Silverbeet

So, I have been wondering this for a while now. (And if you were here, you might be too.)  Silverbeet... what?  It looks like enormous swiss chard.  Is it just enormous swiss chard?  Is this another one of those silly British words for food, like swedes?  Why is it always so big?

We first encountered silverbeet in the beginning of winter, probably mid-June or so, bound in large bunches in a huge crate at the supermarket.  The stalks were all at least two to two and a half feet long.  Needless to say, they did not fit in our shopping bag.

Not to scale.

That first day, and every other day we've purchased (or glimpsed a sight of) silverbeet I've wondered.  Finally, today's the day to get to the bottom of this.  I bought silverbeet at the farmers market this morning, cooked it for dinner and finally got around to asking Google the question: what's the deal with silverbeet?  (Turns out this is not the question you should ask, actually.)

Like (almost) all things, wikipedia has the answers to my questions (or most of them).  First of all, is silverbeet really just the same thing as swiss chard?  (Yes.)  Why do they call it silverbeet here instead of chard?  (Not totally sure, actually...)  Is it just Australia that calls it silverbeet or is this a British thing?  (... British?  I think?  Based off the fact that it's apparently called silverbeet in New Zealand as well.)

Anyway, I feel pretty satisfied with those answers.  They were, after all, the answers I was expecting.  Just wanted to let you know that's the way they do it down here.

Also, silverbeet may be the same thing as swiss chard, but it is most definitely not the same as Silverbeat.  (I regret to inform you that this band name is already taken. Naturally, it's a jazz quintet.)

Sunny weekend

It did not rain as forecasted this weekend (at least not yet, supposedly a 20% chance this afternoon), and turned out to be really beautiful.  Had an unexpected bonus last night of fireworks (perhaps related to the horse races?  We may never know.)  Went out for an early lunch this morning; will head over to Uralla shortly for Reid to do some prep at the brewery and then a Himalayan music concert at the local historical society.

Probably the funniest import we've found from the US yet.
Rocky Mountain Mega Marshmallows, only $9.99!

We've got a little animal menagerie growing in our living room.  Thanks everyone for your contributions!

Springtime in the New England Tablelands

Looking across the valley toward South Hill

After ten months of winter, spring has finally arrived!  (It's nearly official, though many Australians consider September 1st to be the first day of spring.)  The wattles and cherry trees are still blooming--Armidale has so many cherry trees, and of course wattles are everywhere so it's a lovely town for spring blossoms.  Every once in a while you see a magnolia tree in someone's front yard in full bloom, and there are daffodils and narcissus, the flowering bushes that look like red plum blossoms (whatever it is, the wattlebirds love them.)  The one in our yard is still going strong because it doesn't get much sun, and there are little white violets growing beneath it with a couple dandelions.  We've really enjoyed watching the wattlebird hop around the branches as it feeds on the nectar and chasing away the parrots when they get too close.

The red wattlebird (Anthochaera carunculata), a type of honeyeater

Ragamuffin II

Brisbane, Airlie Beach, Whitsunday Islands and back again (Part VI) (Finale)

Our sailing trip aboard the Ragamuffin II with Captain Dave and First Mate Oystein was really spectacular.  We departed in the morning, sailing out of the harbor and out into the ocean, passing between Whitsunday Island and Hook Island on our destination for the day.  There were ten other passengers aboard.  Three others residing in Australia (a German chef who lives in Sydney and an older Australian couple from the Brisbane area) and five visiting on holiday (two young German girls, a Swiss couple and a young French woman).  And us.  (English was not the primary language spoken on board for this trip.  The Swiss couple was lucky because they could speak to everyone in anyone's language.  (Except Oystein, who's Norwegian.))

Leaving Airlie

On our way out of Pioneer Bay

On the passage between Hook Island and Whitsunday Island

(Reid had to shave his mustache for this trip so he could snorkel.)

The channel between Whitsunday Island (to the south) and
Hook Island (to the north)

Ran into the tallship Solway Lass (and many others) on our sails

Our first stop was Tongue Bay on the far side of Whitsunday Island.  We were carried to land on the dinghy and then took a short hike over the hill to the lookout over Whitehaven Beach and Hill Inlet, and then down to the beach.

Looking into Tongue Bay from Tongue Point

Looking out of Tongue Bay from Tongue Point

Hill Inlet from the Tongue Point lookout

Whitehaven Beach

Whitehaven Beach is said to be the most beautiful beach in Australia (some say, of course, in the world.)  The sand is so pure and so fine, it doesn't get hot in the sun (so you can't burn your feet on it, it barely changes temperature at all).  It's also the sand NASA took to make the lens for the Hubble Telescope.  (Though it's protected now and you can't take any of the sand home with you anymore.)

There were stingrays in the shallows

Waiting to get picked up

Rags, as she is affectionately called by the locals.

We walked along the beach, waded and then swam a bit before heading back over the hill where we were picked up, back to the boat for dinner, card tricks and a stargazing guide from Captain Dave.  The boat moored in Tongue Bay overnight where we saw sea turtles poking their heads up for air until it got too dark to see.  The stars were absolutely fantastic, absolutely amazingly beautiful.

