bicycling these green hills

a fine easy ride, 14 miles, av speed 13mph...  early evening...

soft low hills with crops picked and unpicked...  sheep vacuuming up the remains in meadows already harvested.

distant views at what i can only call a human scale: can see perhaps two or three miles to further dark green forested hills that form the backdrop to this farmland, but I can't see much further.  there is something very comfortable and relieving about these intimate views across the green and tan rolling hills, so unlike the grand but almost incomprehensibly vast landscapes of the American West.  I simply love this landscape, as i do the similar ones of NZ:  nothing oversized,  nothing grotesquely disproportionate, and -- i just realized -- no billboards. 

 
     click image to see full size                                                      

Litter is almost non-existent: yes, i've seen a few beer cans and such, but unlike our roads with their dismayingly frequent beer cans and bottles, plastic bags fluttering along barbed wire fences, and the steady stream of fast food packaging, these roads are virtually litter free. I'd like to attribute this to an appreciation of the land by the people, but the fact is that there are few fast food places and, as Michael Pollan says, where you fuel your car is not where you fuel your body.  Gqs stations here certainly do have the usual racks of candy and coolers of soda, but they don't have fried chicken, pizza, sausage or breakfast burritos.

 In a neglected paddock next to a neglected house, a neglected small cabin cruiser on blocks; scrawled on the prow where the name would usually be proudly painted, the boat's new name: "not for sale."

the few cars passing are too close and going what feels like too fast on these narrow roads...

in a small-scale landscape like this, even my 14-mile bicycle ride today leaves me feeling i've been somewhere, traveled some landscape, experienced it, breathed it.


If only we'd stop trying to be happy we could have a pretty good time - Edith Wharton

HERE AT LAST

the two following tell me i am really here:

got a mobile (cel) SIM card for my Kiwi phone. unlike our frustrating phones, i can take this anywhere in the world, buy another SIM there and use the phone there.  at the same time, using a pre-paid mobile account means i pay  40 cents for every HALF minute on the phone, and 25 cents per text.  arghhhhhh.  

and then found this on the kitchen counter this a.m. For those of you not familiar with Vegemite, all i can say is that 

for me the health benefit of the high vitamin B content is vastly overweighed by the sheer foulness of the product.

Smelling it -- no, just thinking of smelling it -- is like stepping into a shed filled with very wet sheep....

all was saved at lunch -- the benefits of living on a farm: go out and pick these just outside the door:

went into town to a sweet cafe and were forced by the friendly locals to devour these:

and finally to the local "op-shop" where i picked up some cheap second hand work
clothes, and something familiar to keep the sun off: 

another glorious day; about 75 degrees, clear, sun, and cool breeze in the shade...........

If only we'd stop trying to be happy we could have a pretty good time - Edith Wharton

IMAGINING TASMANIA

 Quick drive over to Narawntapu National Park for a walk on the beach........


View Larger Map

View Larger Map

Whenever I'm in Australia or NZ, I attempt to imagine what the reaction of the first settlers here might have been to the strange new world they had come to... we've seen -- or can see -- almost everything on our planet online, but they had only slight and completely subjective news from the first explorers...

I got a small dose of their experience yesterday as we walked over to an expansive grassy area near the parking lot: about 100 meters away, i saw two dark objects; at first i thought they were large rocks, but the realized they were wombats; a mother and baby.  as we got closer, i realized that my lifelong idea of the animal was wrong: instead of being about the size of a small dog -- a beagle -- the mother was about 5 feet long and stood perhaps two feet at the shoulder. Solid and thick, she reminded me exactly of a small hairy hippopotamus, and as they grazed on the short grass, her slightly lumbering movements were heavy and deliberate.  Despite our slow approach, the pair quickly moved into the taller bush and disappeared.

Tim tells me that some people keep wombats as pets and their size gives them substantial weight around the place: if a wombat wants to sit where you are, he'll just come over and push you out of the chair.  after realizing how solid and chunky they are, i can believe it:  the mother must have weighed a good 250 lbs, all in a tight little package.

Surprise number two:

turning toward the larger fields, i could
see a number of animals bent over,
silhouetted by the low evening sun:
Forester kangaroos.  the nearest was
at least a hundred yards away and stood
up to watch us as we watched it with our
binoculars.  back to the sun, its  furry ears
were highlighted; i could see the small front
paws almost touching each other, held in front
of its chest.  in the field beyond, another four
were grazing, bent over like old men examining
something on the ground.  One hopped acoss,
perpendicular to our line of sight, and i could see
how he used his long thick tail for balance:  it was
one (slightly) fluid movement -- if you can call hopping
anything but jerky.   push off with large rabbit-like rear
paws, quick balance with tail, and land on those large
rear paws again, small hands held up to chest.

Other animals:  black swans and black parrots...








 gorgeously empty Baker's Beach...

feet wet in Bass Strait...

