little bored today and went exploring around the house.

This is what we found:

Books everywhere!

In Bec's room!


In the hallway!


Books on just about every topic you can imagine. Even the books Bec and Stef had when they were little!




Back in Bec's room we had a talk to George, who is older than Bec and has always lived in this room. Poor George has had a number of wounds over the years and is now quite happy to sit and watch the world pass him by.



Also in Bec's room we investigated the most hated object - the alarm clock! I couldn't work out what the problem with it was. It looks harmless enough (when its not screeching madly!)

We then ventured outside to see what was happening.

We found this really nice seat on the front porch that is the perfect place to sit and watch the traffic and people going past.



This is what we found in the garden (and I can understand why there were so many gardening books on the shelves!!!)

A Grevillia (a native plant) - the newspaper delivery person likes to hide the paper under this bush!


A Bird of Paradise:


And, this is Bec's great-grandfather's Orchid plant, which is going to flower soon!



We also looked in Froddo's pond and chatted to the fisherman there.



Finally, we found this really good hole in the gate where you can look out on the world (and the park across the road)



   

Back into the house again to see what else I could find.

Aha - baby photos!



and more toys!



The little bear is a Care Flight helicopter pilot who rescues people who need to get to hospital quickly and his friend is Casey the Cat.

After all that exploring I was starting to get peckish, so Kalli offered to make afternoon tea.

We looked in the pantry and found Vegemite, which I'd heard a lot about, but wasn't sure about eating.



Kalli promised me that it tasted great with lots of butter on SAO Biscuits and that the trick to enjoying it was to only spread it on thinly, but even so I'm not really sure I like it?

I went out today with Bec's mum, aunty and uncle and we drove over the Harbour Bridge!  The weather was pretty crummy so the view wasn't too great. You can see the bridge in the distance as we headed towards it. (Bec's mum is still learning how to use the camera!)



The little bear has travelled down from Port Macquarie on the New South Wales north coast.

Here we are about to go through the toll gates:



The brown towers you can sort of see if you look carefully through the gates are the pylons on the bridge.

I went out again with Bec's mum, aunty and uncle. This time they were going shopping in Big W, a department store about 15mins away from where I'm staying. To get there you have to cross the Georges River. There is work being done to widen the road by putting in another bridge, so I didn't get much of a view of the river on the way over, but the cranes are HUGE and interesting to look at.



They are widening the bridge, because, at the moment it is only 3 lanes wide and in peak hour there are huge traffic jams.

Coming home the view was much better, except that as it was getting dark the photos aren't as clear.



I wanted to show you the signs that give fire warnings, but it got a little blurred. This signs have different colours and tell you what the level of fire danger is and whether or not you are allowed to have open fires or barbeques. Because Australia is currently in a drought usually the sign is pointing to high fire danger or extreme because the ground and trees are so dry because there hasn't been much rain.

Well, with only a week to go until June the cold weather has finally decided to arrive here. Last week the temperatures were around 24-26 degrees celcius. This week we've been lucky to get above 20. We've been having to put the heater on to keep warm when Bec gets home from work.

Today we finally did something Bec has been promising for a while - we went turtle hunting! A park near to Bec's house has a creek, where, she said, one day she spotted a turtle swimming. Seeing as it is one of my missions to meet a turtle she thought it might be a good idea to go and see if we could find it. So, as soon as she got home from work Kalli and I were ready and waiting to go walking.

When we got to the park it was very, very quiet. There were no children there! As we got closer we could see why - the council are building new play equipment and it was all fenced off. It looks like it will be a fun place to go and play at when it is finished! (And there are no more tunnel slides where adults will hit their heads trying to help children not be scared to come down!!)



The swings were still in the open so Kalli and I had a bit of a play.





After a little while of swinging we walked over to the bridge in the hope of spotting the turtle.



Sadly, while we saw lots of ducks and pea hens the turtle (and the eel that normally lurks there) was no where in sight!



We walked up to the corner shop to buy some groceries and on the way back we walked past a giant ghost gum (called a ghost gum because as it gets older its bark turns white). This is also the tree Bec crashed her dad's car into on her second driving lesson!



You can see me a bit better in this photo:


When we got back to the park again a man was there with his daughter feeding the ducks. We hoped that this might make the turtle come out (because that's how Bec & her little cousins saw it last time) but again, no luck! There were just loads more ducks all fighting each other for the bread. They were picking it up so fast that the bread didn't really have a chance to even get wet!!

Anyway, as sad as I was not to get to see a turtle in the creek I'm sure to see one tomorrow because .........

"WE'RE ALL GOING TO THE ZOO TOMORROW!
Zoo tomorrow
Zoo tomorrow
We're all going to the zoo tomorrow
And we can stay all day!!!"

(Bec's been teaching me the kinder kids' songs!!)

I'm sure to see a turtle there! (and some other sights of Sydney on the way that I've been hoping to see before I have to move on)

This morning we went to the station and caught a train into Circular Quay so we could go to the ZOO!

Once we reached Circular Quay it was time to get on the ferry. The view from the wharf was pretty amazing.



The ferry we caught to the zoo was called the "Friendship", which we thought was pretty appropriate!



I really enjoyed taking in the view on our trip. We saw:

The city skyline


The Harbour Bridge


The Opera House




Fort Denison - which was once an island used in the early days as a place of punishment and confinement for the convict population. During the mid 19th century a fort was built on the island to protect Sydney Harbour from a Russian invasion.