The House(s) of Fran_mart

During the COVID isolation phase there seemed to be a fashion of people issuing challenges to delve into personal histories for a number of days to follow a theme.   I’m not going to do a multi-day epic but instead will (after some preamble) write about links with 10 people with whom I have 1 or 2 degrees of separation. The idea of this is that it has been proposed that by following links of personal connections everyone is no more than 6 links from any other person in the world.   There has been some research on this using Linkedln and Facebook suggesting that everyone on those systems is linked by chains averaging between 3 and 4 links.    So just add another 2 links to get people who are fortunate enough not to be on those systems. Random individuals I decided to try a small experiment of my own by generating random latitudes and longitudes (through EXCEL) and speculating on how I could link to a random person close to that point (as shown on Google Earth). Lat -67 long 57 –

As will become evident the flaw we detected in Eden was not the presence of an apple tree but a deficiency!  It became apparent in the area where the track marked in this snip from eBird ends (the open circle).  We had gone to Eden to buy stuff we can't get easily in Mallacoota and decided to do a lap of Lake Curalo as a walk. The first problemo was that after setting off anticlockwise we found that some jobsworth had locked a gate into the caravan park. So a back track of about 400 m and off clockwise.  Here is a view of the Lake, which turns out from Google Maps to be an anabranch of Palestine Creek,  A good bunch of Swans and Little Pied Cormorants. The track was very pleasant with a good surface and nice vegetation. There were some invasive weeds - this passionfruit was definitely, and unfortunately, prospering - .. and the Banksia integrifolia was flowering well Now we get to the interesting bit.  After about 3.5 km on the nice path it seemed to run out and get to an area whe

We think this red sky at night was a contender for best sunset we have seen here.  And there have been some other rippers! I have included this one as the trees - about 3 km away - silhouetted against the sunset look a little like a fire.