Tibouchina

The Tibouchina "Alstonville" is ubiquitous in the suburbs and with it's "Alstonville" moniker I simply presumed that it was native to northern New South Wales.

Unless New South Wales is a state of Mexico, it appears I am wrong, but they do tend to leave us seeing purple in Autumn and Spring.

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More colours

It's strange to think that one day all this beauty will be covered no doubt with white plaster to produce a "Macmansion" that will conform entirely with its neighbours.

I thought I'd post a second similar shot to string out the joy just a little.

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The colour of construction

I used to build once.  In those days timber was timber coloured and the ground was poisoned with stuff that chased termites away and kept them away.   Sadly one day someone drew a link between those poisons and people falling down dead and a new set of materials had to be devised.

Now the timber is treated against attack with more innocuous chemicals, and dyed so there can be no mistake about what has been dunked in which.

It makes for a colourful life on a construction site though.
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Lock.

Some readers know that we spend summer in Europe travelling by small boat on the inland waterways.   This involved negotiating hundreds of locks in any given season, many of them tens of metres deep.

At Pelican Waters, there is a lock and I often go to marvel at it when I feel homesick for my northern life.   The height of the water does vary with the tide, but it's never going to be a challenge for most boaters.

Pelican Waters

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Lighthouse inverted.

Right time, right place, puddle just big enough to reflect a nice amount of the light from the lead.

Golden Beach

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The lead light.

This is one of a pair of lights that work in unison so that ships can align their passage with the narrow channel close to the shore.

It's part of the system that rendered the old lighthouses in Caloundra redundant.

Golden Beach

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Esplanade frontage.

The apartments aren't at all glamorous, and there's a road between the grass and the building, but it's not a terrible place to stay by any means!

Golden Beach

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Shelter

I wonder if this tree will grow into something that gives shade, or if it will remain a scrappy, stunted shrub struggling to find its way in the world.  Perhaps I should return to this spot each year to find out.

Golden Beach
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Fishing at dusk

Hoping to catch a flathead perhaps?

Golden Beach

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Boom!

I am unsure what to say about this - it looks like a sonic boom, but I think it was just bit of a messy turn!

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Twirly twisty things

Just when you thought you'd seen all the ways technology can be misused, someone invents a way to cut shiny stainless steel into a zillion concentric pieces and mounts them in a way that means that those pieces rotate in an entirely inter connected way.

If you surround them with red yellow and blue curtains, you end up with an ever changing pattern which is sure to please the punters, who will take them home hang them in their beige living room, and wonder why they have stopped working.

Christmas present for the girl who has everything.

Eumundi.

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The next big thing.

Velour boardshorts in your choice of colours.

Just when I thought my my chenille ones were coming back into fashion too.

Eumundi

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Pines

We have an obsession with shortening names in this country.

So when one sees a sign that says "Sweet Pines", one does not think of toilet aerosol, but rather one knows that there are pineapples for sale around the next corner.   These were actually at the Eumundi markets, at the Pine stall and I liked the shadow on the canvas back wall.

Sweet!

Eumundi.


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Signs of the times

I really can't decide if the new signs throughout the town are a cheery adjunct or a shame at best.  I think I am tending towards the latter, as old shops seem to be in competition as though there is a prize for the largest most vibrant billboard, and the town slowly turns itself into just another strip mall.

Maleny

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Layers

Once in the village centre in Maleny the Auto Spares Store sat cheek by jowl with the Cafe.  That was in the days before food was "fine" of course, when "Gelati" was sold as "Have-a-hearts" and cheese came in in one variety.

As renewal of the town continues, the loss of these little hints at a past continues.

Maleny

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Shelter

Maleny's modern shelter structures are lovely things,  open and light and visually satisfying.  If it rains, we suggest you sit somewhere else though.

Maleny
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Banksia House

The name "Banksia House" evokes all sorts of images of the essence of Australia.  

I suspect the garden plant selection is a deliberate irony.

Maleny

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Persona non grata

When I was in Maleny a few months ago, I was clearly a bit grumpy, but even the shop mannequins seem to have taken it personally.

Perhaps one of their kind has been taken to the tip!

Maleny

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Curiosities

The Golden Fleece is variously a remnant from Greek mythology, a reference to an ancient gold mining technique, or an Australian Oil Company which was purchased by a multinational brand around thirty years ago and therefore passed into mythology as well.

This petrol station standard in Maleny is preserved for posterity at Watson's Garage (established 1964), and could be the only one still standing in its original environment.

While it has featured on this blog once before, that was five years ago and well, one would have to do a search!

This post is one of many on the theme "Curiosities" to see more of the City Daily Photo Community interpretations please visit our Theme Day Gallery. 

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What joy?

I am at a loss to understand the pleasure that can be derived from tearing battens off a steel frame, unless perhaps it was to beat the person found doing so senseless.  No wait, that's putting the cart before the horse.

In any case, despite the well maintained everything else, someone has decided the bin doesn't need screening.

Wurtulla.

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Little things I like

I love the way bits of bark and leaf find their way into the bottom of the footprints and just sort of stay there.  Not that anyone can tell they are footprints in the soft sand.

Golden Beach
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but wait ... there's more!

OK two swallows don't make a summer, and there's not much in the way of public transport, or banks or other services around, but they are a stone's throw from the new hospital precinct.

There is no doubt they will be a great place to work in the future (possibly now) but I suspect I won't live long enough to see the planner's dream fulfilled, unless the community grows at a supersonic rate.

