A little walk in MtLawleyShire – flowers, trees, sunset and moonrise

Another little walk (to get cat biscuits and bread) & in the hot windy late afternoon – so much beauty which was unexpected.  I had thought most roses would be scorched by the sun & I didn’t expect all the trees with blossom!

Roses – sweet things amongst sun-scorched ruins of older blooms:

 

 

pretty pink ones:

Ones like vanilla ice cream with raspberry topping (as a friend described it) and lovely yellow:

gloriously sun-kissed :

and rich, beautiful red:

Grevillea:

 

Frangipani:

native eucalypt blossom:

 

 

Trees:

this is a pigeon-berry bush – yes, bush.  This particular specimen is over 100 years old and has been saved by people who have also saved a lovely old heritage listed place, turning it into a family hoe complete with 2 dogs & a gorgeous garden.  The strange shape is apparently quite strong, though it has lost some branches.

 

My lovely friend, the lemon-scented gum:

A tree in someone’s backyard now visible because three old houses on William Street were demolished – there will probably be boxy ugly flats with no gardens at all erected.  I am glad to see this tree and even gladder it is safe in someone else’s backyard:

 

Peppermint tree & ancient eucalypt – the one with the soft fluffy yellow blossoms (those I always associate with May Gibbs Snugglepot and Cuddlepie)

Tall trees growing straight on a street verge:

  

Jacaranda in sunlight and pied beauty on the corner of William Street:

 

Sheoak leaves against the sky:

Sunset: quiet with wind calligraphy written in a light pen:

 

 

the clouds low on the horizon looked like a wave of flames – presaging the heat gone & to come the next day:

 

 

 

And then, the moon:

 

Finally, last glow of light in the sky

yes – it was a busy little afternoon walk 🙂  I hope that this has not been too many photos…

Out of MtLawleyshire – Trees at Murdoch University & Matilda Bay

I have had a busy week and while there have been no sunset photos for the end of the week, there have been lots of trees.

It is Festival season in Perth, and within the Perth festival is the Writer’s Festival – & I am a writer, of sorts.  This year, I actually attended an event at the University fo Western Australia, but before that, I was invited to attend a Q&A with China Mieville at Murdoch University in the southern suburbs.  It was an excellent talk.  He’s a very articulate engaging character, which is to be expected from his books (my favourite is The City & The City).  But, though he would probably raise his eyebrows at this, it was also a chance to look at trees.

Murdoch University has wonderful native grounds, filled with mostly natives.  But not just trees – flowers:

Grevillea:

 

This – so reminiscent of a flame tree flower, but it isn’t.  Glorious red 🙂

Eucalypt blossom:

 

& the nuts they leave behind:

Water lilies:

& this

Grows into this:

 

Now the trees. I don’t know what this is, but its brilliant green is striking, and the duller yet graceful shape of a sheoak:

 

Wonderful tree with almost furry bark:

 

Cape Lilac in the outside cafe:

 

These are just beautiful from various places around the campus:

 

& this is the trunk of a massive tree:

Finally, two towering trees soaring into the inconstant, uneven sky of a terribly hot day threatening rain and delivering none:

 

A plane tree in the city as I made my way home:

& this?  At the small park in West Perth just down from where I teach – a peppermint tree looking like a jungle unto itself:

Today, I attended a talk by China Mieville & the wonderful Margaret Atwood.  They played so well off each other, and Margaret Atwood is such a character – so sharp & funny & wonderfully subversive.  I love her writing, have heard her talk often and this was just as wonderful.  China Mieville was a wonderful partner for her.  Of course, with his genre writing, her novels Oyrx & Crake and After the Flood (as well as The Handmaid’s Tale)  were under discussion along with his novels  (& mention of  a book the talk reminded me of that I want to read for the PhD: Hoban’s Riddley Walker).