Watching for turtles

Sea turtle!  (do you see it?)

Morning for the dinghy

We both had a chance at raising the sail

The Whitsunday Islands are a bit interesting. There's no sources of potable
water on any of the islands (the one resort has its own desalinization plant) and
they're continental islands rather than coral so they look just like the hills
around Airlie.

Reid and Oystein readying the sails

It was a slow, leisurely sail (I drove this segment to Lunchen Bay).

(For some reason I took a lot of pictures of towing the dinghy..)

The next day we sailed up to Lunchen Bay and then to Blue Pearl Bay for snorkeling (lunch in between, and we watched huge batfish behind the boat when we were moored for lunch, so big we though they were sea turtles when we first saw them).  Snorkeling was good--cold, actually (we were grateful for the stinger suits, but they weren't very thick.)  But good.  Lunchen Bay was supposedly better for the coral, where Blue Pearl Bay had a better variety of fish.  Maori wrasse, clownfish and parrotfish to name a few, among so many others we can't identify or don't remember.  The fish were really friendly at Blue Pearl Bay--curious, too.  There was another group there snorkeling, but it didn't feel crowded.  It was a good amount of people for the area.  We saw a lot of boats out for the duration of our trip, and other tour groups.  I can only imagine what it's like in peak season at the beginning or end of summer.

We sailed around Hayman Island to Stone Haven to moor for the night and watched the sun go down over one of the islands.  A big Navy ship pulled in to moor as well.  It seemed to be a popular area to set up for the night.  Looking one way, we could see the lights from the Whitsunday Resort, looking the other, you could just make out the lights from Airlie Beach.

Stone Haven

Evening for the dinghy

Our second day with absolutely no clouds in the sky

Morning brought clouds, and later, rain.

Showers clearing

After it rained it cleared up pretty nicely again and was sunny.

Our third day turned out to be the most exciting yet.  It was a cloudy morning and rained a bit on our way to Langford Island, but cleared up when we arrived.  This was supposedly the spot for sea turtles.  Where we stopped was really just like a big sandbar jutting out of the island.  A couple members of our party went snorkeling right away, but since we were scheduled to be there for a while, we brought our stinger suits, snorkel gear and a book to the beach, walked around and then sat for a while to see what we could see.  (It was cold and we didn't want to get in without a good reason.)

Then!  Long after the others departed and took the dinghy back to the boat, a turtle poked his head up.  When we saw that we threw down our books and started pulling on the stinger suits.  We watched as a couple turtles poked their heads up and we hurried to get ready.  As we were going down to the water, we saw some vigorous splashing from by where we'd seen one of the turtles, and what looked like a fin.  So... was it a shark attacking a turtle?  We'll probably never know.  But that's what it looked like.  (We hesitated then, but I think we went for the denial (there's no way) at that point and then swam in.)

We snorkeled out and found two turtles, and followed it for a little ways.  We were so excited that we didn't even notice the cold!  By this time the dinghy was back with a couple members of our crew to look at the turtles as well.  After watching the turtle for a while, though, we started getting cold again, so we let it disappear from our sight, swam back to shore and caught a ride on the dinghy back to Rags.  We departed Langford Island for Caves Cove for lunch, and then sailed back toward Airlie Beach.

Windy windy.

Raising the sail

The final sail was really amazing, but a little scary.  The ship was going so fast it was almost horizontal across the waves.  We got doused more than a few times with the waves (probably a little more fun in the summer, but at least I could protect the camera in my jacket.)  The last half-hour or so was a little slower as we neared Airlie, and then we saw the whales.

First sighting

There were two small(ish) whales.  Oystein quickly pulled down the sails and we drifted for a while to watch them surface together, and of course we all pulled out our cameras.  Dave signaled to a passing ship that we'd seen them, and we drifted a bit to see where they'd go.  You're not allowed to go any closer than 300m (I think? can't remember exactly.), but they can come closer to you if you're drifting.  They circled around past us, went further out, we followed a little, and then drifted some more.

All in all, it was a fantastic trip.  Next time I just won't leave my beanie in Brisbane!  We didn't take into account the fact that it would be so much colder on the ocean than over land, nor did we imagine our bums would be so sore from sitting on the deck, or that we would have to worry about our lunches blowing away, but when we remember this trip we won't think about those things at all.  I'll think of swimming with the sea turtle and seeing the whales (and holding on for dear life as the ship rocketed across the waves.)

Map of our travels!

Thank you Dave and Oystein!

Just a couple notes:

We figured were on the ocean for about 60 hours, and it took just about that much time afterwards for us to stop feeling the boat when we stopped and closed our eyes.  (Especially laying down, it put you right back in the waves.)  It was a really weird feeling.

Also, here's a little funny anecdote from our trip as a whole.  I was carded for buying a package of plastic knives in the self-checkout aisle at the supermarket in Coffs Harbour (on our very first day)... but no one looked at my passport at the Proserpine airport as we made to fly to Brizzy (on the last day).  Just thought that was interesting... that's all.