Bushwalk and Granddaughter’s party

Between watching and marking Drama performances I did find time to renew my contact with the local bush AND to attend my granddaughter’s Eighth Birthday party (yikes!)… With my son David and friend Graeme we walked all the way from Galston Gorge to Dural and back starting at 5.30am on Sunday morning. A fantastic day for bushwalking: sky overcast, so many birds around and lots of interesting flowering plants coming into bloom: Here is a baby grass tree flower just coming into bloom. This is one of two Australian plants beginning with X! This is the Xanthoria Australia (or grass tree for short… or Black Boy in the old days… when you could say such things!)
and can you believe my amazement when on the same walk, on the way down the hill back to Galston Gorge I caught sight -in full flower and new leafage- the OTHER Australian plant beginning with X… the Xylomylum Pyriform… or Woody Pear…. I just love this amazing plant… it is part of the Proteacea family (along with Waratah’s and Grevilleas).. but this one is a real tree and it has as its fruit something that turns into a pear shaped and sized wooden nut… you don’t see these nuts very often… but when you do they are awwwwwwesome….: Click on the woody pear 3 times to get a close up! And here I am cheating… I managed to get a photo from Google of what the Woody Pear “fruit” actually looks like. I have seen these before… but they are hard to find:
And what other plants did we see on route…. The flowering tee tree just covered in blossoms:
and this hero of the bush, a spectacular Scribbly Gum (Eucalypytus Haemastoma) almost burnt to the ground but standing defiantly against all odds…. the bush around here is filled with such icons of heroic endurance!
Last but not least we saw the buds on all the Scrub Angophoras ( I know them as Angophora Cordifolia): these are going to burst out into flower in around 2 weeks… must go back there then to see them:
and this is what they should look like shortly:

Half an hour turn around from the Bushwalk to get over to my son’s place for Leear’s Birthday…. 8 today:
Here are her brothers Josh 1 and Alexander 2:
and their snap-happy grandma Rosie: