Tag: Photography

Fleeting Visitors

We are very fortunate in Eastern Australia to have a wide variety of native birds, many of which are not intimidated by the onslaught of suburbia. One such species is the Australian King-Parrot (Alisterus scapularis)

In our experience, they usually travel in pairs, the red headed male looking after his partner, or vice versa. While we do not feed them, we do plant lots of native shrubs and trees to encourage their visits. The other day, this couple seemed to think there might be a feed if they hung around for a few minutes. When there was nothing forthcoming, they left to forage elsewhere.

IMG_1034  IMG_1027

IMG_1028

Any tasty morsels on this orchid? If not, I’ll turn my back on you!IMG_1033

… while hubby keeps watch from the safety of the tree.

IMG_1024

Basel : Gateway to the Rhine

In my series of posts last year, about our river cruise from Basel to Amsterdam, I neglected to include a chapter about the starting point, Basel. We had arrived in this lovely Swiss city 24 hours ahead of our cruise, so we had a little time to explore for ourselves. This was made easy by the civilised offer of free tram travel while staying at one of the city’s hotels.

mini 3

We left with several lasting images. Firstly, we awoke to find that it was Basel Marathon day, and our hotel was directly on the route. All traffic, except trams, was halted for the morning while the event was underway. We actually saw the race leader come by while we were enjoying our leisurely Sunday breakfast.  The Mini in the foreground must have ‘failed to proceed’ overnight and had become trapped for the duration of the race. We saw it towed away later in the day.

mini 2 DSC03287

The second aspect we found interesting was that there appeared to be a Moorish(?) influence on the architecture. The Town Hall (Rathaus), which dominates the Market Square, is a case in point.

DSC03329PS

DSC03330PS2

Town Hall, exterior (above) and (interior below)

DSC03331PS DSC03333PS2

DSC03293PS

 Les Trois Rois (The Three Kings) adorning the hotel of that name (above), provide another illustration of this, as does the street monument (below).DSC03320PS

DSC03295PS

One of the most important aspects of Basel is that it sits astride the Rhine, a major trade and tourist artery. Naturally, we gravitated towards the river and here we found a most interesting solution to a navigation issue. The Rhine is known to rise and fall significantly, and this ferry’s funnel has the perfect solution to cater for low clearance bridges when the water rises.

DSC03306 DSC03308

After a lot of walking, we decided to take a ride on the green tram route. We had been advised that this did a circuit providing access to different highlights of the city. One thing we did not expect to encounter was this community garden within a few minutes of the city centre.

DSC03322 DSC03325

As may be deduced, we enjoyed our visit to this city, especially coffee and cake at one highly recommended coffee house. The streets were clean and the transport efficient, as is to be expected of the Swiss.