It is garden week, lets check in on the Portulacas!

The above shot was taken at the start of January – the seedlings had found their feet and begun to flower.

Here is one a week or so later. These plants have been flowering up a storm!

When I bought seedling Portulacas before Christmas, I put a few into a pot for my parents as their Christmas present.

My break is going super well, and I’m going to extend it another week. I’m really boring at the moment, just focused in on diet and exercise, and probably you don’t want to read about that. You might get a Fitbit post later this week, if I can manage it. :)

Sunday Selections Link Up

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Sunday Selections @ Drifting Through Life – Sunday Snap @ JibberJabberUK

Short and sweet this week – some photos from the Booderee National Park Botanic Gardens –

I love Botanic Gardens in general but this particular one is the spookiest one I have ever been to.

I took my Chinese Cousins here when they visited nearly a year ago and the whole time, I was freaked out by skittering noises in the leaf litter.

So I said to The Other Half, I would like to go back with him and see if I found it less spooky.

For 95% of the time we were there, I did not find it very spooky, but then..

I encountered my first ever snake in the wild, after 40.5 years of living in Australia. It was a red bellied black snake which was lying across the path we were walking on.

That whole stand still when you see a snake thing has been so drummed into me, my body acted without me needing to do anything. I was actually half jogging up a hill, and I stopped as soon as I saw it. I had to call out to the other half, who had turned to look at me when I stopped.

The little snake – it wasn’t very old I think, probably 6 months to a year – saw us and looked at us. Then it turned around and moved on top of a nearby rock. It sat there taking a good look at us, probably for a minute or so. Then, it quickly disappeared into a crevice.

I had my camera in my hand the whole time but not the mental capacity to take a photo. It was part shock, part awe, part wow. I remember seeing the eyes, and I remember how red the underneath of this snake was. It was a truly gorgeous snake.

The gardens were *extremely* spooky after that event, for both of us!

The Sunday Link Up

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Also Linking Up With

Sunday Selections @ Drifting Through Life – Sunday Snap @ JibberJabberUK

Following on from last week, we are still on our walk from Huskisson to Vincentia. Last time, we were looking down a path to the beach – here is what you will find at the end of that path.

This is where the kite boarders do their thing, if the wind is playing rough.

Remember last week I mentioned the circle house? In between the circle house and another fancy looking house, this tiny shack exists. This poor house must feel quite shabby in between the two modern masterpieces!

Here is another modern masterpiece that I like the look of. No idea whether it belongs to someone or if it is a beach rental type place. I love the wood stairs that seem suspended in space.

Sometimes when you are looking the other way – towards the sea – you will get a surprise! This is the HMAS Canberra. I don’t know a lot about ships in general but this one made a big splash here last year when she first visited Jervis Bay, and she is quite recognisable with that big flight deck.

Here is another view of her.

This is a slightly less scary beach path. I followed a lizard up this path recently. On the day I took this photo, a small sparrow was dustbathing in the sand here.

These next 3 photos were taken yesterday, on the Australia Day long weekend.

You can see that even when there are a lot of tourists in town, you can still find your own place on the beach.

Will I ever get tired of walking here? Probably not. There is always plenty to distract you from the fact that you are exercising. :)

The Sunday Link Up

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URL – The link to your post.

No spam links will be accepted. Your post must contain at least one image. The linkup will remain open until I close it, most likely on the following Saturday.. You do not have to put a link back to this link up or to my blog on your blog, because adding your link here will make it available to everyone else.

Also Linking Up With

Sunday Selections @ Drifting Through Life – Sunday Snap @ JibberJabberUK

For the next couple of weeks, I would like to take you along with me on my favourite walk. Where will we be walking? Here.

Why do I love this particular footpath? There are many reasons – it involves two of my favourite towns in the world – Huskisson and Vincentia. It has a little bit of uphill and downhill but mostly it is flat. The scenery changes – you get sea and beach views, you get to look at some pretty fancy houses, you get greenery views, you walk past two caravan parks.. Let Us Go!

This is looking back towards one of the Huskisson caravan parks – the footpath follows alongside it for a little bit here.

This is the view looking in the opposite direction. We are up on a bit of a sea cliff here, not too high, but enough to climb a couple of floors according to Fitbit.

Here is a spot near Vincentia where houses are on one side of the footpath while sand dunes and the beach are on the other side. Many of the beach houses along here are worth over 1 million dollars and are available to rent on Stayz.com.au and various other websites. Many of the houses have their own websites! And mixed in with those, are occasional weatherboard shacks.

Some of the houses we have given nicknames to, and consider them as landmarks. This one here is known as the Circle House. It has a large balcony which follows the circular shape of this end of the house. We watched them build this house for a super long time, it was several years in the making.

There is also a small part of footpath where you have the beach and sand dunes, footpath, then a road, then houses. The road is called Illfracombe Road.

This spot has a bench where you can sit and watch everyone go by. I’m sitting on it, so you don’t get to see the bench. It is raised up a little, so you can see to the ocean.

There are several places on the path where you enter a tree tunnel. Very pretty!

Along the path there are many offshoot paths which take you down to the beach.

Next week, we will see what is at the end of this path, plus we’ll take a walk on the beach, because we can. :) And more footpath. :)

The Sunday Link Up

Link Title – The name you want to appear with your link eg Sunday Selections @Snoskred 1

Email Address – You can feel free to put in a fake one eg none@none.com – I’m not going to be emailing you, unfortunately I cannot remove this field.

URL – The link to your post.

No spam links will be accepted. Your post must contain at least one image. The linkup will remain open until I close it, most likely on the following Saturday.. You do not have to put a link back to this link up or to my blog on your blog, because adding your link here will make it available to everyone else.

Also Linking Up With

Sunday Selections @ Drifting Through Life – Sunday Snap @ JibberJabberUK

Part of the reason it is time to get moving again is to go out and enjoy all the awesomeness nearby. For our first Fitbit walk, we went down to Huskisson and parked next to the kids playground there, and walked over to Vincentia, then back again.

There are some great footpaths around the bay and basin which we want to explore over the next few months. This was an 8km walk. All the tourists were in town so it was a little busy and we couldn’t park where we wanted. But no matter – we got out and we enjoyed our walk.

This photo looks across Moona Moona creek. The tide was out, as you can see.

This photo was taken near Vincentia and is overlooking Collingwood Beach. We did not walk on the beach this time – maybe another day. The footpath is beautiful and takes you past many amazing houses.

The Sunday Link Up

Link Title – The name you want to appear with your link eg Sunday Selections @Snoskred 1

Email Address – You can feel free to put in a fake one eg none@none.com – I’m not going to be emailing you, unfortunately I cannot remove this field.

URL – The link to your post.

No spam links will be accepted. Your post must contain at least one image. The linkup will remain open until I close it, most likely on the following Saturday.. You do not have to put a link back to this link up or to my blog on your blog, because adding your link here will make it available to everyone else.

Also Linking Up With

Sunday Selections @ Drifting Through Life – Sunday Snap @ JibberJabberUK – The Maple Hill Hop @ Maple Hill 101