 Baker's Beach at sunset, view to Badger Head

and a drive home on roads lined with eucalyptus trees glowing in the last flames of the sunset.
Bennet's wallabies stood in the cleared verges along the road; some watched and others
bounced away back into the bush as we drove home.. 

If only we'd stop trying to be happy we could have a pretty good time - Edith Wharton

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If only we'd stop trying to be happy we could have a pretty good time - Edith Wharton

Farming...

the surge of interest in locally grown food,  urban gardens, and growing your own food is great, but the fact is that farming is
continuous damn hard work.  There is no rest in the growing season:  Tim and Anna hand-pick zucchini for two hours EVERY day -- and that's just the start of the work.  A bit of tea and then time to snip the parsley, cut eggplant and rhubarb and complete whatever daily maintenance and cleanup is required.  Today I spent an hour in the steaming greenhouse picking up all the rotting eggplant that had been trimmed off the stalks over the past weeks, and learned why Anna was so pleased that i was available (and willing) to do it:


rotting eggplant smells just like rotting meat.

Not quite as instant gag-producing as, for example, rotting chicken (just imagining that while writing those words turns my stomach), but foul enough.  the skins are strong enough to hold the partially-rotten fruit together -- until you pick it up -- but the underside has often decayed thru, leaving behind a smear of brown...

I know that from now on, when i eat, I'll be thanking whoever grew and picked the food.

And speaking of picking food, another revelatory experience: went with Tim to deliver a load of vegetables to his local buyer, and everyone working there was Anglo.  It was a genuine surprise for me to enter a labor-intensive operation and not see a single Hispanic laborer doing difficult dirty jobs.  this again reminded me and reinforced the sad truth that more than most Americans want to realize, Hispanics -- often illegal and so, reviled by the right -- actually make America run, and we should thank them profusely instead of hounding and deporting them.

Just as most previous waves of laboring immigrants, once distrusted and resented by the previous arrivals -- Africans, Italians, Irish, Chinese, Germans, Japanese -- now see themselves as a vital and legitimate part of the American experience, i trust that the ridiculous onus of being "illegal" will someday be a badge of courage and contribution.

 LOCAL HEADLINES OF THE DAY:

                        BUT WHO TELLS THE PENGUINS?

                                                                                                                    AGAIN: DO THE GRASSHOPPERS KNOW?

If only we'd stop trying to be happy we could have a pretty good time - Edith Wharton

Platypuses, Wallabies and Crop Circles

after days of refreshing rain, two solid days of sunshine.

weather: clear, dry, sunny, 75 degrees.  Perfect.

Two bicycle rides and i'm approaching verticality again.

I did cross the Mersey River here, but on my bicycle rather than by ferry........

Some lovely local bits:

This is a beautiful green country, with stands of straight tall Eucalyptus trees dominating the landscape among the cultivated fields...

Latrobe, the nearest town (2 km) bills itself as the "Platypus capital of Tasmania," and i can well believe it:
 
Platypuses are ALL over the place, their flat tails beating against the pavement in a threatening manner if you ignore their requests to bum a cigarette or stand them a beer,  just DARING drivers to run them over as they saunter (any better word comes to mind i'll change my verb), and in general making nuisances of themselves.  Good thing they don't fly, because being bombed by platypus crap would be really annoying..

Children gleefully pose by the largest Platypus ever killed in this region                                                           

It also has the Australian Axeman's Museum (no, not a history of a famous ax murderer,tho Americans are forgiven for instantly drawing that conclusion). A current axeman is moving up in the world: 

click on pix to enlarge

***
While bicycling the other day, I kept noting large signs warning of death if the crop on the expansive fields beyond were consumed...  turns out Tasmania provides almost 50% of the worlds's medical opium and those were fields of opium poppies.  they've been harvested already, but there are those locals who have insisted on getting into trouble.  From the BBC (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8118257.stm):

'Stoned wallabies make crop circles' 

Australian wallabies are eating opium poppies and creating crop circles as they hop around "as high as a kite", a government official has said.

And these flagrant abuses of the law have inspired readers' ire:


READERS' RESPONSES:


I have seen a stoned wallaby but I don't know about them making crop circles. The one I saw was slurring his words and asking me for a dollar as he was trying to get the boat to see his brother in New Zealand - he looked in no mood to be formulating a series of complex agricultural design patterns. I could be wrong - they might have masterminded the twin tower attacks, who really knows?                                                                                                                                 
Dijon, Hobart, Tasmania

I resent this report that we are high as a kite and making crop circles! I haven't been stoned since 1971. A few young hoppers eat the wrong plant and you trash our species in the news. What's this world coming to!
Wally Baby, Australia Bush

I saw a whole bunch of them going mad in my corn field only last night. I'm not sure if they were high or not but I'm pretty sure they were. One of them had a ghettoblaster and they were listening to some kind of fast electronic music. Lock 'em up and throw away the key, that's what I say!
Roger, Melbourne

Bumped into a couple o' stoned wallabies coming out the co-op up Lochgelly high street the other night. This seems to be a problem on both sides of the globe.
John Smith, Lochgelly, Fife, Scotland

