Campfire Yarns
Flying Foxes, Australia, Megabats. 07/21/2010
   There are some great painting and photography opportunities while we tour, I turn paintings into postcards. Check out the postcard printing opportunities if you are in the retail business. People call them bats, megabats, fruit bats and flying foxes but they are not related to foxes, rarely eat fruit, and are totally different to other members of the bat family. They are similar to monkeys and humans than they are to the insect eating bats that live in caves or will enter homes here in the Atherton tablelands of Queensland, or blood sucking bats from central America. They do not use sound, or, echolocation to “see” but have excellent eyesight like ours in daylight and they see better, than we do at night. They roost in trees. There are Black Flying foxes and these are increasing, in numbers and there are little red flying foxes and a Spectacled Flying fox, mostly seen in the North Queensland ranges. Because the flying fox population can carry a disease, never handle a Flying Fox. Any native animal can carry disease or cause injury if not treated properly. Flying-foxes are known to carry Australian Bat Lyssavirus, but the best available evidence suggests that this virus can only be transmitted to humans in saliva from an infected Flying-fox via a penetrating bite or scratch. If people do not handle bats, there is little to no risk of infection. Simply touching or coming into contact, with Flying-fox urine or faeces will not transmit Lyssavirus to humans. Flying-foxes may also carry antibodies to feared, Hendra virus. There is no evidence that Hendra virus can spread directly from bats to humans. Sick horses appear to have been the source of infection to humans. Spillover infection to horses and then humans is a very rare event. Fishing For Children. 07/21/2010
      Our friend Nikki and family toured the Queensland coast during the recent school holidays and stayed here at Flying Fish Point for two nights and went fishing with Reg. Her three boys were charming and great anglers. J. It was great for Reg to have new fishing mates interested in talking about boys and fishing, lol, his adult fishing mates just want to talk about cheap car insurance. I found this article on the web, about Children Fishing and I can certainly recommend Flying Fish Point as a fantastic place to try your luck, both Reg and I caught fish here at our very first attempt. Bananas. 07/16/2010
 Did you know you can treat depression, sleeplessness, high blood pressure, and cholesterol, PMS, and lots of other medical conditions, by eating bananas? 22 Fantastic things to know or love about Bananas A cluster of bananas is called a hand and consists of 10 to 20 bananas, which are known as fingers. As bananas ripen, the starch in the fruit turns to sugar. Therefore, the riper the banana the sweeter it will taste. Banana plants are the largest plants on earth without a woody stem. They are actually giant herbs of the same family as lilies, orchids and palms. Bananas are a good source of vitamin C, potassium and dietary fiber. Bananas, instead of, sleeping pills? Like turkey, bananas contain tryptophan, a protein that converts to the neurotransmitter serotonin. Serotonin is instrumental in facilitating relaxation. Low levels of serotonin are believed to cause mood disorders including depression. Bananas are high in the B-complex vitamins, which are known to have a calming effect on the nervous system. Bananas are great for athletic and fitness activity because they replenish necessary carbohydrates, glycogen and body fluids burned during exercise. Bananas are one of the few fruits that ripen best off the plant. If left on the plant, the fruit splits open and the pulp has a "cottony" texture and flavor. Even in tropical growing areas, bananas for domestic consumption are cut green and stored in moist shady places to ripen slowly. Bananas are perennial crops that are grown and harvested year-round. The banana plant does not grow from a seed but rather from a rhizome or bulb. Each fleshy bulb will sprout new shoots year after year. Bananas have no fat, cholesterol or sodium. Each banana plant bears only one stem of fruit. To produce a new stem, only two shoots - known as the daughter and the granddaughter - are allowed to grow and be cultivated from the main plant. In some lands bananas were considered the principal food. Early travelers and settlers would carry the roots of the plant as they migrated to the Middle East and Africa. From there Portuguese traders carried banana roots to the Canary Islands, where bananas are still grown commercially. In South East Asia, the banana leaf is used to wrap food (in the place of plastic bags and cling wraps), providing a unique flavor and aroma to nasi lemak and the Indian banana leaf rice. India is by far the largest world producer of bananas, growing 16.5 million tonnes in 2002, followed by Brazil which produced 6.5 million tonnes of bananas in 2002. To the Indians, the flower from the banana tree is sacred. During religious and important ceremonies such as weddings, banana flowers are tied around the head, for they believe this will bring good luck. Some horticulturists suspect that the banana was the earth's first fruit. Banana plants have been in cultivation since the time of recorded history. One of the first records of bananas dates back to Alexander the Great's conquest of India where he first discovered bananas in 327 B.C. The banana plant reaches its full height of 15 to 30 feet in about one year. The trunk of a banana plant is made of sheaths of overlapping leaves, tightly wrapped around each other like celery stalks. The origin of bananas is traced back to the Malaysian jungles of Southeast Asia, where so many varieties and names for the banana are in that area. The phrase 'going bananas' was first recorded in the Oxford English Dictionary, and is linked to the fruit's 'comic' connections with monkeys. The word 'banan' is Arabic for finger. There is no such thing as a banana tree. Bananas grow on plants. Today's commercial bananas are scientifically classified into the genus Musa of the Musaceae family. Because my friend Gem, grew this hand of Bananas in this photo and cut me this bunch, giving it to me as a gift J. Thank you Gem.  An Aboriginal Dreamtime Story of forbidden love tells of a beautiful girl named Oolana, from the Yidinji people, who married Waroonoo, a respected elder from her tribe. "Shortly after their union another tribe moved into the area and a handsome young man came into her life. His name was Dyga and the pair soon fell in love," the legend says. "Realising the adulterous crime they were committing, the young lovers escaped their tribes and fled into the valleys. "The elders captured them, but Oolana broke free from her captors and threw herself into the still waters of what is now known as Babinda Boulders, calling for Dyga to follow her. " As Dyga hit the waters, her anguished cries for her lost lover turned the still waters into a rushing torrent, the water sparkling like, loose diamonds and the land shook with sorrow . Huge boulders were scattered around the creek and the crying Oolana disappeared among them. "Aboriginal legend says her spirit still guards the boulders and that her calls for her lost lover can still be heard." 15 men to have lost their lives in the past 50 years are said to have been victims of careless behaviour in the rocks and deceptively-strong currents. Tourists are warned to obey signage and remain in designated swimming pools. The Great Green Way, Far North Queensland. 06/23/2010