And although I had no time to wander along the river, everywhere you go around the University of Western Australia and Matilda Bay there are trees:

a Moreton Bay fig dappled in the inconstant sunlight today:

A scribbly gum and another:

 

just trees – a strip of manicured wilderness between roads and car parks, paperbarks and others:

 

in the university grounds as I hurried towards the lecture theatre – white trunk amidst intense green:

& this wonderful tree on the corner of a carpark:

 

& then it was time to go in, and after that?  Time to go to work.  No more trees till, maybe tomorrow.

& today, it rained.  A little.  Enough for me to make my students laugh as I ran outside to dance about in it.  In the middle of the city.  Oh dear 🙂  But it was such a relief after a cooler, though intensely humid day, and tonight, I will have to have a light blanket.  Much better than the 40 degree celsius of the two days before!

I hope you enjoyed my trees.  I enjoyed looking at them, and the activities of the two days 🙂

MtLaweyShire sunset – Wednesday 20 February

After so many bland glaring sunsets, one with clouds was a gift – & it was spectacular, changeable and beautiful.

Of course, there was more to the sunset than just sunset.  There were roses in other people’s gardens:

 

There were even birds” New Holland Honeyeaters on a wire outlined by a thunderhead in the east, just touched by sunsetty glow

The sun through the clouds was a glory:

The clouds themselves a low patchy roof of the heat of the day:

 

Light pouring down in gold, rendering distance magical – actually it’s only the next suburb, but it looks so mysterious:

 

Somehow the clear sky away from the clouds lost importance:

 

 

 

Then the colours deepened, turned powerful and almost sullen, heavy:

  

before attaining a touch of gold to lift it into beauty:

              

the light leaving the sky, concentrating on the massive cloud structures:

 

sinking, taking the colours and brilliance with it:

 

touches of sunset-coloured virga in the north:

 

In the eastern sky, clouds and blue skies:

 

In the west as sunset faded, just the grey of clouds touched here and there with sunsetty light:

 

till finally, nothing but the charred remains of day,

of cloud,

 

of sunset:

 

Finally, the moon, sailing serene above the clouds

& free of them all later in the evening:

It was wonderful seeing such a sunset.  I hope the weekend brings more.

🙂

 

An evening walk in MtLawleyShire – and Jupiter!

I went for a walk down to Beaufort Street a couple of days ago, but haven’t had a chance to post – working and so on.  And I am still not used to the settings on my camera – or checking them before I take photos, so these roses are in light too low for crisp detail.

The first of these seems to have light inside it & all I can think of is that it caught the light of the lowering sun.  The 2nd is just a pretty bud.

 

& these – the orangey one is overblown, but still beautiful, considering that most roses I saw that evening were scorched by the hot sunny days we’ve had recently.

 

A tree loaded with pomegranates – ripe-looking pomegranates.  Maybe I should’ve nicked one or 2!

Late afternoon light on the branches of a lovely tall gum on William street, and the second photo is of my ‘pied beauty’ friend, also on William Street.  These 2 trees are almost opposite one another.  One is a sort of street tree, the other grows in the grounds surrounding a block of flats.

 

On a side road, this tree, spindly and untidy, soars gracefully into forever and light behind a box tree adds mystery & magic:

 

The wonderful shapes of the lemon scented gum street trees: they keep them lopped so they don’t entangle the power lines.

 

And then – I saw a pair of galahs – they started far apart, but then began to groom each other:

 

 

 

I finished my shopping and began walking home.  Sunset glow was visible ahead of me, behind the rise:

At the top of the rise – William Street, the glow was broad:

 

To the east, the pastels were beautiful.  The second of these is the same tree that up above has light on its trunk:

 

And although there were no clouds, nothing to differentiate the sunset, I had to take photos of that tree:

& finally – lastly – the moon.

 

It turned out to be  the piece de resistance!

I caught – without knowing what it was – the occultation (or the beginnings of) the moon with Jupiter.  I actually got Jupiter in my little camera!!  OK, very small, unbanded, totally undetailed Jupiter, but it *is* Jupiter!

