Month: August 2017

Paluma – rainforest and birds

A Danish visitor, in Townsville for the recent Australian Festival of Chamber Music, provided us with the necessary extra incentive to visit Paluma, in the ranges an hour or so North of Townsville, for a walk in the rainforest and some birdwatching. The three of us had a lovely day, so thanks, Poul!

We paused briefly at Crystal Creek (where Poul was quite excited to see his first-ever Scrub Turkey) on the way up the range but didn’t really stop until we reached McClelland’s Lookout Continue reading “Paluma – rainforest and birds”

Strand Ephemera 2017

Townsville’s winter is a busy time for all sorts of open air events because the weather is so reliably beautiful. The fact that tourist numbers are up, as Southerners escape their own not-so-nice winter weather, doesn’t hurt either. Strand Ephemera, occurring in odd-numbered years since 2001, is one of the highlights. (I posted articles on the 2011 and 2013 events but missed out on 2015.)

This year’s event closed last Sunday. The ‘People’s Choice’ winner was also my own favourite because it ticked so many boxes – appropriate to the site and to the notion of ‘ephemera’, saying something important (i.e., ‘don’t trash our oceans’) without letting the message overwhelm the art, collaborative and local. Here it is:

Strand Ephemera 2017
Marion Gaemers and Lynnette Griffiths: Ancyent Marinere … are those her sails?

The sails were even more dramatic at night Continue reading “Strand Ephemera 2017”