Stone the crows



Magpies are notoriously territorial in Australia and are famed for swooping on passing cyclists, skaters or even passers-by. You never quite get used to having a bird bouncing off your bike helmet and squawking in your ear as you ride along but after a while it becomes more of a nuisance than a danger, once the initial panic subsides that is.

 

What I didn't realise is that crows will also swoop if they feel that their young is threatened. Crows are a lot bigger than magpies, and we have a family of crows living in the tree next to the back garden. Last week I think one of the young tried to fly and failed, ending up in a low tree close to our back fence, and the parents switched to Def-Con One...(this should be displaying as an animated gif)

 

Luckily things have calmed down now, because hanging out the washing or taking out the compost became far more exciting than it deserved to be...

Drifting along

I dug out my drift / freeline skates this week as well, and tried them out on Burleigh Hill. I forgot how quickly they picked up speed - this may look mundane, but at the time it was terrifying! It's amazing how much I don't bend my knees as well...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FE6R2VX2Zbc

Views from the 15th floor

When we weren't in the water or sampling local views we spent a lot of time just hanging out on the apartment balcony just watching the world go past and soaking in the views...warning - picture intensive post...

 

Pigs & Pints

The last time we were down in Burleigh we decided that it would be the perfect place to set up a craft beer bar. Unfortunately someone beat us to the punch, but fortunately they located it right next to our hotel. The Pigs & Pints is well worth a visit for friendly staff, its fine range of Burleigh Brewery beers on tap, a wide range of bottled beers and some very tasty American-themed bar snacks.

It's on the Gold Coast Highway just behind Burleigh Arcade  and looks like this

Sadly it's also only open on Wednesday - Sunday, which on a hot Tuesday afternoon with a thirst for hops was a very unfortunate thing indeed...

They need a flag they can hoist when they're open so that local hotel residents need only descend from their balconies when it's worth it...

Surf's up

One of the reasons for going down to Burleigh Heads was to get back in the water, and our apartment on the 15th floor of the Burleigh Beach Tower gave us a cracking view of the water. Sadly it also clearly showed us the weak, late breaking waves... 

We were keen to go though, and managed to get into the water at least once a day for a couple of hours at a time.

 It may not sound much, but to our untrained bodies it was pretty exhausting. This sums it up...

We surfed Burleigh & Currumbin, and checked out Kirra as well. And on the way home we stopped off at our 'usual' spot on the Spit 

It was pretty blown out but that didn't stop the crowds...

We've decided that this year we'll try to fit more surfing in and get a larger, more stable board that will give us a chance of standing up - the 5'6 finless Albacore just isn't a good board to learn on! So in advance of a Summer chasing the curl, here is this week's tune - Bombora, by the Atlantics. Who bizarrely are Australian despite the fact that no part of Australia touches the Atlantic...

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOW0697mfBs

Hopdate # 4

The hops are loving the rain and the coffee grinds trick seems to be working (thanks Mark)...I think next time I'll plant the rhizome nearer to the stake though, as it'll be able to grab hold and start climbing quicker

 

Holidays

We're off to Burleigh Heads tomorrow for a four night break so things may be a little quiet. I'm really looking forward to spending some quality time with Liz, and also intend to get back out into the sea again for some gnarley 'repeatedly-humiliate-myself-with-a-piece-of-buoyant-foam' action. Generally when I go away there's always a touch of sadness that I won't get to go mountain biking over that period, which is another reason why I'm liking these storms - a bit of rain isn't going to stop me getting in the water but it does mean that I probably won't be missing any dirt sessions. Sorry guys.

With that in mind, here's an old-skool classic to keep you entertained when BOM starts to get you down....

TheVishfiles 8 on Pinkbike

 

How narrow are some of those bars?