You know it will be a nice sunset when the inside of your house starts turning unusual colours…
gum tree
bromeliad
Eucalyptus ficiafolia (Summer Beauty)
Eucalyptus ficiafolia (Summer Red)
As the sun sank behind the D’aigular Range I went across to talk to our neighbours and look at their hard work creating a home from an unkempt block of land.
My artistic impression of Beerwah lying behind the twins Tunbubudla
Glasshouse Mountains viewed from Bribie Island
and viewed from the road to Peachester
Mt Beerwah
Mt Beerwah
Coonowrin
Ngungun
After helping Phil with some computer issues he took me up for a scenic flight out of Redcliffe in the aero clubs new C172.
Helo LFD departing Redcliffe
My namesake, PA31 BSM off on a quick training flight
airborne off R07 at Redcliffe, admiring the canal estates
Scarborough Harbour
it is amazing to see the phenomenal growth through the Narangba Valley
Caboolture River
Caboolture aerodrome
Arriving safely back at Redcliffe after a fantastic flight. Thanks Phil.
Ryan celebrated on his birthday by taking Grandad down to the trains. We had a great time with my cousin Sandra and her family along for the ‘ride’. As it was his special day, Ryan was given the job of driving the train. He was also allowed to sound the emergency horn on the station, which brought all the trains to a stand-still (that thing is loud).
Becky on the locomotive.
Joshua
Gabrielle
Elizabeth and Sandra.
After 4 years here in Burpengary we are still seeing new wildlife around our block. Here is a dove or pigeon that we haven’t seen before. It was eating the seeds from some weeds I had pulled out and wasn’t overly intimidated by our presence. When we got too close it sought refuge in the lower branches of one of the wattle trees and was quite content to sit and observe Karen and myself.
Ryan thoroughly enjoyed his 9th birthday. Because of work committments we ended up celebrating it over two weekends. On the real birthday he had Anthony and Kegan over and Becky was allowed to have Demi over as well. Dad was driven insane 
Afternoon showers have finally made a return in the leadup to summer. It is so nice hearing the rain on the roof in the afternoon and smelling the rain on the air, cooling down the day.
The kangaroo paws are enjoying the heat and putting on a fiery display of their own in an attempt to eclipse the beauty of our recent sunsets.
It has been an extremely busy couple of months since my last post. I will do a single large update here as I have a lot of different photos to upload…
Perhaps the most important event was mums 70th birthday. Dad organised a special day out for her and we had the party up here at Burpengary. Warren and Kym, Kyle and Tegan helped bring mum up and Kym helped with a lot of the cooking. We did a lamb on the spit outside over the coals and had a bar-be-que with lots of food for everybody. Earl and June, Wayne, Ken and May Leckenby, Graham and Judy Reid, Kyms gran Mavis, and Ron, Nory and her two children all came up to help make this a special occassion.
We’ve had a little rain closer to the coast, which is keeping things green. Unfortunately the dams are still missing out on most of the falls.
The nights continue to get shorter as spring turns to summer. We haven’t had too many hot days yet and there is normally a nice cool breeze blowing throughout the day to make walking pleasant.
There have been a few very nice sunsets, but you know the story – you never have a camera handy to catch them.
We were also lucky enough to have a visit from my jetsetting brother Rohan who didn’t realise I had modified this photo of him
The Illawarra flametrees are in bloom across the region.
with the Jacarandas providing a mauve contrast.
The lovely little brown honeyeaters – Lichmera indistincta -(with the huge melodic voices) are having a field day with the abundance of nectar being provided by all the native bushes and trees in flower.
the plunkett malee – Eucalyptus curtissii
unknown
flowering gum “Summer Splendour” – grafted Eucalyptus ficiafolia
I’ve been pretty busy recently with Flight Simulator and haven’t had a chance for any real-life photography. I thought I would share with you some of my recent photoshop edits from FS2004. I have linked the above thumbnails to full size A4 images if you wish to download and print out.
Shadow Dancer
It has been bitterly cold this winter and we needed to thaw out. What better place to do that than the waters of the Gold Coast. Apart from our time on the beach we visited Warner Bros. Movie World and dined at Outback Jacks.