🙂

 

A quiet sunset in MtLawleyShire – and the fat fluffy cat

 

It was a very subtle sunset.  A cloudy day with not much more than the scent of precipitation – the forecast showers did not eventuate, and then, by the time sunset arrived, all the clouds were gone.

Very disappointing, though the fattee cattee didn’t seem to mind:

Then she got impatient for DINNAH!

 

I went to check silhouettes in the next street: that golden sky.  I almost forgave the lack of clouds.

I loved the light on this tree:

 

& walked around the block for a different view of the sky and found intense gold and colour framed in foliage:

a tree in a garden – slightly caught in the light:

The wider view showed how slight the sunset was:

 

I went back to the first street, passing my girl on the way:

 

The silhouette was lovely, the wider view showing a few golden puffs of cloud

 

        

There were soft pastels in the south east:

 

The sunset disappeared rapidly, leaving subtle shades in the west:

 

She is thinking evil thoughts:

Then – oh!  What was that?  Grrr: noisy neighbours.

Unimpressed:

Tonight’s moon:

& time for dinnah ?

It was 🙂

Out of MtLawleyShire – an afternoon at Matilda Bay

An afternoon too hot and time poor to wander too far, with the river unstill and sparkling in the endless sunlight.  But it was nice to stop for an hour, have a coffee with a dear friend, before we both went back to our respective work.

There were so many swans!  On the ground in front of me on the path I took towards the tea rooms.  They have very big feet!  The second of these swan photos (it’s the same swan) paused at the foot of something larger:

 

A large, graceful paperbark:

 

& its flower:

A plane tree, leaves burnt by the long heatwave, and the same damage can be seen in the leaves of the flame tree outside the tea rooms:

 

& this one: I am fascinated by its knobbly trunk and the way its branches have grown:

A cormorant on a post in the river & later I caught him just coming up from a dive:

 

Swans on the river:

 

 

I think this is the River family all grown up:

 

& sometimes the ubiquitous gull makes a statement: on the beach & against infinity:

 

There were ravens – the 2nd photo is definitely ‘quothing’:

 

The city from across the river: that infinite blue sky speaks of the heat:

 

Wider views towards the hills, with little bits of wind calligraphy & the long tidal ripples in the river:

 

 

Through the doorway of the tea rooms: it looks so invitingly green

         

My favourite cedar: foliage & trunk with a patch of sunlight:

 

Foliage:

& at work, in the small gardens on the corner of 2 busy roads: a bush with tiny white flowers – & a bug!

 

Finally, home later at night: the moon:

Hopefully, there will be a gradual cooling.  & hopefully next time I am there, I will have more time.

No sunset photos tonight, as the sky is clear, but I will be able to shoot the moon 🙂

I hope you enjoyed my little afternoon out before work.

Monday’s sunset over MtLawleyshire

 

All day it was cloud pressing in the heat, but not one drop of rain.

It will be the same tomorrow.

I was impressed with the sunset though:

 

A magpie coloured by the amazing light.

 

 

A hint of virga in the violently coloured clouds

 

 

 

 

 

     

looking up William Street – clouds behind the city:

I wanted more detail of those molten gold clouds

 

& the sun appeared, for almost the first time the entire day:

 

but it went again

 

 

and the sky turns to gold as the sun sinks below the clouds, leaving them turning to dark & grey, and below the horizon, leaving the hot world to a restless night.

I will miss tomorrow’s sunset but I have hopes for Wednesday 🙂

Or maybe tomorrow evening will have some thunderheads…

 

 

Trees in MtLawleyshire’s Hyde Park

These are from a walk I did earlier in the week  & it was a strange place to be, Hyde Park, filled with works and diggings.  It’s impossible to take photos in some areas and they still have no idea what they are going to do with the island they have razed in the middle of the eastern pond.  It remains a terrible eyesore and must bewilder the birds that used to shelter there.

