Somewhere Else

A day or two back we mentioned that the Wharf Precinct in Darwin is a good place to catch a harbour side meal and to watch the full moon rise over the water. It is also a place where you can appreciate how big the tides are in Darwin. The difference between low and high tide can be as much as 7 metres, and that makes a huge difference to the appearance of the Wharf Precinct.

The photo above shows the wharf at high tide – the water comes up almost to the walkway, and the boats float high. By contrast, the photo below was taken at low tide – the wharf stands well clear of the water on its tall pylons and the boats are well below the wharf.

We’ve been in the Northern Territory of Australia for the past week and have found these interesting palm trees in most places that we have visited. They are cycads (Cycas media to be precise) and are relatives of the zamia palms in Perth, which we have mentioned previously.

Like zamias, cycads are very ancient plants. They’ve been around for over a hundred million years and are the oldest seed producing plants on the earth today. They were around when dinosaurs still ruled the planet, so they are real survivors.

Their fruit is very striking:

Yesterday we walked down to Darwin’s Wharf Precinct in the late afternoon. The precinct has a good nautical atmosphere and is a popular restaurant area. Just after sunset there was a dramatic sight as the one-day-past-full moon rose orange/red in a deep blue sky:

A few days back we visited Berry Springs Nature Park, south of Darwin and not far from Humpty Doo. It’s an idyllic rain forest area and we enjoyed walking along the short monsoon forest trail.

But what really amazed us were the pools. They were surrounded by dense forest and had striking mirror reflections on the dead flat water surface. The really surprising thing was that no-one was swimming in them. Maybe we just got there ahead of the crowd, or maybe the locals don’t swim until the wet season has ended (it’s being a bit slow to end this year). Or possibly the signs at the pools put people off a little:

Today we have been looking around central Darwin. Towards sunset we went down to the beach to see the famous Mindil Beach Sunset Market. It was a much bigger market than we expected and raised one serious problem – what to choose for dinner. There were so many options that it was a tough choice. We settled on Indonesian vegetarian mixed plate, which was truly first rate.

At about 6:30pm many people headed down to the water’s edge to see the sun set. It was very impressive (above) and the market stalls looked also spectacular in the twilight colours:

As a bonus, today is the full moon. So as the sun was setting in the west, a beautiful full moon was rising in the east. Here it is peeping through the sheoak (casuarina) trees:

Maybe we were a little bit mean with yesterday’s entry – we told you what we didn’t see at Fogg Dam (a large crocodile), but didn’t tell you what we did see. So here is a bit more about the dam, which is about 50km east of Darwin.

A conventional dam generally has a high concrete wall across a valley, trapping water into a huge deep reservoir. Fogg Dam isn’t like that at all. The country is fairly flat and the dam is a slightly raised section of roadway separating two extensive areas of reedy wetlands. There are several bird observation hides and plenty of water birds to observe (above).

We also saw this beautiful dragonfly, seemingly waiting to have its photo taken:

Yesterday we flew to Darwin, in Australia’s “Top End”. Today we’ve been exploring some of the national/conservation parks east of the city – and enjoying them very much.

One thing you can’t overlook here it that this is croc country. There are crocodiles in the ocean, rivers and lakes; so you have to be careful around water. We have seen plenty of crocodiles today, though they have all been “mockadiles” – not the real thing. The Big Crocodile above is next to a service station in Humpty Doo, on the Arnhem Highway. It doesn’t look too ferocious.

But there was one crocodile that we didn’t meet, and were very glad about that. We visited Fogg Dam and saw the signs warning that you shouldn’t walk along the road across the top of the dam (below). There is a “large crocodile” in the water, so you have to drive across rather than walk. Needless to say, we drove across.

A few weeks back we visited Angove’s Winery in Renmark, South Australia. As writers and avid readers, we were please to find that Angove’s is in Bookmark Avenue – near Bookmark Creek.

Angove’s big claim to fame is that Thomas Angove, who died earlier this year, was the inventor of the wine cask – that silver laminated plastic bag of wine inside a corrugated cardboard box. Thomas came up with the clever packaging idea in the 1960s and completely revolutionised the mass market for wine in Australia.

Another plus for us at Angove’s was the fact that they still produce sherry on site. And it was labelled “Bookmark Sherry” so we simply had to buy some. And it was ridiculously cheap. And it was very good. So you know where to go if you happen to be visiting Renmark.

Earlier this month we visited Psyche Wines in Mildura, Victoria. It’s not one of the better known Australian wine companies, but has a very proud history. It is located at Chateau Mildara, which used to be very famous as a pioneer manufacturer of sherry.

Before table wines like cabernet merlot and chardonnay became top sellers, Australia was famous for its fortified wines like sherry and port. Mildara Sherry was one of the greats and was produced at Chateau Mildara. You can still buy Mildara Sherry today, though it is now made by a different manufacturer.

At Psyche/Mildara there is an extensive wine museum which spreads out through several of the old wine making buildings. Along the way you can see the old covered concrete vats in which the legendary Mildara Sherries were made (below).

While we were in South Australia earlier this month, we visited Kingston (actually Kingston SE, since there are several of them). This small coastal town has several interesting features, including a “sundial of human involvement” or analemmatic sundial.

That’s the sort where you tell the time using your own shadow. There is a figure 8 diagram on the ground which shows where to stand at different times of the year. You raise your arms, and your shadow indicates the time on the hour markers. But there was one snag … we were in Kingston SE on a cloudy day.

Incidentally we’ve read that there are only about eight of these rare sundials in the world. And this is the third one we have seen and featured on this blog. The others were in Mount Annan on the outskirts of Sydney, and Sale in Victoria. Maybe we will have to visit all the others – that would make an interesting theme for a world tour!