Sweet Wayfaring

I have long admired the work of fellow bloggers in capturing the essence of the sea -- Peter at Sunshine Coast Daily and Lucy at Bermuda Daily Photo . I wanted so much to get some of their magic but the seaside remains an alien space that defeats me most of the time. Over the next week I'll show you what I managed. Musing: From The Surfer by Judith Wright "Take the big roller’s shoulder, speed and serve; come to the long beach home like a gull diving."

During our leisurely breakfast on Sunday morning, looking down from our room with a view to the street below, we saw yet another crowd of people purposely walking. A quick web search revealed these were on the 25km Seven Bridges Walk . Musing: From View of Sydney Australia from Gladesville Road Bridge by Les Murray "There's that other great arch eastward, with its hanging highways; the headlands and horizons of packed suburb, white among bisque-fired, odd smokes rising; there's Warrang, the flooded valley, that is now the ship-chained Harbour, recurrent everywhere, with its azure and its grains; ramped parks, bricked containers, verandahs successive around walls, and there's the central highrise, multi-storey, the twenty-year countdown, the new city standing on its haze above the city."

Having finished the circuit at the zoo we settled down for a nice lunch at the cafe. This chirpy little blue wren came close to our table while his brown wife Jenny jumped playfully on the grass. Nesting swallows swooped in an out of the rafters. Musing: The Blue Wrens and the Butcher Bird by Judith Wright "Sweet and small the blue wren whistles to his gentle hen, "The creek is full, the day is gold, the tale of love is never told. Fear not, my love, nor fly away, for safe, safe in the blackthorn-tree we shall build our nest today. Trust to me, oh trust to me." Cobwebs they gather and dry grass, greeting each other as they pass up to the nest and down again, the blue wren and the brown wren. They seek and carry far and near, down the bank and up the hill, until that crystal note they hear that strikes them dumb and holds them still. Great glorious passion of a voice-- sure all that hear it must rejoice. But in the thorn-bush silent hide the nest-builders side by side. ...

Last weekend was a long weekend and we went wayfaring again at last! It was off west to Wellington where we had so much enjoyed the June long weekend. The weather was mostly fine, the grass was verdantly green after recent rain and there was an explosion of spring blossom in the gardens. Musing: By Emily Dickinson "A little madness in the Spring Is wholesome even for the King, But God be with the Clown — Who ponders this tremendous scene — This whole Experiment of Green — As if it were his own!"

I've learnt how to take night shots successfully at last. So here is the office that glistens from my balcony each night -- only one tenant seems to be green-aware. I must confess that even though I am fond of the shifting display from the room with a view I would really prefer to be back in the leafy green of my mountain home. Musing: From Clancy of the Overflow by Banjo Paterson "I am sitting in my dingy little office, where a stingy Ray of sunlight struggles feebly down between the houses tall, And the foetid air and gritty of the dusty, dirty city Through the open window floating, spreads its foulness over all. And in place of lowing cattle, I can hear the fiendish rattle Of the tramways and the buses making hurry down the street, And the language uninviting of the gutter children fighting, Comes fitfully and faintly through the ceaseless tramp of feet. And the hurrying people daunt me, and their pallid faces haunt me As they shoulder one another in their rush and nervous...

The weather in Wellington was sunny, warm and glorious and a change from what had been a constantly grey wet week in the city. The townsfolk were kind enough to acknowledge that we were having a good weekend but couldn't resist mentioning that they were anxiously awaiting rain. They dry landscape was dotted with windmills faithfully pumping much needed groundwater to the surface. Water restrictions in the city and Blue Mountans have been lifted a little now the catchment has 66.7% storage. We can wash our cars again. The other side of the picture is that the drought has not yet broken in the bush, Lake Burrendong near Wellington is still at a mere 25% Musing: From Summer in the Country by Peter Skrzynecki "... watching grasses and grains shimmer in paddocks or sheep and cattle grazing beyond a windbreak of pines. Galahs clanged over the homestead. A windmill turned when a breeze sprung up. Cockatoos screeched from the pepper tree."