They are digging up near some of the paths – the intention is to install a bio-remediation area – a reedbed to you & me.  This will clean the water that comes down from the roads into the ponds and help remove the toxicity from the mud which poisons the birds.  A good thing.  But the park at the moment is very difficult to walk around – bobcat tractors and cars and mechanical diggers, piles of sand and dirt, workmen and utes and trucks and cars, neon orange plastic fencing.

It’s a mess.

Yet the trees rise above it all, mostly.  The plane trees have suffered, their lower limbs lopped off, surrounded by the piles of sand and the plastic fencing.  I did get some reasonable shots.  In the 1st two, this is obvious, but I still love the strength in their trunks:

 

& in these, replete with leaves, glorious in sunlight:

 

This guy is so massive he rises above everything:

Shapes of trees.  I don’t know what the first is, but I love the shape of the peppermint tree next to it, & I’ve posted photos of this tree before.  Possibly not from this angle:

 

The bush – paperbarks and tangle – on the western island:

& here are the willows they wanted to remove.  They have been saved, but are going to be ‘managed’ – I don’t really like the sound of that.

Finally, the Moreton Bay figs – nothing seems to bother them – though there were a few I couldn’t photograph because of blocked paths, etc:

 

 

& one of the few paths still untroubled by ‘works’:

I didn’t make it for a walk this morning – got up too late and then it was too hot.  Hopefully Wednesday.  Tomorrow, I think it might be Matilda Bay… in the heat.

The river will, at least, make a semblance of cool…

 

Subdued Sunset in MtLawleyshire

You’d think, with the heat, there’d be a fierce sunset of virulent colours, but no.

It was almost subdued.  Almost.  There was something about the understated nature that was menacing, threatening.  It’s beauty is likewise understated.

first – light slanting across the road & picking out emerald verdant green from the street trees

 

The sky was smeared with cloud, blurring and swallowing the light:

 

It didn’t intensify, but darkened – the clouds were only in a small area.

 

One moment of intense glory

The clouds radiated out without taking colour with them

Wind driven calligraphy

the clouds themselves were beautiful, but it was all so static, understated.

the long view is less static and implies the sense of distance between me, across miles of urbanity, to an unseen, unreachable horizon where the sun slips behind the clouds into the darkened sea.

There was no further colour.  THe ramparts of clouds swallowed all, waiting for the heat tomorrow.

 

A walk in the heat in MtLawleyShire

It’s the 2nd day of a heatwave where not once day will dip below the old century, & today it will go well over.  I didn’t set off as early as I wanted to due to various hold-ups, so only walked around where I lived a few decades ago, and though the heat is too much for any flowers, I found a rose or 2 unspoiled by the fierce sun:

 

and trees 🙂

I was taken by the patterns in box tree bark (& thought of Wanderlust Gene as I did)

& here, the papery bark of a paperbark tree:

 

 

this particular paperbark tree is in a very unphotogenic spot – no matter the angle, the tree is diminished by cars or badly designed modern housing (in what used to be a heritage area).  So, this is all I could take.  I will keep trying.

I came across a lovely Grevillea with a few flowers:

& the gnarled, scrappy, scratchy, untidy peppermint trees.  Their girth, their relative lack of height in relation to their girth which increases as they get older somehow add to their attractiveness for me.  And the scent of them 🙂

Intricacies of age:

 

This little guy popped down onto grass in front of me.  Hopping all over the place.  I was lucky to get this one, almost unblurred shot!

A streetside Plane tree – all cropped on one side.  It looks so peculiar! Esp compared to the grace of the unpruned box tree:

 

A gardenscape:

White tree limbs against a sea of wind-tossed foliage and a tree dark against the day

 

Young lemon scented gums:

Against infinity and the blasting brilliance of midmorning sun.  That deep blue sky is not enhanced.  That’s the colour it is at the moment.  It means extreme UV ratings and a fierce light.  And heat.

A few blocks on is this tree – a survivor of car crashed and urban vandalism.

 

& finally – these two grace the Bowling club grounds:

  

I hope to go walking very early tomorrow morning before the heat so – hopefully, there will be more.

Hope you enjoyed 🙂