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Not quite central business district.

The offices are wonderfully located of course, and you can always have a break under the umbrella on the verandah, but they just appear to be a long way from anything else.

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Planning dilemma.

Here's the problem:  We live in a town that's fifty kilometres long and not very wide.   That's the edge of the built up area over there.   That's also the edge of the commercial centre of the type that sits outside the city limits in other situations.  

There is a bit of effort being made to create a town centre of sorts around this lake, which is a lovely thought, but where is the centre of a town of this dimension?  

I think it will take a hundred years or so to sort itself out.


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Hospital

Work on the hospital is coming along nicely, although there'll probably be a claim for delay for this day due to the effect of rain.

This photograph was taken  five months ago though, so another update on progress is a little overdue.

Watch this space!

Wurtulla

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Graf

The etching on the  paving at Eumundi looks far too structured to have been an ad hoc thing, but whatever the case, the texture is a lovely thing.

Eumundi

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Snow Cones

Once snow cones comprised a bit of crushed ice, some coloured syrup and a plastic tub.

Just another example of how our language is changing.

Eumundi.

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Still Pleasant despite the drizzle.

In a shower, the rain seems to filter through the trees along with the light.   It could get a bit damp in a proper storm though.

Eumundi.
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Pleasant

Even on an overcast day, or perhaps specially on an overcast day, the surroundings are, well, genial!

Eumundi Markets

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Markets with the lot.

Tibetan food, children's dresses, psychic readings, german sausages and toilets.

What more does one need to fill in a lazy Saturday?

Eumundi

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Fake Hippy Stuff.

They may have got away with the fake wood panel on the fibreglass counter at the organic coffee stall, IF the screws on the print had been circular.

Or perhaps oval screws are the next big thing.

Eumundi

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Hash Burger

 There are places where one could get arrested for being in possession of one of those, or perhaps sir would prefer sir's hash brown?

Eumundi

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Wind 'n Sea

The Wind 'n Sea Surfrider's Club has been around a long time, since back in the days when banners were hand painted on canvas for instance.

Imagine that!

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Tooway the other way.

I have posted a zillion shots from the bridge over Tooway Lake looking in the other direction, but on a stormy day with the early morning sun illuminating the mangroves, it looks ok this way as well.

Moffat Beach

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Reminder.

A shell, no longer in it's natural environment, awaits purchase as a decor item.

Why do we feel compelled to have things around us that remind us of where we are?  I would have thought that at our place the sound of the ocean and the salt build up on the windows would be a fair indication, but apparently not.

Moffat Beach

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Rain over Mooloolaba.

 There's a bit of rain hanging about.

Moffat Beach

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Tube!

Those who have no interest in surfing may fail to see that the tunnel through the pandanus almost perfectly replicates the barrel waves off the point.

Moffat Beach.

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Watching the dog.

Somewhere to the right of the picture, there is a small dog, trying to dig a hole in a large rock under which a tiny crab holds no fears for its life.

Life at the beach is never dull.

Moffat Beach

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Morning Dip

At various times of the day, the predominant colours change our perception.  An hour or two later and the water would have matched the colour of his shorts.  For now, we'll have ourselves believing that his shirt is the colour of the rocks, which it isn't.

Moffat Beach

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Wrong way!

I suspect he knows that he's heading in the wrong direction - there'll be another wave in a minute.

Moffat Beach

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I've seen this movie before.

"Narelle, mind the boards for us will you, we'll be back in a sec."

Moffat Beach

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Body Board

It's not about the kid, it's the colour of the water I love, constantly changing like a giant kaleidoscope.

Moffat Beach.

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Classic Ices

I just need one.

Moffat Beach

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Lost in thought.

It's an easy place to do nothing, out there among the rockpools.

Moffat Beach.

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There's one!

A boy fossicks among the rocks for things that will surely die if he takes them home, but that's how one learns about things.

Here's hoping he didn't put any in his sock drawer.

Moffat Beach


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The photographer

Surf photographer waiting for the semi-final heat to begin.

Moffat Beach

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Tip toe, no tulips

Leaving the surf, taking off leg rope, not missing a stride.

The consummate surfers skill set.

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Coming round.

I fail to understand how it can possibly be that one can have one's surfboard higher than one's body, be completely airborn, yet land with everything in the right spot and spear off in another direction.

But one can.

Apparently.

Moffat Beach

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Going In

That moment when you wish you were a few inches taller.

Moffat Beach.

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Bicycle, or crab bait?

These poor little bikes have been pulled out of the water under a bridge no doubt by some fishermen when were hoping for a different kind of catch.

Clearly someone has stolen them and chosen to dump them rather than to return them to their rightful owners.   Perhaps if one was to believe in Karma, the miscreants will end up as crab food themselves!

I don't know what it is about modern society that some have so little respect for property, that they are prepared to steal it, then simply dump it out of sight, then do it again. Is it simply out of spite?

On that cheery note, please don't forget to check out today's City Daily Photo Theme gallery:- "Bicycle".

NOTE;

I think the difference between the respect that is due to all property, and the lack of it that is so prevalent in our over-fed Western World is no clearer than in Shantaram's comment below:

For a moment, I thought it was something made up. Bicycles should be passed on from one generation to the next, not left to rust. :( 

Thanks Shantaram, I hope many people check out your Chennai Daily Photo Blog!


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