Whenever you are creating beauty around you, you are restoring your own soul. ~~ Alice Walker.
When I read this quote from Alice Walker it resonated with me. I love having beautiful things around me, and when I see Mount Warning rising above a valley filled with fluffy white mist before sunrise, it makes my heart sing. Even though I didn’t “create” this beauty, I can take photos to virtually make the beauty last longer than nature intends it to.
When the sun shone on the mountain it glowed and glistened in the sunlight. The photo doesn’t do it justice. I’ve seen this glowing effect before when there’s mist in the valley, so I suspect it has something to do with the sun’s rays reflecting – or deflecting? – on both the mountain and the mist. Or maybe the clouds play a part in creating the glow. I’m not sure.
While the mountain and mist created their magic this morning, a pair of Figbirds feasted on the red palm berries. The early morning light of the day made it possible for me to take a cute silhouette photo of a Figbird with one of the berries.
This last photo of four kookaburras is from yesterday morning. I know there are about one dozen Kookaburras in my area, but only four are visiting regularly just now. I’m hoping that means the mama birds are busily tending their nests. If that’s the case, I may have some fluffy young Kookaburras visiting my garden by summer. I hope so.
So that was my “soul restoring” activity for this morning, taking photos of the beautiful view from my garden to share with my bloggy friends. No wonder I enjoy blogging so much and miss it when I’m away from it for too long. 🙂
Just the tiniest, flimsiest wafts of mist danced around the valley this morning.
Before sunrise Mount Warning looked a tad grey, even the sky was grey. Then the sun peeked over the hill and lit up the morning sky.
What a difference a few minutes makes early in the morning!
I’m sure kookaburras enjoy the attention, because it seems that every time I venture outside with my camera lately, I find a little poser nearby. This little guy struck a pose on the top of my clothesline.
“Would you like a closeup of my profile? I think this is my best side …”
I can’t resist taking photos of the kookaburras I see perched on a tree down towards the valley. There were two on the branch this morning.
There are so many flowers blooming in my garden right now, even though we are in the middle of winter here in Australia.
The daisies look gorgeous right now, dancing in the sunshine.
There are only a few gazanias, but the yellow always looks so bright and summery, even in the depths of winter.
Did I say depths of winter? Our weather just now is probably similar to what some countries experience during summer! It’s a beautiful time of year.
My pink dianthus bloom nearly all year round.
When I saw this butterfly, which I believe is a male Common Eggfly, flitting around the daisies, I suspected it would fly away before I had a chance to get a decent shot – but it didn’t! I’m pretty excited to get my first decent photo of a butterfly in my garden. There’s another photo of him on yesterday’s Wordless Wednesday post too, with his wings open.
It took a while, checking the valley at various times of the day, seeing only a sheet of white. Finally, just before nightfall, Mount Warning emerged from beneath her white blanket.
The rain bucketed down for most of the day and during the only break I noticed in the rain I went outside with my camera for a few minutes. It was then that I saw quite a few familiar bird faces around, so I assume they were taking advantage of the dry moment too.
There’s a family of Pied Butcher Birds nearby and I’ve often noticed they take refuge on my veranda on rainy days.
I call the Butcher Bird above Hoppy. They arrived at my house one day with a mangled foot and I feared they’d be attacked by the other birds as can happen when a bird is injured. I thought I’d never see them again, yet here they are, still visiting.
The bird above is another Pied Butcher Bird, but this one is less than a year old. He, or she, usually visits with Hoppy and I’ve noticed he-she also often stands on one foot even though both feet are just fine. I don’t know if Hoppy is a male or female, but I suspect this young one is “hers” which is why it mimics her stance.
The larger bird on my clothesline is a young Australian Magpie, and its little friend is another Australian native bird, a Noisy Miner. I’ve noticed that Magpies and Miners seem to hang out together a lot and even share food without squabbling. They must have some sort of a birdie-world agreement going on!
And the of course, there’s always a kookaburra or two in the garden. They usually have comical expressions on their faces, but I really had to laugh today at this pair with their inquisitive stares and wet, bedraggled feathers!
The view to Mount Warning and across the Tweed Valley this morning looked incredible. A thick layer of mist had settled in the valley overnight, hiding from sight every object – both natural and constructed – that is usually visible on the valley floor. I took a series of misty morning photos which I will post here tomorrow.
Yesterday, my husband and I spent the day in our garden, right down the back of our yard among the fruit trees we planted several years ago. We’ve had a pretty hectic past eighteen months for one reason or another and have consequentially neglected our orchard area. And it shows. We have lost a couple of trees and have pruned back others harshly, hoping they will bounce back after some care and attention.
