Royal Adelaide Show, Show Homes, Election, Fledglings and Hugs!

Its been a whirlwind of a week, starting with the election and change of  Prime Minister on Saturday.  From the flurry of election broadcasts, sniping, spin doctoring etc., etc., which follows every election these days, we are now in the throes of the post election settling down and the post-mortems.  All will be settled (hopefully) in the next few weeks.

It was also (co-incidentally) the day we chose to go to the Royal Adelaide Show, not to hot or chilly it seemed the perfect temperature to face the crowds and tramp around busy pavilions and show ground. What a show, I think it covers just about everything the south of England Show does but on a huge scale.

In one of the marques a couple of Rangers from a local conservation park were handling a Stumpy Tail and a Blue Tongue lizard. They had both been rescued from cat attacks and taken to the park to heal.  The Rangers were talking to people about the importance of making sure domestic animals are kept away from our diminishing wildlife.

This handsome fellow is a Blue Tongue Lizard saved from a cat attack.

The biggest draw for me (no surprise) were the food stalls, so many fantastic things to sample, all locally made, deep joy.  Followed by the Alpacas, such beautiful animals and their owners all seem to be really lovely people, full of enthusiasm and happy to share information.  We watched as a couple of the Alpacas were shawn, it didn't look a kind way to go about it and they didn't look very impressed.

And then there was the tree cutters demonstration, which was absolutely amazing.  These chaps are soooo fit and fearless.  We sat in the warming and gentle afternoon sun cheering on the lads and lasses as they went through the various competitions.

The next day was Sustainable Open House day across the whole of Australia.  We visited a couple of homes they were very interesting and we picked up quite a few ideas we could eventually use in our own home.  We were also able to pick the experts brains and found (much to our delight) we are on the right track.  So a few more adjustments to our drawings then back to the draftsman for another chat.

Mean time Spring temperatures have been up and down, one day we hit 30 c the next it was back down to 15 c.  Due to the rain and warmish winter many plants are in flower already.  One part of our early morning walk we go under a gazebo covered with racemes of Wisteria and heavy with their delicious heady perfume. The Bottle brush trees are coming into flower, they look stunning with their bright scarlet flowers.

Here the Honey Eaters have been busy feeding their young from the nectar of the Crocosmias.  The nesting Honey Eaters at Deb and Roberts have produced a couple of young, dear little things.  Unfortunately I only managed to capture one of them hiding in the Japanese Japonica.

And last but not least I saw this sign, which I thought was brilliant and I just had to share it with you.