 Wallaman Falls, North Queensland. The Great Green Way is the coastal strip, the tropical islands off shore, the Great Barrier Reef, and the wet tropical rain forests, between Townsville and Cairns in North Queensland. This is the area for eco tourism and green study with over 25 tropical islands, 12 mainland National Parks, and it is the closest mainland access in Queensland to the outer Barrier Reef. Tonight we can hear the surf in the distance, it sounds almost like thunder and the waves are crashing 4 foot above the sea wall, a spectacular sight. Next week it will be a peaceful serene beach for the angler, once more. Drives along the coast are spectacular with mountains on one-side and ocean views across the Coral Sea on the other side. We plan to spend several months exploring the area of far north Queensland.  Tropical Weather. 06/23/2010
 Everything grows better and bigger in Queensland including the tropical rain when it comes, even in the winter, it packs a punch when it sets in. Reg has stayed home for a couple of days and not gone fishing though I still went out in the car and for my walks and even a run and swim yesterday despite the rain, but today even women's rain boots could not get me exercising in the rain for long. I did try, I headed out to the esplanade, walked beside the sea wall and took some photos just before the rain began. Then the rain came down, stinging, hard. At first, I thought it had to be fine hailstones then I realized it was too warm to be hail, it was simply the speed, it was coming down, totally unlike rain, in Victoria, where you might get wet, but it does not actually hit, so hard as to hurt. The rain began a couple of days ago and it looks like raining through until the end of the week. We cannot complain, I am sure our family back home in Victoria experiencing the cold of midwinter would envy us our little taste, of Queensland's, tropical, downpour. This would be mild compared to the rain in the wet season. That is something I have never experienced.     Leaving the Kuranda Market in Northern Queensland I discovered ‘Geronimo’, in the vegetation on a side pat and this ‘made’, my visit to this town as was not I overly impresses by the well know tourist market considering it commercial and mostly Asian novelties, not something I would bother to go to see again. This plane was quite the most remarkable sight to have found, laying there, semi overgrown, by the tropical rain forest. For more information about the life of this plane view ->History of DC-3 c/n 6051, by Gil White The Great Green Way is the coastal strip, the tropical islands off shore, the Great Barrier Reef, and the wet tropical rain forests, between Townsville and Cairns in North Queensland. Wallaman Falls emerge from the gaps in the overhead rocks in a single stream like Kohler kitchen faucets has been turned on at full force. Many of the waterfalls in this area are spectacular.    I have lost the use of my caravan freezer. I bought turkey and ice cream to place in the freezer in the supermarket today and Reg went into the bait and tackle store for more accessories I go to pack the freezer with food, and it is full of fish bait. Well with Reg catching beautiful whiting which I saw selling for $29. a kilo, I think his bait takes priority over the ice-cream, so if I pig out on ice-cream tonight lol, at least it’s the low calorie variety. An excess of dairy food will bring out my lactose intolerance and have a faster effect than diet pills, lol, my trying to use up all of the small tub of ice-cream in one evening, could have an interesting effect. I am going to need that new empire line dress I bought today to hide the bloating tomorrow. lol, I will be puffed up like this puffer fish.  Fish are Biting at Flying Fish Point. 06/01/2010
 Reg is fast asleep, on our comfortable, bed mattress after having caught 12 fish today. He started the day at dawn catching a Mackerel on a light line, which threatened to break the rod, and he had to grab a cloth to protect his hands and try to bring the line in manually, taking the pressure off the rod, he still could not get the line in and the mackerel broke the line. Then he succeeded in catching a variety of undersized fish, flounder and whiting, and a large puffer fish and he put all these back Finally, later at night when all the other anglers had given up, including me as I went home to roast a chicken, he caught two good size and one large whiting. My Hero! J This man woke up in pain with arthritis and had some pain through the day but he was out there enjoying life to the full, wearing his pedometer, checking that he got in a lot of walking and add to that, the active stretching and movements of casting a line, I think he is doing brilliantly J. Images below are of Reg telling me about the 'one that got away'.     My friend in the mountain wilderness, to the north west of this quiet fishing spot, Flying fish Point, where I have been exercising in the pool every day, left a status update this morning that said. :- “Having a wonderful day, weeding the old clucker tucka bed...new Arrowroot bed and building a compost pile during my weeding, also collecting old chook poop from the old chook farm next door.Gunna have a rip snorta of a compost in a few weeks. ALSO Serving customers off the road with my pumpkin, eggs and broms....wonderful day :)” Now that sound like the sort of Lipofuze, lose 7 lb fast, sort of action I would love. LOL, let me out of this clean swimming pool and into some good tropical dirt and even chook poop, compost bin and I will be as happy as a pig in lol J. I am a gardener at heart and no amount of downsizing and coastal holiday making, will take away my love of the land, hard work doing things I love and the dream of self-sufficiency.    | Categories
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