THE DUNG BEETLES WERE LATE!!!!!

Although it was really good to get away from home for a while, WOO HOO it’s great to be back!!!!!

I realised at the end of the first day in Busselton that I didn’t much like being cut off from the internet. Kept thinking that so much was going on and I was missing out!! Took a few days to come to terms with it all :-D
(*note to self *– never stay in accommodation where there is no internet connection...or a town where you can’t find the internet café :(

We stayed in a lovely bed and breakfast (dog friendly) place on a farm about 10 minutes out of Busselton (South of Perth on the coast). It was a self contained cottage fairly close to the main farm house, but facing the other way, so it was private enough to mostly feel that you were on your own. The lady of the house would bring us a cooked breakfast each morning, and we would then proceed to sit like stunned mullets for quite a few hours, slumped in lounging chairs reading on the veranda every day.

There were REAL chickens running free around the farm which Jake had never before encountered, so I think it was lucky we had our own fenced off yard, otherwise Jake may have ripped their bloody heads off :-o Especially the rooster ha...

There was also a huge protected section of wonderful Australian bushland right next door and we eventually (after a couple of days of just doing nothing) walked the four kilometres of marked trails.

We are such city slickers, literally living right inside the concrete jungle, that to step into that bushland was like being teleported to another planet. Absolutely no human/mechanical noises but many birds and lots of wind through the trees, it was very soothing. However, it was pretty hot and the bush flies were really horrendous! The bastards were literally right in your face, up your nose, in your ears and constantly settling around your eyes. A small branch of soft fresh eucalyptus leaves had to be constantly swished around your face, more like a whip in the end because you got so frustrated with the bloody things you wanted to smash them to bits! Along with the flies were the bull ants (nasty biters) and the beautifully coloured christmyth spiders which draped their webs across the trails forcing the use of a long stick waving up and down in front of you as you marched along so you didn’t end up with them draped in your face....Imagine this, walking along in the bush, swishing your gum leaves for the flies and waving the stick for the spiders and hopping over groups of bull ants....totally hilarious if you throw in having to carry Jake for parts of the way because when he’d had enough of the above he just wouldn’t walk and wanted to get into my swish zone!!!!

We were told the flies were so bad because the dung beetles were late again. Not being sure what this meant I asked around and got varying answers from ‘they’re late arriving’ to ‘they are late hatching’ I’m still none the wiser and will have to do a little searching to find out the whole story. In the early mornings up until about 8am there were no flies, lovely time of the day, then they arrived in hoards and the whole day if outside is spent swishing your branch, to the point where your arms started to feel the stress. Then about 7pm they were gone again!


In the bush with video camera in hand, Protium captured many priceless moments which I’m sure he’ll be sharing with us all really soon. We encountered a few kangaroos which was very exciting in a totally bushy kind of way, and also met a true unsung heroine of the bush, Jenny the Ranger...a volunteer ranger, aged in her seventies and very proud of her big bit of bush where she puts in quite a bit of time and effort. Along with a committee of locals and a troop of volunteer rangers they oversee the whole area and arrange groups of students to come down and help plant more native plants back into the area, keep the trails clear and check everything regularly. Amazing people!!!

Ah well, that’s the away part of our holiday, now we have two more glorious weeks at home before the mayhem starts again for the year.

Its going to take me a while to catch up with everyone’s blogs, but oh what a pleasure it will be....hope you all had a great new years eve and that 2008 brings all manner of wonderful times for you all!!!