A couple of days after my last post about the Royal Easter Show, this delightful picture turned up in the newspaper showing a horse appearing at the show who had never seen rain before. The article did not specify where he was from but, even in New South Wales there are towns which see very little rain, like Tibooburra or Menindee, and in parts of the outback years can go by without any significant rainfall.
We have not ventured far afield this week but there has been plenty going on in our little township to keep us interested. First a 65ft prawn trawler sank in the bay, it was moored at the marina and was discovered one morning half underwater. The, already overworked, volunteers of the Rural Fire Service were called in to help and the hazardous chemical people came and set up a boom around the boat to stop diesel leaking out into the water. The area is home to several oyster farms as well as being a prime fishing area so luckily that aspect was made safe quite quickly. Not so refloating the thing though. The local marine repair company tried and failed over several days to get the trawler upright again, even temporarily sinking one of their own barges in the attempt! It seems they did not have the necessary equipment and were wasting their time so a big rescue organisation were eventually called in and it is now floating again. It doesn't look too good though, I would have thought a few days underwater would not be too much trouble for a boat but apparently that is not the case.
Meanwhile the local council have invested in an upgrade of our foreshore which involves replacement of jetties around the boat ramp and a new ocean pool with shark/jellyfish nets to take the place of the, rather tatty, old one. The pool is very popular with the local kids, some of whom get off the school bus and jump straight in still wearing their school uniforms on hot days. The uniforms here are just shorts and polo shirts, not blazers and ties, so not the end of the world.

As the old pool disappeared, the children were still jumping in off the remaining bits then there were a grim few days when the whole area was fenced off as the digging for the poles took place and they could only look longingly from the beach. Finally, as the new pool went in, they were sploshing around in it before the workmen and women had finished putting the nets up.

 Later on we spotted a procession of children with fishing rods heading in the direction of the pool, the way it is built now means they can sit on the edge and fish on the outside of it.

Ian had a Big Birthday this week and one of his gifts was a new fishing rod so I expect he will soon be joining them.
On a happy note to finish, the fires at the Tilligerry Habitat do not seem to have put off the wildlife, the plants are already growing back and this kookaburra did not seem to mind at all that the tree he had chosen to sit in was burnt to a crisp.