De Young Gallery

My second day in the USA. Emily, Greg and I went to the Toyota dealer in Palo Alto to pick up their (semi)-new Camry this morning and, having returned it to their Mountain View apartment, we headed off for San Francisco  60km up the bay. Although cold, it was quite a nice day in the sense that the sun was shining, and lots of others must have opted for a day out as the freeway was busy. We headed to the De Young Museum / gallery in the Golden Gate Park for lunch, a part of SF I'd never previously visited, although I've been to the city many times over the years. The lunch was reminiscent of the one I had with Rebecca and Max last year at the Tate Modern - delicious. We sat outside in the sculpture garden amidst items like the safety pin, field of apples and synthetic rock attached.

Then Greg headed off to see some down-under friends who lived nearby, while Em and I toured the museum's contents. The main attraction was the Olmec art dating from c.1000 to 400 BCE. This was a blockbuster exhibition a bit like the Terracotta Warriors at the Art Gallery of NSW reported earlier in these pages - and from a similar period of time. Of course, they could not have influenced each other because the Olmecs were in Mexico (pre-Mayan) and the Qin Empire unified what is now China. That said, there were amazing similarities in the types and qualities of artifacts shown in the two exhibitions, and some big differences. Most notably, the Olmecs were stone masons rather than working with china and terracotta and there were some huge stone heads or other body parts on display carved into blocks of granite or other igneous material. Anyway, the exhibition was just as instructive and interesting as the earlier one and very enjoyable.

After visiting that part of the museum, Emily and I took a lift to a viewing platform on the ninth floor of the administrative block alongside to see SF from above. The attached picture show the wonderful view the greeted us all around: from the Presidio to the north (with the pylons of the Golden Gate Bridge poking up above the hills); to the coastal scenery of Marin County to the north-west; to the city centre lying eastwards; and across the science museum to the south.

After soaking up the views we spent the rest of the afternoon looking at displays of American art and we were the most interested in quite a large collection of modern art. Some of it was difficult to understand and seemed more or less pointless; other items often had little point, but were exquisitely executed with great skill and aesthetic quality: sculptures, furniture, photographs, and paintings in a wide variety of materials. It was all quite entertaining and, indeed, we ran out of time before the gallery closed. Exiting the building was quite a shock - it was cold! Rather than stand around awaiting Greg's appearance with the car, we headed into the gardens separating the science museum from the De young, and especially to a dude standing on a plinth. It turned out to be Francis Scott Key, a lawyer and amateur poet who wrote the Star Spangled Banner in 1814. I first encountered this Baltimore citizen three years ago when visiting Fort McHenry at the entrance to Baltimore's harbour. His poem, which became the US National Anthem, was penned to celebrate the defeat of the British navy at that time and we heard a rendition at the fort. Greg eventually turned up and we sped home to Mountain View amidst the gathering dusk. All in all it was a good day.

AS

Em's New Home

We took a trip to look at Emily and Greg's new abode, which they have just signed up for in Santa Clara, near San Jose in the southern end of the San Francisco Bay area. In case you hadn't heard, she and Greg moved here 3 weeks ago as Greg's new job is with Google in the Googleplex at Mountain View. I'm here for a conference in Monterey about 75km away and conveniently I'm staying for a few days with them before and after the meeting. However, I'm staying their temporary home in Mountain View. They'll move here in 2-3 weeks after the ship docks with their container-load of furniture!

I attach a couple of pictures of their home, which is in a nice area close to school and shops. Don't ask about the rent, which is a sore point. Alas, Silicon Valley has escaped most of the US recession for the obvious reason that it is still the world's high-tech engine-room. We've sailed past endless office blocks owned by the leading names in technology.

My trip is probably the first of many, with three planned for 2011: now, July and Christmas. I must head off now to pick up (not metaphorically) their new Toyota Camry and visit some of San Francisco's art galleries. It's only 10.15 on Saturday morning, but confusingly 5.15 am on Sunday morning back in Oz.

By the way, the new home has lots of space and, if you'd like a quick visit to SF and ask nicely, they may be able to help reduce the cost of your trip by asking you to stay a few days. Better be quick though. I imagine that list of visitors is likely to lengthen quickly! Don't bother trying right now, however, unless you're a masochist! The forecast today is for temperatures in the 3-9C range!

AS

Garden Party

I was invited by my local MP, Tony Windsor, to a garden party today at his home 'Cintra', just south of the little township of Werris Creek. That's about 170km south of Armidale, so that made for a long return trip of getting on for 340 km. Dot was to accompany me, but unfortunately had an engagement in Canberra. So, instead, I took a family friend, Jane Stening, and she enjoyed the outing considerably.