Photo: Old House, Hill End Musing: From House That Was by Laurence Binyon "Of the old house, only a few crumbled Courses of brick, smothered in nettle and dock, Or a squared stone, lying mossy where it tumbled! Sprawling bramble and saucy thistle mock What once was firelit floor and private charm Where, seen in a windowed picture, hills were fading At dusk, and all was memory-coloured and warm, And voices talked, secure from the wind's invading."

The historic town of Hill End has a museum and quite a lot of well preserved cottages. This rainwater tank was on one of them. Rainwater tanks are of course a very old fashioned country-style type of thing which are now very in vogue in the city as an answer to water restrictions during drought. Photo: Rainwater Tank, Hill End Musing: Rainwater Tank by Les Murray "Empty rings when tapped give tongue, rings that are tense with water talk: as he sounds them, ring by rung, Joe Mitchell's reddened knuckles walk. The cattledog's head sinks down a notch and another notch, beside the tank, and Mitchell's boy, with an old jack-plane lifts moustaches from a plank. From the puddle that the tank has dripped hens peck glimmerings and uptilt their heads to shape the quickness down; petunias live on what gets spilt. The tankstand spider adds a spittle thread to her portrait of her soul. Pencil-gray and stacked like shillings out of a banker's paper roll stands the tank, roof-w...

Here's one last shot of the glorious golden trees before moving on from Mount Wilson. Today is Whitsunday (and Mother's Day). Musing: From The Whitsun Weddings by Philip Larkin "The fathers with broad belts under their suits And seamy foreheads; mothers loud and fat; An uncle shouting smut; and then the perms, The nylon gloves and jewelry-substitutes, The lemons, mauves, and olive-ochers that Marked off the girls unreally from the rest. Yes, from cafes And banquet-halls up yards, and bunting-dressed Coach-party annexes, the wedding-days Were coming to an end. All down the line Fresh couples climbed abroad: the rest stood round; The last confetti and advice were thrown, And, as we moved, each face seemed to define Just what it saw departing: children frowned At something dull; fathers had never known Success so huge and wholly farcical; The women shared The secret like a happy funeral; While girls, gripping their handbags tighter, stared At a religious wounding."

The stone angel at the Catholic Church at Kurrajong forever looks over picturesque undulating farmland that seems to roll on forever. Musing: By Emily Dickenson "This world is not conclusion; A sequel stands beyond, Invisible, as music, But positive, as sound. It beckons and it baffles; Philosophies don’t know, And through a riddle, at the last, Sagacity must go. To guess it puzzles scholars; To gain it, men have shown Contempt of generations, And crucifixion known." This is a repost to participate in the   Taphophile Tragics   meme.  V isit there for a wondrous variety of graveyards.

Is this a picture of the duck or the water? Photo: Duck pond, Botanical Gardens, Sydney Musing: The Duck by Ogden Nash "Behold the duck. It does not cluck. A cluck it lacks. It quacks. It is specially fond Of a puddle or pond. When it dines or sups, It bottoms ups."

With all the visitors I am not getting much Wayfaring done at the moment so will explore a little more of Sydney before moving onto new places. The Botanical Gardens have a spectacular location by the sparkling habour, right where the great city of Sydney started. Photo: Sculptural detail, Botanical Gardens, Sydney Musing: From Flower Poem by A.D. Hope "Not this cut flower but the entire plant Achieves its miracle from soil and wind, Rooted in dung, dirt,dead men's bones; the scent And glory not in themselves an end; the end: Fresh seeding in some other dirty mind, The ache of its mysterious event"

Photo: Central coast hiterland Musing: From The Lady of Shallot by Alfred Lord Tennyson "There she weaves by night and day A magic web with colours gay. She has heard a whisper say, A curse is on her if she stay To look down to Camelot. She knows not what the curse may be, And so she weaveth steadily, And little other care hath she, The Lady of Shalott."

I am getting jealous of my friend who has started a photo a day blog the Sunshine Coast Daily . I miss posting daily like I did for nearly a year for my Blue Mountains Journal -- though I don't need that pressure right now. We have lots of visitors at the moment, with not even a chance to get out wayfaring, so I will post a few pictures from a trip we did to Forster about this time of year. Photo: Boats, Forster Musing: My Pretty Rose Tree by William Blake A flower was offered to me, Such a flower as May never bore; But I said, ‘I’ve a pretty rose tree,’ And I passed the sweet flower o’er. Then I went to my pretty rose tree, To tend her by day and by night; But my rose turned away with jealousy, And her thorns were my only delight."

