Pliny's Train Ride

Pliny the Elder's bicycle was in three pieces. He wasn't going anywhere on that.

Would you like to come out with us this afternoon? I asked him. We're going to use public transport all weekend. We plan to take the bus into the city and then catch the train up to Belair National Park.

I would like that very much, said Pliny, looking pleased to be invited. I have never been on a bus or a train before, and I'm sure the National Park will be delightful.

Don't get too excited, Pliny, I said warningly. The National Park has never been delightful.

Nevertheless, said Pliny, I will come.

So we all got ready and walked over to the bus stop. The fourth bus let us on. We made it to the train with one minute to spare, and sat down next to the window.

Pliny gazed about with interest. Five boys had got on the train with mountain bikes, which a guard was officiously ordering them to rearrange in front of the doors, in case of emergency.

The train started off again. Pliny stared out of the window at the passing trees. Willows, he muttered. Olive trees, pines, aloes, geraniums, eucalypts.......do you by any chance have a pencil?
I lent him a pencil, and a little red notepad with a mushroom face on the front.

Here, Pliny, you can make notes in this.

Thank you, he said.

At Belair the three of us got out and walked into the Belair National Park, down steps and through a wooden archway built in grander days. Pliny nearly tripped over himself as he wrote furiously in his notebook.

I wondered what he could be writing. The Belair National Park was full of the dullest of trees. The light was sickly yellow and the path was lined with piles of stones from which twists of frayed blue and black plastic netting trailed in ugly heaps. I decided I was not the person to blog about this outing.

Pliny! I shouted, trying to get his attention.

But he didn't take any notice. He was too absorbed in taking his endless notes.

I mean to ask him to blog about it tomorrow.

The Cormorant

It was warm today, but only outside. It was windy too. Pliny and Nostradamus decided to go to the beach.

When they emerged from the dunes onto the windy beach Pliny turned the colour of a person who wishes to be elsewhere. What are you thinking? asked Nostradamus, who already knew.

So they went to West Lakes instead. It was windy there as well, but warmer than it had been on the beach. They walked along the narrow path at the edge of the lake.

The wind blew patterns over the ripples on the water. Ripples on ripples, triple ripples, quadruple ripples, as though the wind were a feather duster.

Low bushes edged the gardens of the close-packed houses overlooking the lake. Photinia with pink flowers and bees. Lantana pushing through rosemary, hibiscus poking through proteas. Diosma, alyssum and geraniums the colour of tongues. Palms. A boab tree.

Decaying pontoons rocked in front of the gardens. The wind whipped the water into little green macaroons, some of them topped with a white froth cherry, spat from the mouth of a frog.

A bay, a strip of pale sand, and some rocks. A young family playing, well clear of the unpredictable water. Pliny and Nostradamus followed a wide cement path to the limits of public access. Just then the sun emerged from a high grey cloud, which darkened to ominous black. A glittering burnished path shone momentarily across the wine dark lake.

On the way back, they saw the same things, from behind. And a cormorant up to its neck in the water, which swallowed it suddenly.