Birds and wildlife in and around Lockhart

Ron has been nagging me to put up some more photos of the the birds and animals we see up here.
So I am finally getting around to it!

This was stumpie a feral free range boar, but alas he has gone the way of all little piggies now!

Ron's trash bird the Palm Cuckotoo, of  which we haven't seen many of late.

A crab of some sort at the beach.

Grey goshawk at Portland Roads

A very large spider, one of many in a communal web.

Shining Flycatcher at Portland Road.

Lots of these dragonflies have been seen.

A red dragonfly

A praying mantis- yes it is Ron's head!

One of our favourite visitors at home.

Blue winged kookaburras are plentiful

Snoozing in the trees.

The Waterfalls

After a short drive of about 20 mins and a 15min walk through the bush we arrived at the beautiful waterfalls. Some nice still pools to swim in and also heaps of falls to get under.
Very nice.

The waterfalls looking upstream

Looking down the falls

Easter Holidays in Lockhart

The sink hole and the detour

 Well we have now been on holidays for a week, and I am feeling very relaxed. Ron and I got away for a couple of days to stay at the Beach Shack in Portland Road. We had been told the road was closed due to the road being a bit washed out and a bad sink hole. However locals were allowed to travel on it, so long as we didn't expect the police to come and get us out of any bogs. So Ron being the old bushie said no worries.. and off we went.

The detour around the detour

Finally arriving at Portland Road we moved into our very picturesque accommodation. It was a steep climb up to the house so after a couple of days doing this we were almost super fit! It is advised as being rustic get a way, which does sum it up pretty well.

The Beach Shack

The path up the hill!

The top one is where we stayed.

The lovely open verandah

Open plan house

The view from the loo.

Our view of the bay.

Unfortunately the weather was slightly overcast so I didn't get any good sunset or sunrise shots.
We went for some walks on the beach, a drive around to Chilli Beach, (about 10km away) and relaxed and read.

Ron collected some oysters off the rocks! They were abit sandy and gritty to eat.

Back in Lockhart I have been getting cultured checking out the local art work. It is quite a big business here with a number of the artists exhibiting all over Australia and some overseas. There have been a number of art works sold to Aust. galleries and in Aust museums.
There are a number of books about the local artists and as Ron and I have been doing lots of reading  up on the history of the place we bought some of the books.

Carvings out the front of the arts centre

Painting by local artist on the outside of building.

Another painting on outside.

Some of the art inside. So much to look through to choose by piece as a keepsake!

Many of these paintings are hundreds or thousands of dollars, a bit out of my league so it will be rummaging through the cheap baskets for me.  Could take a while!

Well tomorrow it is hopefully a trip to the waterfall with some of the other teachers and partners.

April 10 2011

Yay, last week of school before Easter holidays. At the moment we are having our wet! It has rained or been overcast everyday this week. We have managed to go to the beach, but can't go anywhere else much because of the rain and the wet roads, which become impassible. So my photos are of a few things close to town, on the sealed roads which is about 10km of road! For those of you planning a trip to Lockhart and haven't got friends to stay with!! this is the only local accommodation at the airport. 

IronRange Cabins

Iron Range Cabins, right at the airport

Tropical downpour in Lockhart

A friendly little Sunbird in our front garden

Ron and I are off to Portland Road Beach Shack for a couple of days over the Easter holidays, so long as the road is open, but it will be nice to get out of the community for a couple of days! Watch out for the photos!

Living and working in Lockhart

I thought I would finally put up some pictures of our house and the school, as many people have been asking what these are like. I seem to work even longer hours in Lockhart than ever before, probably because it is so close to home, only a 5 min walk. I walk to school about 7.15 and don't usually walk home until 4.30 and after a walk with the dogs and dinner it is back to about another 2 hours preparation. In a yr 3/4/5 with children operating at a range of abilities, Year 1  to year 5 and a couple of 'special needs' though not officially diagnosed our days are very busy!

My classroom is the closet end upstairs.

I have attached a couple of photos of our street and our house. The duplex is very comfortable and we have no neighbours at the moment. Also it is great having bush on 3 sides of the house. We don't have any problems with noise or anything from the community. Across the road is other teachers accommodation and other non indigenous government workers.

This shot is looking directly at our side of the duplex.

The view from the other side.

Last night we went to the fortnightly Bingo session in the church hall. It is very serious as they have really good prizes. For $10 you get 10 games and the chance to win 20 prizes. (things like eskies, camping goods, kitchen ware etc). Kids are not allowed to play and are discouraged from being in the hall, but they still come in and often get growled at to stay quiet. However meanwhile there is probably 50 kids and dogs outside the windows running around and making lots of noise, so the adults get cranky and yell at them.... not exactly a relaxing night out, but now we can say we have been and experienced the local entertainment!

Portland Roads

Red and white bottlebrush were flowering everywhere and looked beautiful on the way out to Portland Road.

This is on the road to Portland Roads, you can see the sea in the distance.

We went out for a drive last Sunday to Portland Road and took some photos and did some birdwatching, so that was really nice and a great way to wind down!

Lockhart cont.

After 5 days in Canberra I flew back to Cairns, where I had to attend a 3 day inservice on Classroom profiling (this relates to behaviour management). Then on Thursday it was back to Lockhart and a few changes. I am now working in a 3/4/5 class with Julia, a first year and we both have days were we do other jobs so we have 1 day both in class and then parts of other days. We have 17 very lively kids and some with very big ATTITUDE! so it is going to be an interesting class! My first week back was broken up with a celebration here called Foundation Day which is a public holiday, teachers had a professional development day. Foundation Day is celebration and rememberance of moving the Lockhart community to its present site from the old Lockhart site in 1969. They remember the old people  and lives left behind at the old site. This was also the time some families resettled up at Umagico, near Bamaga. The day was celebrated with games and activities and a barbeque at the beach.

While games were played on the beach, the local children swam with the crocs (one has been sighted regularly on this beach) and the jelly fish!

Some of the local teachers and partners, check out the 'oldfellow' up in the covered area!

Local dancing- 'shake leg'

That evening we attend a traditional feast as part of the day's celebration. Yes, there was turtle, dugong, fish and local  wild pig served up with rice and salad. The evening finished with more dancing. This was much closer to the islander style dancing and really brought back some memories of up north for Ron and I. It was a late night, but worth it!

 It continues to rain most days in Lockhart, mostly falls of 20 - 30mls, usually about lunch time each day. So at the moment we aren't going out much further than the beach as the rivers and creeks go up and down and you can get caught out.  The dogs enjoy their visit to the beach once a week and its nice to get down there and go for a walk.

The church hall decorated for the feast.

Back in Lockhart

Well, it has been over a month since the last post, so I have some catching up to do! On the 8th Feb Charlotte and I flew to Canberra to get her settled in ANU.  It is a really nice campus and easy to get around, everything is either in walking distance, Canberra City centre is only 20 min walk and it is a very attractive uni and I really liked Canberra. Charlotte and I did a couple of the tourist things as well. We went to Parliment house, did a guided tour, it was very interesting. We also went to Australia's National Museum, I was a bit disappointed with it, and then the War Memorial, that was extremely good, interesting and very moving.

Inside the War Memorial, looking towards the Shrine of Rememberance

Parliment House

Indigenious mosiac at front of Parliment House

Old Parliment Hous

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Charlotte out the front of the War Memorial, Canberra