The portal to the universe has returned and there's so much to report. I've missed my connection with everyone. It's good to be back. The move was smooth but long and exhausting. Now that I have more or less settled in, my camera and plastic bags are resurfacing from a box.
I've left a temperate climate and now live in a subtropical climate. It's bright and sunny and warm during the day but very chilly at night. Sunflowers grow here in the middle of winter.

A friend, from a local sugarcane farm, brought me some beautiful orange plastic bags back from a trip to Berlin, as well as tangellos from his garden. Such sunny colours.
Also new creatures....... strange calls at night and a certain amount of destruction after a nocturnal feeding frency!
This snoozy, baby red-belly black snake was in the compost heap. Yikes! I wonder where it's mother is. Note to self: start wearing gloves when gardening.
So much rain has fallen here in the last couple of years and the staghorn ferns are thriving. Two of my favourites survived the drought. I used to cart buckets of shower-water out to them when the water was scarce. Now the tanks are full.... and the showers luxuriously long. This one is growing on a big basalt boulder, shot out of the old volcano millions of years ago. The branching fertile fronds are full of brown spores.
In an attempt to retain the gene pool of the surrounding rainforest and revegetate the land, I have been madly collecting seeds and hope to be able to germinate them.

These black seeds came from the loofas (in the vegie patch) I harvested last week.
Straight off the withering vine......
.....peeled and seeds removed. Ready for scrubbing!!
The kookaburras are laughing and the horses are being led out of the stable across the road. The sun will be up soon. I'd better catch a bit of sleep so that I'll be ready for another glorious day. It's good to be back here.