The House(s) of Fran_mart

Possibly "Back to Brown" would be more accurate but that isn't the title of an AC DC album.  Having got the word that the road to Mallacoota was open to residents we loaded up the car and left Bunda St about 1000 hrs on 21 January.  The load included doco to show we owned a house at Mallacoota. The drive down to Cooma was very dreary with dry hillsides in every direction.  Needless to say that continued on the way to Nimmitabel.  Which is normal for that area at the best of times.  However then a patch of green appeared.  Irrigation from a bore or have they had rain? Heading down Brown Mountain (as all roads South of Bombala are still closed, and the first "Road to Victoria Closed" was at the top of the mountain - about 100km from Eden) the mountains behind Bemboka were burnt out, which surprised me as I thought that area had suffered a wildfire only a couple of years ago. Getting close to the village and the fire had obviously jumped the road....

I don't quite rate the past three weeks as the worst in my life, but it has been a contender with shingles, bushfire and horrible smoky weather in Canberra.  I have barely been out of the apartment but now feel a bit more like doing so and the weather is improving,  I can see Black Mountain Tower from my desk. For the second day in a row I did the Tammy Memorial loop of Nerang Pool.  When Frances did this recently she commented on the little black chickies beside the pool and wondered what species they were.  Judging by the company this one was keeping I'd say Australian Swamphen.  A Parrot was showing its Red-rump ...  ... and offering a contrast to its more camouflaged female companion.  In the shallower part of the pool itself water lilies were avaiable in white ... .. and pink.

What with Shingles incapacitating me and then the fire in Mallacoota I haven't done much worth reporting for the last few weeks. We are now in Canberra waiting for VIC Roads to quell their jobsworthiness and let us get back to Mallacoota.  So I was quite interested to see a message talking about 400 waterfowl in Central Basin, including a couple of unusual species.  Thus I fired up the Jetta and drove down to Blundell's Cottage to see what I could see. The flocks of waterbirds were roughly in the two circles when I arrived.  (A pair of kayakers caused those in the red circle to panic somewhat and fly to the blue circle.  My count was roughly 500 birds including 193 Eurasian Coot, 111 Hardhead and 105 Australian Wood Duck.  There were I think 4 Great Crested Grebes (all in adult plumage) ...  ... and at least 2 Pied Cormorants. Here are a couple of parts of the flocks.  First looking to the blue lot: ..  and then to the red.