I've lived in Tasmania for many years. Not only do wallabies congregate in poppy fields, but also on the local golf courses. They do this mainly at night and I can only assume they're playing several rounds of golf while avoiding greens fees. You only need to be really worried when one of the stoned wallabies gets into a golf buggy.
John Larson, Launceston, Tasmania, Australia

I want to know who sold out the wallabies? Who's the narc? My guess is the platypus.
Chet Guest, St. Paul, Minnesota USA

Don't know about crop circles but I saw one today trying to jack a car, presumably trying to get enough together for his next fix.
Greg Corcoran, Durham, UK

The question should be whether or not those law breaking wallabies should be brought to justice for indulging in illegal substances. The law makes no exceptions for no-one no matter what their excuse is or even what species they may be. They are not setting an example for their joeys nor for any other marsupials and I fear this could become an epidemic of outback size proportions.
Phil, Edinburgh

****

According to Tim here, Tasmania is the roadkill capital of the world; can't dispute that since that was the the first thing i noticed on  the night drive from the airport: mashed beasts everywhere.  I can also report that i've seen two dead Wallabies along the road. There is something particuarly sad and pathetic about a dead wallaby:  they're a smaller version of a kangaroo, only about 2 1/2 feet tall, and seeing one along the road,  lying on his side with his lttle paws drawn up and his thick long tail extended behind him is as touching as seeing a familiar dog or cat dead in the road.  For me, the wallaby's harmless appearance makes a dead one all the sadder.

****

and a few images from here:

(click pix to enlarge)

 

Pepper on the job

      a view of tim and anna's house from the paddock, looking north across Max licking his butt........

          Pepper, ginger and Max on the beach last evening..........

                                                    Anna and Tim w/ Ginger -- Max on a leash

                                                         another crowded evening on the beach

If only we'd stop trying to be happy we could have a pretty good time - Edith Wharton

Antipodean ease

Auckland airport (nahh, i'm not still there):  one of my strongest memories of my times in NZ  has been the ease and generosity of Kiwis.   while experiencing it in a small town is a sweet surprise, to have a similar experience in the International terminal of a major airport is even more pleasing:

the Air New Zealand employee who offered to make a call for me to inquire about carrying bottles of duty free gin (presents for Anna) onto the domestic flight from Melbourne to Launceton.  In the states, once thru Customs and Immigration, duty free liquids have to be packed into checked luggage.  Can you say "gin-soaked clothing?"

inquiring about the above at the Duty Free shop, both the manager and the woman employee offered to put their names on the receipt so that if i weren't able to carry the two bottles thru onto my domestic flight in Australia, they would refund my money. Imagine that at an airport in the states....  not likely.

the woman security officer standing at the metal detector who offered to hold my silver-buckled belt when i forgot to remove it before approaching the detector.  the simple fact of NOT having to remove shoes when going thru security.

I feel i can breathe again, that small daily requirements (especially at an international airport) do not carry the sense of imminent danger should i inadvertently do something "wrong."  LIfe here -- to generalize about NZ and Australia, but these are both places where i've spent a lot of time since 1965 -- does not seem to be lived on the defensive. I more and more understand my brother saying that when he returned home to Sydney he felt he had just "been let out of prison." 

Here, the common response to any spoken thanks on my part is "not a problem..." The only place i have this same experience is home in Boulder...

Taking off for Melbourne, looking down at a pleasant green and gently rolling landscape, with an inviting delicate and human scale, i smile.... it just makes me smile in familiar comfort, seeing the land where i experienced -- again -- such easy generosity.

***

Flight:

and we took off for Melbourne.  the seatback video monitor:

the seatback screen  offers not only movies, music and all the other distractions (including seat to seat texting -- now where was that attractive woman sitting?) that have replaced books as reliable travel companions, but travel info from Lonely Planet guides for all Qantas destinations.  For Hobart, the Tasmanian capital there are sections on Eating, Accomodations, Sights, and my personal favorite: "Dangers and Annoyances."  Such an Anglicism, "annoyances;" I half expect it to list "aggressive squirrels" and "ill-behaved children" instead of the usual cautions about not wandering around drunk if you are a single woman.  It's mentioned so lightly...


The oddities of International travel

Sitting next to two engaging older women from the UK, bound for Hong Kong and home after 4 months in NZ, they ask about my travel plans and point out an ad for Banff and Jasper BC in the airline mag.  Well,  i JUST HAPPEN to have photos from the 2006 motorcycle trip i made up there with my German motorcycling partner Thomas from Hamburg (with who, oddly enough, I've done more miles and kilometers than anyone who lives in the States).

So, T: I'm sitting on an Aussie plane flying across the Tasman sea from NZ to Oz, showing two British women photos of a Canadian motorcycle trip on  German motorcycles taken by a German and an America  on a Japanese computer while feeling great affection for you and missing your company. Can't always complain about the 21st century, can we?

two of the photos i showed them, the Grand Tetons....