Saturday 9/22, Iluka

Goanna on the beach

     After a relaxing breakfast on the terrace birdwatching we drove a short way to a beach for a walk. While Kim read and napped, Diana and I walked along a curving stretch of sand that connected two low rocky headlands. Even though the tide was still out I had to roll up my pant legs (since I left my shorts in the LC back at Kim's) because the low dune bordering the beach had eroded and bleached gum trees were scattered like pick up sticks at the top of the beach.

Neat little sand thingies

Must be some kind of sand worms, are we on Dune?

     We saw an osprey pair perched on the top of one of the dead eucalypts, and a number of Rainbow Bea-eaters zooming in and out from the forest, but our best discovery was seeing a monitor lizard eating the rotten carcass of a wallaby or kangaroo on the sand. They are called goannas here in Australia, a corruption of the word iguana, to which they are not related, other than being lizards. In the animated film “Rescuers Down Under” the evil trapper's pet is a goanna called Joanna. She's a Burt family favorite, so much so that the kids named an old mink pelt of my grandmother's Joanna when they were young.

Get your own wallaby!

     After spending a couple hours at the beach we went back to the condo and relaxed with a couple beers. Kim's friend Sue took the ferry across the Mighty Clarence from Yampa and we went out to lunch at a restaurant overlooking the harbor. I had deep-fried whiting and chips. You know, for the most part, I don't like deep-fried food. A nice golden beer batter coating that crackles when you bite into it, that's hard to beat. But most restaurant fare is fried in over-used oil, heavily salted, and with breading that looks like sandy tan skin ... I know, what's not to like?

    

   Gambling is legal in pubs and bars in Australia. The few bars we've entered have digital slot and keno machines, but there can also be a dozen different screens on the walls displaying various sporting activities on which one can place bets electronically. Australian football, car and motorcycle races, horse and dog races. Most startling however are the computer generated horse and dog races, complete with breathless announcers describing the action. Can you believe anyone would bet on a CGI horse?  Kim being the good country girl, it took some convincing on our part that the dogs weren't real.

Kevin sitting with two lovely Sheilas, Kim and Sue

     Later that evening Diana and I took the kayaks out at sunset and explored the nearby mangroves. We saw herons, ibises, pelicans and cormorants, as well as a stunning white-bodied black-headed Royal Spoonbill.

      For dinner I made pan seared yellow fin tuna steaks with steamed carrots and broccoli and brown rice. And for dessert we had 'ice blocks', which are ice cream bars here in Oz, not to be confused with 'block ice', which is what is put in a 'cool box' or 'Eski', not to be confused with an 'ice box', which is a 12 volt or LPG powered appliance many Aussies take camping. For the record, the ice block I had was vanilla ice cream covered with almonds and chocolate, and was delicious.