Last Day of Autumn

The 1st June marks the official beginning of winter. Or is it? If we're on the verge of winter, that season has redefined itself. Would you believe that today's perfect weather saw the maximum temperature reach 19 degrees C? I had an appointment with the doctor this morning and turned up in shorts and a t-shirt - my normal wear around these parts and he was almost similarly attired! When was the last time Britain recorded 19C on the 30th November? And the flowers in the garden are telling me that something is wrong. Who's ever heard of bulbs coming out on the edge of winter? And the buds of spring are appearing around the garden. I only hope they don't get a rude shock in the next few weeks!

AS

Bridge Directing

Yesterday, Sunday, was a first for me. As chief director of the Armidale Bridge club, I've directed hundreds of local bridge events over the years. However, this time I was asked to direct a regional event - the New England Novice Pairs, restricted to players who are relatively new to the game or who have failed to amass many green points in club tournaments.

I had a great time! But it was exhausting. I was in the clubhouse from 9 am until well after 5 pm (that's 8 hours altogether). I was up and down all day responding to requests for the director to rectify mistakes in bidding, play, scoring and so on - the newer players are particularly error prone. I also had to help one of our regular scorers to score the two sessions (one in the morning and the other in the afternoon) and that was time consuming because of all the incorrect scores that had been entered mistakenly during play. And prior to the event, I spent considerable time allocating participants to tables and to either N-S or E-W, calculating the numbers of boards to play (44 in all), and then using our dealing machine to randomly construct deals and deal the cards into the bridge boards.

Surprisingly, the N-S winners from a field of 10 contestants turned out to be a father and son combination from Glen Innes, but alas they didn't think they'd be in the hunt average an average morning session and departed immediately after the end of play in the afternoon. I do hope that the other players from Glen Innes resisted the temptation to consume the winners' prizes on the way back home! And, by the way, Max please note, the younger of the two players must have been about 15 years old - so his win was a great achievement. Maybe Max will play in this event in the next few years! The young guy is immediately in front of the door at the far end in this picture.

AS

New Moon

In some parts of the world, France for instance, it is (was?) thought that the sight of the full moon made people crazy - even to the extent that it was once accepted in French courts that people could legally cite that fact as a defence to such serious crimes as murder. Of course, the French word for moon is Lune, and hence we've inherited the word lunatic.

Well, count me mad if you like for making this posting. However, last Friday we were told that the full moon that night would appear in the sky bigger than we see in a long time as it was rather closer to the earth than usual. So I rushed outside with my camera at about 8pm to take several shots of our nearest neighbour in space, 150 minutes after the sun had set. Because of the exceptionally clear night it was almost like walking into daylight and I could see everything around with great clarity.

Here's the picture you're waiting for. Nothing special mind you! Alas you cannot any of the surface detail.

AS

Unusual Parrot

Dot and I caught sight of a very unusual parrot eating seed in one of our bird feeders the other day. Is there anyone out there who can name a grey-feathered bird with a red beak? We cannot find it our bird books, which is itself strange, and we cannot believe it flew across the Torres strait from Papua New Guinea!

AS

An Incandescent Day

One of the pleasant things about living at high altitude in winter is the beautifully clear weather we often receive. Last Sunday I and my visiting colleague headed east to the gorge country and the 'snowy' range at c. 1700m - it rarely has any despite the altitude. Here are some pictures of the view from Point Lookout and looking towards the range to show what I mean in an atmosphere with no humidity, no pollution, and no clouds.

In the next view pointing east you can just make out the Pacific Ocean on the top right horizon.

The valley in the next picture contains one arm of the Bellinger river on which Bellingen reported in earlier posting is located. The vegetation at the bottom is sub-tropical rain-forest, but at c. 1600-1700m asl it's altogether different. It's hardly surprising that there's rain-forest down there as the rainfall is over 2000mm annually! Look at how all the slopes are heavily timbered.

The plateau in the background here is the Dorrigo plateau - the back-ground ridge. It's a cattle raising area and remarkably English-looking when you get close.

And here's the range from Wollomombi approaching dusk. It looks idyllic.

AS

No Water

Since I returned from the United States 7 weeks ago, Armidale has had virtually no rain. Instead it has been unseasonably warm and dry. This was brought home to me the other day when I took a visiting academic to see the local countryside. We wound up at Dangars Falls and for the first time ever I saw this dramatic waterfall without any water. In other words, the stream flow of the Salisbury Water has stopped, although there is still plenty of water in various pools along the watercourse.

Although the picture below looks as if there is falling water it's a mirage. You are having a look at white-tinged rock. The falls are 30m high (about 100 feet).

This picture looks down on the viewing platform at the top of the falls, and also shows the near vertical rock faces surrounding the gorge.

And here is one of the attractive rock pools still attracting water birds.

AS

A Quick Trip to Bellingen

Last Sunday I fancied a drive in the countryside and Dot agreed. And it occurred to me that it has been some years since we took the spectacular drive to the coast. So I prosed driving to Bellingen, a picturesque little town on the banks of the Bellinger river full of 'alternative' lifestyle people.

The drive takes about 2 hours and rises about 350m (1000 feet) as one reaches Ebor and then plunges 1300m (about 4000 feet) through lovely scenery (mountains, creeks, waterfalls, huge panoramas) towards Bellingen. It was also a lovely sunny day with not much traffic on the road. And we took Dot's friend Jane along with us. Although the Armidale district is currently quite dry and rather brown, the landscape greened as we drove east and by the time we were near Dorrigo -  another picturesque little town - the countryside was a lush green colour.

What does one do in Bellingen? Well, apart from being pretty, it's full of cafes and interesting buildings and shops and we spent perhaps two hours there imbibing coffee and some fancy food and strolling around soaking up the atmosphere. Here are some pictures of the event:

AS

Piano Recital

One of the marvellous things about living in Armidale is the procession of excellent orchestral and instrumental concerts held in town by both local and international performers. And last night added one more stunning event to the list when Konstantin Shamray, a very young and exciting Russian pianist gave a breathtaking recital at the New England Conservatorium of Music. Yes, we have such an institution along with two orchestras and an opera company - all in a town of 25,000 people - and don't forget the brass band and the pipe bands I reported last week.

His technique and command of the instrument was impressive and he chose some ferociously difficult works from across the classical spectrum:

1. Bach's Toccatas in F# minor (BWV 910) and D major (BWV 912)
2. Haydn's Sonata in B flat major (Hb XVI:18)
3. Beethoven's 32 Variations in C minor (WoO 80)
4. Myaskovsky's Sonata #3 (Op19)
5. Rachmaninoff's Etudes-tableaux (Op 39) Nos 3 (F# minor), 5 (Eb minor), 6 (A minor) and 9 (D major)

The last two items comprised an unbelievable torrent of notes, rhythms, tones, and volumes of sound from soft the crashingly loud. Nor was there a sheet of music in sight. Everything was from memory and at least some of the time Konstantin seemed to be staring at the ceiling rather than the keyboard. Even the fare at the intermission was classy by local standards - champagne and Lindt chocolates. The applause at the end was so pronounced that we received two marvellous encores. His mannerisms and bearing caused me to reflect that here we had another Franz Liszt, though I didn't see an imperial coach pulled by 4 white horses at the front door.

Dot accompanied me to this extravaganza on the very day she returned to Armidale after nearly 10 weeks in California helping Emily through the early days of Flynn's life.

AS