Tony is one of our excellent independent MPs representing the 1x Federal and 2x State seats in New England. The conventional parties are unrepresented! And the independents are hugely effective in defending our regional interests, extracting policy concessions, and raising the tone and quality of debate on key issues. I also see eye to the other Tony on many policy issues and have helped him and our State independent, Richard Torbay, retain the seats at many successive elections.

The pictures show Tony, and his wife Lyn, welcoming us and then he giving us a brief speech on aspects of federal politics. Mostly we talked among ourselves as we had a lovely barbecue lunch, though I also discussed several important policy isues with Tony. The demographic was on the loder side and distinctly prosperous. Most of the men, though not me of course - I'm a contrarian, were dressed in R M Williams outfits and Akubra hats (or similar) as befits millionaire owners of farm properties.

Tony's homestead, Cintra, has been beautifully landscaped over the years by Tony himself. He constructed lakes, timber decking, barbecue areas, paths, rock walls and so on - as pictured, rather like Winston Churchill did with Chartwell. By the way, it was hot today, but very pleasant travelling in our new well air-conditioned RAV4. Armidale reached 30C and Werris Creek an estimated 38C.

AS

Cyclone Yasi again?

The two weeks of >30C weather have screeched to a halt and today we only reached 15C. However, we've been looking forward to some wet weather after hot dry conditions browned the landscape. Alas, we were not looking forward to the torrential downpours greeting us today. It started raining at noon and five hours later we've had around 70-80mm, or three inches for those mired in imperial measures.

Buried in there was some of the heaviest rain I've ever seen - the kind that yields 25mm (=1 inch) in 5 minutes or less. Our garden is flooded and looking at the met office real-time rainfall maps I'd say there's a mass of water to come. The source of the rain is interesting. It's being fed by a jet stream in from the remnants of cyclone Yasi, the biggest storm to have hit the east coast of Australia in living memory, which takes us presumably back to c. 1920. The tropical low pressure system it became ended up in flooding Alice Springs! and now the rain-bearing cloud still swirling in central Australia is being syphoned off to our 'benefit'. So the rain we had to today part originated in the southern ocean and partly neat Vanuatu in the Coral Sea.

Oh well, I off to look again at Dumaresq Creek which I'd guess is now at its highest flood level in years. There will not be much damage because Armidale's flood-plain is all parkland - excellent foresight and planning.

AS

Cyclones (or Hurricanes)

Remember hurricane Katrina or Cylcone Larry a few years back. The former flattened New Orleans and was a major catastrophe, and the latter hit far North Queensland between Cairns and Innisfail, but with much less damage. Both were category 5 storms.

Well, Cyclone Yasi is just about to hit between Innisfail and Cardwell to the south and it's also category 5. But this storm is huge ... huge. It's roughly twice the size of Larry in diameter and the central windspeed is reported at 290km per hour (180 mph). Compare that with some of the winter storms lashing the English Channel or the North Sea. My guess it's several orders of magnitude higher. The storm is likely to flood much of tropical Queensland north of Rockhampton - itself on the tropic of Capricorn and this will mean that almost the whole state - an area this size of western Europe - will have been subject to flooding.

The picture shows, courtesy of the Bureau of Meteorology, the storm and its eye clearly and I'd estimate its diameter at about 1500km!

This summer is becoming harsh even in little old Armidale. We have now had more than a week of >30C temperatures and as I was driving our car around this afternoon its external thermometer was registering 34C (93F). And don't forget that my home is similar in altitude to the summit of Mt Snowdon. It's also very humid and I can hear thunder as I type. This is the hottest summer in two decades, but bearable.

AS

Changeover Day

At the end of a tumultuous month we have just exchanged our 12 yo Toyota Camry for a new RAV4. It was a sad day as we took our faithful and very successful v6 Camry down to the local Toyota dealer. We had had 175,000km (110,000 miles) of trouble-free and efficient motoring from the old work-horse, but she was beginning to show her age as functionality decreased slowly. The two things that remained sound to the very end, however, were the engine and the ride. Au revoir, UZN288.

When we reached the show-room Max transported his child safety seat into the show-room and we picked up UZN's replacement after a few formalities like writing cheques. It's a RAV4 awd automatic with 4wd capability for steep slopes on unsealed roads, and unlike its predecessor is a bright red rather than silver colour. SIlver is easilty the most popular shade at the moment, but I regard it somewhat boring. Red matches my shorts as the photo shows, though I doubt that is the main reason for chosing the colour of a vehicle.

