The House(s) of Fran_mart

 For some reason both of us were awake very early on 16 December so we packed up the Mazda and headed off at 0600.  Frances drove the first leg to get in some practice at city driving: on discussing this we concluded that she hadn't done any big-city driving (neither Canberra nor Adelaide count - although the driving style of Adelaide motorists makes it a trickier place to drive than most).  The route was very simple: along Commercial Road (which becomes Malvern Rd) and a right turn on to the Monash Freeway. The traffic heading East on the Freeway was notably light at this time, but from around Dandenong Rd onwards the Westbound lanes had already clogged to stop-start.  I would hate that commute. At some point a copmobile was on the shoulder flashing a sign about "debris on the road"  There surely was: lumps of tyre all over the place.  A little further up the road a small lorry was parked.  It had double back wheels which on the drivers side were disp...

 We have seen balloons land in Fawkner Park a couple of times.  On 14 December it was a take-off site. A bonus snap of the CBD at dawn. On the 15th they also took off from the Park. They seemed to get very close, but presumably - hopefully, remembering a fatal accident some years ago at Alice Springs - the pilots know what they are doing! It is interesting how the balloons waft around.  They must get very detailed information on the wind at various levels as they go up.  The same flight path has been followed on both days.  Fortunately the Albert air ambulance hasn't come in from the North at the same time!

Through her Primary School our older grand-daughter, Arabella, has participated in a project by RMIT in designing an alternate version of a block in Cardigan St Carlton.  This is the street on which the component of RMIT is located and very close to the school.  The class had submitted about 25 entries for the project all displayed in a room for parents and friends to inspect for the project wrap up. Here is Arabella's entry (her team-mate was Tyra). The audience was encouraged to vote for the best three entries.  From family loyalty we were always going to put this as #1 but even without that bias I gave lots of points because the model also had a poster explaining what they had done and why which I rate as pretty good initiative for 11 year olds. Here are some other models. The winning entry was also pretty good and the team leader had worked the room rather well asking people to vote for her entry!  Again good initiative for her age.  Arabella's entry came 3r...

Following the success of starting our last trip at 0730, this time we tried for 0700 and overachieved, heading away at 0655 on 7/12.  There was a little more traffic than last time with a few very slow caravans causing some annoyance.  The weather was also manky until about Orbost (~170km).  However, as a strategy it seems to work well. The most interesting sighting was fishing Santa, sitting on the railing on the Avon River bridge just West of Stratford.  It seems this is an annual event as our daughter reports seeing it last year. The traffic got rather heavy entering the Domain tunnel - the presence of an ambulance with lights and siren suggesting a stupid had happened towards the West Gate bridge.  Not a biggie. After a very pleasant get together we the sunset was pretty good. As we were heading to bed, we had an issue arise with the louvres on our Winter garden which we had opened to let the breeze off the Bay in.  (The day had been pretty tropical.)...

 A collection of FAQ photos, mostly taken on the 15th of November.  The beginning was a couple of early balloons overflying Fawkner Park (and possibly hoping The Alfred helicopter doesn't have to leave in a hurry). One of the frequent sights looking South is a parasail ripping along the Middle Park seafront. Sometimes there are two or more. What makes this surprising is that the beach is at least 2km from home but the parasails are easily visible to a naked eye. The sails of yachts can also be seen at times - these were about 1730hrs, so after work hours, on 13 November. (The blue cast is because I didn't want to mess about opening the louvres of the Winter Garden so the photos were taken through tinted glass.)  In the first image a parasail can also be picked up. I then used my longer lens, at full zoom plus digital multiplier.  These are probably at least 3km from the apartment. On the 15th the sunset was attractive in a restrained way.

 Having been very impressed with the Shrine of Remembrance we thought it would be interesting to attend their event on Remembrance Day, 11 November 2024.  Coming in from St Kilda Rd we passed a couple of interesting works of art.  The first is basically a fountain .. ...while the other is a memorial to the battle at Fromelles: one of the worst bad decisions in the fighting on the Western Front. The formal event of Remembrance started at the 11th hour.  However there was a large crowd already on deck when we got there at about 10:40. A guard detachment was marched in. We had missed the formal Welcome to Country but the smoker was still going. There were many dignitaries present including the Premier, Leader of the Opposition, a Senator representing Albo and the Governor who was escorted down to inspect the guards,  The crowd was quite diverse with this guy possibly being at one end of the range.  Here he is persuading his pooch to sit, which it did pretty we...

 To begin with, many thanks to Wildlife Rescue Victoria and Fire Rescue Victoria whose efforts made this story have a happy ending.  On our morning walk this morning we were on the Punt Rd side of Fawkner Park when my attention was grabbed by a lot of noise from Noisy Miners.  On peering into the afflicted tree I spotted a Tawny Frogmouth tangled in some line. I rang Wildlife Rescue who asked for help from the Fire Brigade, and sent a volunteer.  The volunteer rang me to say he was incoming.  He received a call from the fire people to say they were coming as well and found a bug red truck in his mirrors.  They all arrived pretty promptly from St Kilda. Initially with some basic equipment. Then some more advanced equipment arrived from a specialist unit in Richmond. Lots of expert help! It was very impressive watching how they set about this task. Lots of onlookers! The Frogmouth flapped about a bit at this stage - proving it was still alive.  The climb...