Before you tire of bugs I have to get in a spider's web. Now we all know dew spangled webs are a photographer's delight but the interesting thing about this one is the leaf. I saw one web with a leaf in it, then another, and another - heaps of them. By then I figured this was no freak accident of falling leaves but a design feature. Photo: Leaf curling spider Musing: From Design by Robert Frost "I found a dimpled spider, fat and white, On a white heal-all, holding up a moth Like a white piece of rigid satin cloth -- Assorted characters of death and blight Mixed ready to begin the morning right, Like the ingredients of a witches' broth -- A snow-drop spider, a flower like a froth, And dead wings carried like a paper kite. What had that flower to do with being white, The wayside blue and innocent heal-all? What brought the kindred spider to that height, Then steered the white moth thither in the night? What but design of darkness to appall?-- If design govern in a thin...

Add water to the list of things I like to photograph. I like light playing on ripples, how setting sun makes rivers flow golden, reflections in glassy streams, the bubble of rocky creeks, and the white veil of waterfalls. I also like the foam of the sea on black rocks but never get it right. Photo: She-Oaks beside Lane Cove River Musing: I guess this is about the most famous poem about water. From the Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Taylor Coleridge " Water, water, every where, And all the boards did shrink ; Water, water, every where, Nor any drop to drink. The very deep did rot : O Christ ! That ever this should be ! Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs Upon the slimy sea. About, about, in reel and rout The death-fires danced at night ; The water, like a witch's oils, Burnt green, and blue and white. "

Photo: Somewhere near Oberon This photo has three of my favourite things -- a haystack, a fence and grass seed swaying in the wind -- perfect. It is such pleasure to stop and savour the moment instead of whizzing by saying isn't the countryside pretty today. The photo, the blog post -- a snapshot in time to be relived at will -- a treasure bank to call on when live gets too busy, like it is for me right now. Today's musing is a favourite poem of mine about favourite things. I learnt it by heart the other day during my daily crawl to the city in heavy traffic. I am learning lots of poems -- it makes the time pass more pleasurably . Musing: William Street by Kenneth Slessor "The red globe of light, the liquor green, the pulsing arrows and the running fire spilt on the stones, go deeper than a stream; You find this ugly, I find it lovely Ghosts' trousers, like the dangle of hung men, in pawn-shop windows, bumping knee by knee, but none inside to suffer or condemn; You f...

Photo: Hayfield, near Tarana Musing: From Haymaking by John Clare "And its beautiful to look on How the hay-cleared meadow lies How the sun pours down his welcome heat Like gold from yonder skies"

Like Robert Frost ( yesterday’s poem ) I also saw a small bird near the wood pile. Photo: Bird on gate in pine forest near Black Springs Musing: My Papa’s Walz by Theodore Roethke “The whiskey on your breath Could make a small boy dizzy; But I hung on like death: Such waltzing was not easy. We romped until the pans Slid from the kitchen shelf; My mother's countenance Could not unfrown itself. The hand that held my wrist Was battered on one knuckle; At every step you missed My right ear scraped a buckle. You beat time on my head With a palm caked hard by dirt, Then waltzed me off to bed Still clinging to your shirt.”

Photo: Pine logs in forest near Black Springs Musing: From The wood-pile by Dave Frost "The view was all in lines Straight up and down of tall slim trees Too much alike to mark or name a place by So as to say for certain I was here Or somewhere else: I was just far from home. A small bird flew before me. He was careful To put a tree between us when he lighted, And say no word to tell me who he was Who was so foolish as to think what he thought. He thought that I was after him for a feather— The white one in his tail; like one who takes Everything said as personal to himself. One flight out sideways would have undeceived him. And then there was a pile of wood for which I forgot him and let his little fear Carry him off the way I might have gone, Without so much as wishing him good-night. He went behind it to make his last stand. It was a cord of maple, cut and split And piled—and measured, four by four by eight."