Dot wasn't around at the purchase because of a hair appointment, but we're all off for our first real drive in the vehicle to see the local waterefalls in full flood after some more heavy rain yesterday.

AS

Yabbying II

 Max and I headed out on another unsuccessful yabbying expedition late this afternoon - in the sense that we did not manage to catch one. This time we went westwards over the Great Divide to Booroolong Creek at the headwaters of the Murray-Darling system. The drive was lovely in the sense that the scenery was great and the car was air-conditioned, both relaxing after a terribly hot day that felt like 36C (mid-90s F). It was also a sticky heat with storms brewing to our south. The pictures show the Creek where it is crossed by the road linking Armidale to Bundarra and a view downstream to the south-west with late afternoon sun filtering through.

The creek had lots of rocks and pot-holes which favour yabbies and the stream was flowing sufficiently well to disperse the surface algae that were a problem at Dumaresq Dam earlier in the week. Despite our not sighting a yabby, Max had a good time walking across the shallow waters dangling meat on the end of a piece of string in the hope of luring a bite. And the site was so picturesque and peaceful that I was glad we went to get away from the hustle of modern life. By the way, today was a public holiday to celebrate the POMS turning up at Sydney Cove 223 years ago.

The nation has come a fair way since then and yesterday we had one of our great modern sporting successes. The Europeans have their European Cup (or whatever it is now called) and the Asians have the Asian Cup, albeit for national teams (like the World Cup) and not the best national club sides. Australia is now recognised as an Asian side and last night they beat one of the best Asian sides - Uzbekistan - 6 - 0 to reach the final against Japan this coming weekend.

AS

Yabbying

Many inland streams and dams are home to small crustaceans locally called yabbies (Cherax Quadricarinatus), and kids love to catch them. They're edible and rather nice. Indeed a colleague once hosted a Japanese delegation and served them yabbies from his farm dam to their great excitement and approval.

Well yesterday we went to nearby Dumaresq dam, just 15 km or so from home, at Max's request and we took along pieces of string and food to tie on at the end - chicken pieces, ham and that sort of thing. At one stage we had about seven pieces of string dangling in the lake. Alas we didn't even have a nibble as far as we could tell and when we left all the pieces of meat were intact.

Nevertheless, it was a lovely late afternoon excursion amid some more picturesque scenery in the shadow of Mount Duval, which is about 1400m high and completely covered in forest. And, by the way, real summer has arrived. It was 31C yesterday and 33C today!

The final picture shows Cherax Quadricarinatus, but the picture is from the internet - we didn't see one in the flesh, but they were there!

AS

City of Cards

Dot taught Max to construct a house of cards. From there they both ran riot and produced a veritable city of cards in just a few minutes. The result is shown here. Some of the cards were from Max's favourite card game, not bridge but UNO. The other cards were from a large-format standard deck.

AS

Rock Hopping at Dangars Falls

Today was an absolutely beautiful day: crystal clear, mild (only 26C), and sunny. This is much more like the summer weather we cherish than the heavy rains of recent weeks. It was also an invitation to go bush, so Max - who is staying with us for 2 weeks - and I headed off to Dangars Falls to go rock hopping, looking for lizards, eels and yabbies. We traversed the 20+ km from Armidale across some glorious countryside, as shown in the first photo. The rolling grasslands, with their knee-high grass, stretch some 40km into the distance. The low conical hills in the middle distance are the cores or vents of long dormant volcanoes.

Under normal circumstances, when the water is low in the Gara river, there are lots of exposed rocks over which to stroll or hop as the case may be, but the great volume of recent water had covered a lot of the rocks and crimped our style somewhat. The second and third photos show the natural pond at the entrance to the Oxley-Wild Rovers national park. Not only was the water high, but the vegetation was exceptionally green - almost like the Garden Eden.

From there the substantial outflow accelerated downhill towards the top of the falls and the column of water shown in the next two photos. You can see the rocky banks of the stream in the first of these and often one can leap across the river ... but not today. Even so, Max had fun chasing lizards and poking the water with a stick in his quest for snake-skins and yabbies, a form of crustacean. Judging by the number of tadpoles in the river, there will soon be an explosion of frogs.

The fifth photo shows Max in pursuit of those ends. We'd covered his legs up out of fear that he's encounter a brown snake like he did at the same spot last year, but all was well. And, for my British readers, he was wearing his Animal T-shirt acquired in Padstow last year. We're going to return to this spot within a few days as Max wants to catch some yabbies - not I hasten to eat, but to examine and return to the river. He's aware that this is a national park!

AS