Aussie Bloggers

My favourite stop on the trip from Port Augusta, South Australia to Darwin, Northern Territory would have to have been Mataranka Thermal Springs.

We only stopped there for a couple of hours but it was a very rejuvenating and relaxing couple of hours. We could easily enjoyed a couple of days in such a tranquil environment.

At the time we had a 4 year old and an 18 month old with us and they really enjoyed the warmer swimming water.

What I found most interesting was that our 18 month old’s skin started to heal up. She had struggled with dry skin and excema since birth and yet by the time we returned to South Australia, her skin was completely soft and clear. Given the humidity should have theoretically exacerbated the problem, we can only put this down to the benefits of the minerals in the waters.

What also amazed me about some of these tourist locations in the Northern Territory was that accomodation was easier to come by if you DIDN’T have your own caravan. Finding a powered site beyond lunch time was almost impossible in many places. At Mataranka I actually heard the staff explaining to a caravanning couple that they couldn’t have a site but they did have onsite accomodation available (ie cabins and motel rooms) if they wanted. It was certainly caravan city up there!

Mataranka was a lovely location to visit and I would definitely recommend going there. I can’t wait to go again myself.

A trip to the wondrous Buchan Caves in Victoria earlier this year captured my imagination and I just had to find out more about the history and geology of the place.

A good few years ago (about 300 – 400 million) the Buchan area was covered with sea, leaving behind limestone composed of the skeletons of shellfish and coral. After this the area was subjected to earth movement to the extent that the area is now part of the Snowy Mountains.As water seeped into the soft rock caves were formed. Then nature which, as that clever guy Aristotle, said “abhors a vacuum”, began to fill them in again with the speleothems. These turn the caves into magical places with names such as Fairy Cave, the Grotto and the Bridal and Jewel Chambers

We are most familiar with the dripstones: the stalactites and stalagmites (remember tights come down so the mites are the ones that hang down). These are created when droplets of water form on the roof or drip onto the floor of the caves. These release a carbon dioxide gas which leave little rings of calcite which build up, drop by drop, over thousands of years.

Another kind of speleothem are flowstones which form in sheets; some, known as ‘drapery,’ hang down like curtains. Others resemble waterfalls: caused by water flowing over ledges of rock or gravel . The calcite is white but in parts iron oxide turns it red and copper gives it a green tinge

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The caves were discovered in 1907. The bones of a giant kangaroo and a wombat the size of a horse were found on the cave floor as was the extinct Tasmanian Tiger. As I, not surprisingly, couldn’t find a photo of the 3 metre tall giant kangaroo I have done a rough reconstruction below:

Procoptodon goliah with A.afarensis

Our trip through the caves was made more interesting, if not a little spooky, by a power cut but, not wanting to miss anything, we decided to complete the trip by torchlight.

I thought that it was only in Scotland that you could have sun, rain, wind, cloud and hail stones within an hour, but Ryan and I and a few hundred volunteers got that and more when we planted trees near where the River Murray meets the sea. It was also shocking to note how green everything was given all the talk about drought. From our vantage point, we could see the River Murray as it trickled into the dried out beds of Lake Albert and Lake Alexandrina subject of so much political spin at the state and federal level.

Green Fleet and the South Australia Scouts partnered to plant over 3000 native trees on top of a hill near Goolwa yesterday. The Scouts have been doing this at different sites in South Australia for eight years. Ryan’s Joey mob had fun getting wet and dirty, getting a nature connection and developing some carbon offsets for some organisations. Not that complicated really.

Incredible logistics to get so much done in a few hours at a relatively remote location. I used to grow native seedlings for Trees for Life here in South Australia. It was nice to see the other part of the puzzle, actually getting trees planted.

I liked the way that it was set up, where a large number of people could do a small bit to make a difference. Collectively they had a achieved a lot and by the time that we left you could see an area that was previously just pasture showing the first signs of a return of habitat that has been lost for hundreds of years at that location. People from the Cleland Wildlife Park brought along some friends who used to live in these kinds of habitats and Ryan was introduced to a very nice black headed python. A nice connection for the kids to see.

Now wouldn’t it be good if our proposed Emissions Trading Scheme were that simple.

I have lived in Sydney for just over 18 months since moving to Australia from London and I still have to catch my breath every time I see the bridge. My favourite view of the coathanger is at night when the lighting makes the bridge appear to hover over the dark waters of the harbour. I can imagine myself living in this city for many years and never getting tired of this view!