In Hamilton, waiting for the rain

There was a shower in the morning. Clouds all around but no more. I hope it is raining further west to justify this extra day in Hamilton.

This morning I walked into town and explored the Botanical Gardens. They are the 4th oldest in Victoria and were set up according to a plan drawn up by the bloke in charge of the Melbourne Botanical Gardens in 1870.

The emphasis was on open spaces highlighting specimen trees. It also had animal enclosures as they were popular in those days. The animal enclosures are long gone except for the fence around the kiddies playground.

Definitely worth the time to walk around, there are trees from all over and most over 100 years old. Very impressive.

There is also a sensory garden. Not sure what that is but it did have quite a few flowering cottage garden plants in it. I sat and watched two honeyeaters having a good feed. One on watch, the other in the flowers. They looked like New Holland Honeyeaters but maybe had too much yellow on them. Had a look in the bird guide and OK must be New Hollands.

The red blob is an art work. A plastic oval shape cut into 4 and each part moves independently of the others. I was the only person standing there and watching. I also found it useful to see it and know where I was.

(A block I couldn’t get rid of)

Walking through the central shopping area it struck me that drivers just don’t care about pedestrians in this town. Most other places I have walked through in recent times it’s been with pleasant surprise as drivers stop if you are waiting to cross at a crossing, corner, exit lane from business and so on. Luckily I don’t trust people to stop and they certainly don’t in this town.

It would be interesting to know how this social standard has been reached. Has it something to do with the fact that the Glenelg and Henty highways both run along the boundary of the CBD? Whatever, drivers here are very pushy.

My gas supply (small can) is running down so I looked for some more. The only size available was this huge can. How to carry it is the next question.

While gas hunting I passed a shop selling everything a shearer needs. There were notices re “Shearers Required” too. We don’t get those in Longford and although we have many fine wool sheep in Tassie I don’t recall ever seeing anything like this. Makes you wonder why not. Then two shops down was a training centre for shearers. They’ve got it covered in this town.

So, day off used usefully. Hopefully a ride tomorrow.