The birds and the trees

Here is a community-built playground in Albert Park nearby. When we went by it, there were no children playing - but we thought it was a pretty amazing playground (the photo doesn't quite do it justice). Think 'castle.'
It was built as a community project in the '90's.

This weekend, we walked to the Royal Botanic Gardens. On our way, we took this picture. We've been noticing these beautiful flowering plants all over the place and wondered what they were. At the botanic gardens, we learned they are camellias (the same family from which tea is cultivated).

Across from the botanic gardens is the "Shrine of Remembrance," a large shrine built in honor of the lives lost in World War I. It is an impressive building (here is an artistic shot looking up from the courtyard outside the visitors centre).
You can also walk up to the top balcony to get good views of the city. Since the building is also on a hill, the added height makes for good views. Here is a view looking towards the center city.
The tall building on the left is, according to one of our books, the tallest residential building in the world - called the Eureka Tower. According to wikipedia, it's not the tallest, but it does have the most number of floors. There's some building in Dubai that has 2 fewer floors, but is 30% taller. Mysterious... maybe the Eureka Tower is 31% underground?

We then spent a couple hours at the Gardens. They're huge - it will take another couple trips to really see it all. We thought this tree trunk kind of looked like a dinosaur. Or an elephant's leg. Or just a pretty tree.


Below is our new favorite type of tree - it looks like a cross between a fern and a palm tree. (If you look closely you can see the actual name on the sign in front of it).



And a note about Australian birds: they are loud. We went for a walk in the nearby park the other day, and every third palm tree was blasting with bird noises. Imagine 100 swallows screaming at each other. We couldn't see them, so they weren't attacking each other or anything. Just screaming...