Queensland Capers: June 2014

We have recently had another nasty episode with our Laptop. Thankfully the lesson learned last time was a good one and when a RAM stick failed we only lost two days of junk mail. A quick trip to the Apple shop, a diagnosis and some handy advice, provided gratis, meant I was able to replace the $50 Ram stick myself and get the damn thing up and operating again with a minimum of fuss.

This second PC crash prompted me to do a full reconciliation of all our most treasured PC based assests - our digital photos! The digital reliance began with our first digital camera that I purchased to capture Emily's birth. It seems that when the hard drive failed we had about 37 images disappear from our library, albeit with thumbnails of the images intact!? Could have been much worse!

It was a wonderful few hours going through 8500 images spanning 11 years, you quickly forget how much the two girls have grown and changed.

Anyway, I stumbled across quite a number of photos taken recently that had not been saved into our library. They included a trip in the last term break where the girls visited GOMA to see Cai Guo-Qiang's exhibition called Falling Back to Earth.

Falling Back to Earth

A few short weeks ago we spent a big day traveling the Brisbane River on the Ferries.

Brisbane River

South Bank Ferry Terminal

We boarded at St Lucia and traveled downstream to Newfarm Park which I have to say has the best adventure playground I have ever seen the girls play on. The highlight for me was the enormous Fig trees incorporated into the playground for the kids to climb.

Climbing a Fig at Newfarm

At the top of the Spiders Web

We left Newfarm and cruised down to Portside wharf, where we visited the Eat Street Markets for a feed.

Pancakes, berries and cream

Potato Slinkys

On our return journey I quickly called into the Brisbane Apple store to pick up the Laptop after having the aforementioned dodgy RAM stick diagnosed.

The day after our Ferry rides Karren and I spent some more time in the garden, just a couple of hours to plant a few more additions to the front garden. Now you may recall that we have a hidden fence to keep our beloved Charlie from wandering the streets. Not surprisingly when planting two new variegated shrubs in the garden I cut the wire that keeps him contained, not once but twice. That seems to be my luck of late, in addition to cutting the hidden fence, I have also chopped up the garden irrigation pipework no less than a half a dozen times and just yesterday I holed the water mains twice as well. It seems that wherever I dig a hole I find another service to cut or put a hole in.

Repaired Water Main

There was a huge amount of dead wood, branches, leaves and palm fronds that had accumulated around the garden and it was time to get rid of it. A bonfire seemed like the best way to dispose of it all. A couple of afternoons work to gather, break, cut and stack in to a large pile ready for combustion. I set it alight at about 5.30pm, a very short time later we had a visit from a neighbour who was concerned that our house was on fire, such was the sheer size of the initial blaze. At its peak there was a 10 metre high flame illuminating the whole gully behind our house. I had sufficiently planned and set up the bonfire so that there was never any danger of it running away or causing any spot fires. Needless to say though that Karren was not impressed by its size. By midnight the fire was all but done so we doused it with water before retiring for the night.

After the fire had settled

Nearly done.

Kondalilla Falls seemed like a good place to visit for some sight seeing and bush walking, Kondalilla is about two hours north of our place, so prior to heading off I gave the Hilux a quick once over, you know the usual water, oil, tyre pressures and a quick once over. To my horror I discovered a little issue that had occurred sometime since the brakes were replaced, most likely while we explored Mt Mee. It looks as though a rock or similar had become stuck between the upper control arm and the front tyre of the LHS front wheel. The said stuck stone then set about gouging out a 50mm wide section of rubber from the front tyre. It actually looks far worse than it actually is and I reckon the tyre will be replaced shortly as all four tyres are nearly shot with only a couple of millimetres of usable tread left.

Could have been much worse!

The trip to Kondalilla was great, it was a great day for a walk and the falls themselves are very picturesque. I would recommend a visit if you get the chance.