Having Fun in a Changing World
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The boyf and I went to NZ for a bit of R & R, doing the camping, tramping (hiking) and fishing thing. Being based for a week in the sleepy hamlet of Okarito, surrounded by great walking tracks made it easy to write cartoon ideas. I also took my little sketchbook, as I am trying to draw something every day this year and it is a good way to keep the drawing hand in (hover over images for captions).
The boyf and I went to Tasmania and loved it. It’s not all beautiful – there is a lot of heavy industry, mining and forestry, but the other scenery is fantastic, the wildlfe is incredbible and the people were, for the most part, friendly (the exception being the woman in the “British” pub in Deloraine who must have sniffed me out as one of the “greenies” she loathes). Mouse over for captions…
Say it isn't so!
This is my fourth year of volunteering with Earthcare to look after the penguins on the breakwater. Last night, I took up the invitation to go out with the research team which goes out every second Sunday to measure the penguins. This involves rock-hopping and trying to grab the penguins as they run for cover. Not easy and I didn’t catch any (frankly, I was happy just to watch and help pass on the caught birds), but the team caught a lot and microchipped all the birds which didn’t have a chip and were big enough (over 650g – fully grown birds are about a kilo) to be injected with one. Just like dogs, the chip is injected into the scruff of the neck.
clambering over the rocks, looking for little penguins
Injecting a microchip into a little penguin
A chipped penguin - look at that sharp beak...
This is what happens to inexperienced handlers (me) who don't know to always point the penguin away...
It's late in the season, but some of the penguins are still breeding and as is usual, this clutch contains two eggs.
When we had finished, at about 11.30pm, I took the opportunity to walk to the end of the breakwater on a beautiful evening in Melbourne
Living and working in a one bedroom flat, with a small courtyard, I dream of studios/workshops etc. On the way to Wilson’s Promontory National Park in Victoria, we discovered this talented artist in Fish Creek. Andrew McPherson works with old materials, including a lot of old metal. I’m kicking myself for not having bought one of his pieces due to a lack of cash at the time.
Wilson’s Prom is beautiful. The only drawback to this is that everyone knows it’s beautiful and it fills up with bogans at the weekend (why, when you have the sound of the bush and the sea would you play techno music???). Sunday night was waaaay quieter and more pleasant than Saturday.
One of the great things about WP is the amount of wildlife. You can get up close to wombats and wallabies and as I was in the surf a huge school of fish lept out in front of me.
Back from a rainy weekend at the beach on the Mornington Penninsula. Still managed to swim a lot and have a little surf, so I’m ready to hit the drawing board again.
The boyf and I are back from two weeks in Vanuatu. We spent most of it on the island of Tanna and really enjoyed the pace of life there.
our hosts, Tom and Margaret, at Rocky Ridge Bungalows
Most buildings in Tanna are made from local materials
Our delicious bread came from this oven every day
Bananas and paw paw were the main part of our breakfast (I LOVED breakfast)
Coffee is grown on Tanna (roasted in Port Vila) and was really good
Joseph the gardener, who works with Tom and family on their smallholding
water taro
manioc (we loved this sliced and fried like potato chips)
island cabbage
yam mounds
transport is mostly by 4WD as the roads are super-rutted and washed out by the wet season rains
Most people go to Tanna for the volcano, so we had to have a look
It was spectacular
Food that wasn't from Tom's garden came from the local market in Lenakel
I loved the use of natural packaging - the way these mandarins were plaited onto a branch.
outrigger canoes are used for fishing off the reef
real recycling
My kind of holiday
We went to the Dandenong Ranges on Sunday for the Open Studios Weekend. I love having a nosy at other people’s studios and I love the autumn foliage and the huge mountain ash trees that pepper the landscape.
Ches Mills's studio - click to see more
Facebook is a great way of keeping in contact with friends and catching up on what they are doing, wherever they are. It’s ideal for posting photos when you’re traveling, or seeing how your niece is growing up on the other side of the world, or just finding out about what project a cartoonist friend has been working on.
But it is not a great way to present yourself professionally to the world. I wouldn’t put up any photos of myself that I wasn’t happy for every stranger to see, but my friends would and have done (and I’ve had to try to untag myself before too many people could see just how appallingly I dressed in the 80s).
When fellow cartoonists wanted to be “friends”, even though I had never so much as emailed them, I thought it was cool, until half my Wall turned into postings by people I’d never talked to, many of which were in languages I didn’t speak. And once I’d agreed to one random cartoonist or fan, I had to agree to them all.
So this weekend I went on a brutal Facebook cull. Now I like Facebook again – it’s full of the news of friends and family I know in the real world (and it is pretty much the way the application was designed to be)
Arctic Circle still has a Facebook fan page as well as this blog. There is enough information on that and my twitter feed about what is going on in my cartooning life, but I want to keep my personal life private….ish (it is the internet, after all and I still don’t intend to post photographic evidence of what happens when I go out drinking with my sister)
One last thing. It is great to read Facebook wall posts, click links and see friend’s photos, but that’s it. I’m still never playing Farmville.
My new Facebook profile picture, courtesy of Neil Smith at Chocolate Dog
A few people questioned the set up of this immaculate workspace… It was a set up: in Neil’s garage. My actual workspace looks like this:
click for a larger picture, if you dare...
Tags: facebook, facebook cull, facebook diet, facebook purge
About to head back to Melbourne after three weeks in New Zealand. We have had some great weather and great experiences. Stayed a night at the isolated Vulcan Hotel in the old gold mining town of St Bathans. Got to see an iconic Craig Potton postcard reenacted when we watched the sheep being mustered past the pub in the morning.
Driving to St Bathans in the fading light, Central Otago
Early morning sheep mustering
The sheep are guided up past the vulcan hotel
A huntaway keeps the sheep going in the right direction
The sheep stream past
The sheep carry on up the hill through the small settlement of St Bathans
The huntaway is a kiwi dog, specifically bred to herd sheep. Lovely animals.
Tags: huntaway sheepdog, mustering, new zealand sheep, sheep herding, vulcan hotel
I’ve tried twice before to kayak the Okarito Lagoon, but the weather conspired against me both times. This trip it worked out fantastically and I loved it so much I want to go back next year (and camp overnight, with any luck).