We were not alone in the garden though. As we were digging around our (very healthy!) pecan tree we noticed a kookaburra watching us from its perch in the pear tree.
You might notice the intensity of this gorgeous bird’s gaze! We knew what he was looking for – dinner – and it wasn’t long before he swooped down to catch a tasty morsel he had noticed in the soil.
At other times he seemed quite nonchalant, as if the potential of discovering a meal in our turned garden soil hadn’t crossed his mind!
After collecting dinner he flew back to the tree branch and dined alone, then shortly after he flew away.
Meanwhile, we heard the crackling sound of a sugar cane fire starting in the valley.
The fire was just a short distance away from our yard, but far enough away from the sudden drop at the end of our yard to be able to see the cane fire clearly. As the fire burned, I took a series of photos.
The outer perimeter of the cane field is clearly outlined, and as you can see the fire has been lit around the perimeter. The flames quickly gain momentum, burning the inner section of the field to remove leaf debris before harvesting can take place.
Within an incredibly short time, the fire is over. The job is done.
The time between the last two photos is just two minutes.
Just one minute later, the flames are virtually gone.
From the first dim sound we heard as the cane fire began, to the time the flames were gone, just ten minutes passed.
The sugar cane industry has played an integral role in the Tweed Valley for many generations. Newcomers to the area often cannot understand the attraction locals have to seeing cane fields ablaze every winter, but to the long-standing locals like myself, and to my husband – a fourth-generation Tweed local – the area simply would not be the same without the familiar orange glow in the valley each winter.
Just over twenty-six years ago when we built the home where we live, one of the main attractions was the imposing views we would have across the Tweed Valley and specifically the view of Mount Warning. Over the years I must have taken hundreds, perhaps thousands, of photos of the mountain and I never tire of my view, even after all these years.
Some people said we would forget about our view eventually. According to some, water views are far more impressive than views across inland scenery. Water views are constantly changing and are therefore far more interesting, we were told. Views across the land, they said, never change. We would become bored of our view. How wrong those people were.
Close up taken 1:15 pm today
I’ve always spent a lot of time at home. I love spending my days here, working from home, studying from home, and working in my garden. During the COVID-19 restrictions when we were all urged to stay at home as much as possible, I have been the typical example of one of the memes seen on Facebook. I’m the quintessential person who hasn’t noticed much change in my life as I stay close to home regardless. And while I’ve been at home, I have been noticing and photographing Mount Warning more than ever before.
Every day, the mountain looks different than it did the day before. Every hour of the day, the light cast across the mountain changes its appearance. Cloud formations over the mountain present a different appearance yet again. The sun changes the mountain; the rain changes its appearance even more. As the sun rises each morning, the top of Mount Warning is the first place that the sun hits Australian earth. If I catch the sun rising at just the right time, the top of the mountain glows.
Sugar cane fields in the valley provide a beautiful background for a lone kookaburra. Photo taken today.
The mountain is to the south-west of where I live, and some afternoons the sun sets without incident. Other days, however, the sky about the mountain lights up. I have possibly seen every colour imaginable lighting up the sky above our magnificent mountain over the years. Recently, I have taken photos of the mountain at sunset more than ever before, and seeing a multitude of different images from day to day has got me thinking, maybe I should take a photo of Mount Warning every day for a year. How great would it be to have a journal of photos of the mountain taken every day, throughout the seasons, to show how versatile and magnificent a view across land can be?
Sun setting over the mountain yesterday at 5:15 pm
The obvious place to add a photo of Mount Warning each day is here, on my blog. Today though, I begin a new semester of university study, online of course so I can study at home. I took a break from uni earlier this year to help my husband get his elderly parents settled into aged care, so now that’s sorted I can begin working on the final five units of my Bachelor of Arts. There have been times in the past during semester, particularly when assignments are due, I have become chained to my computer and I’m not looking forward to that situation again now I’m back at uni. The trouble is, I know it will happen. How can I commit to adding a photo a day, when some days I hardly have time for anything other than reading and assignments?
Mount Warning from Tumbulgum, a small village beside the Tweed River. Photo taken Wednesday last week.
I think I’ve worked out a solution. Even if all I do is take a photo of Mount Warning while I’m eating breakfast, it will only take five minutes to add it to my blog page. If I have time, I can add a few words to my post. If I’m too busy, I can just add a “wordless” or “silent” image. As it is, most days I hand write a few words in my journal while I eat, with each entry beginning with a description of the morning view across the valley, and specifically a description of Mount Warning. I’m sure I can manage to find a minute to take a photo each day as well.
Lets see how my plan goes. Hopefully by mid-July next year I will have a year long blog-journal-record of my ever changing view across the picturesque Tweed Valley and magnificent Mount Warning.
In My World 