Perth, Western Australia
A good day around Perth: first, a visit to the Kings Park Wildflower Festival. Then we head over to the Perth Zoo, and finally end up at the Garden City mall for a movie.
Just a fun day poking around town. We even didn't mind the flute player at the festival playing "My Heart Will Go On"... you know, that theme song from Titanic. We were that relaxed.
Every year in early spring, the Kings Park Wildflower Festival is held, showcasing the huge variety of wildflowers found in this part of the world. We've already seen a good amount in the wild, but still, I had to go to this, just to check out the exhibits, and finally see parts of Kings Park that were cordoned off while they were setting the show up three weeks ago.
To be honest, there wasn't much new to be seen in terms of flowers and such. But in one of the exhibit tents I saw the most fascinating thing: banksias and others of their cousins being grown in hydroponics, showing off their odd root systems. I chatted up the guy from the University of Western Australia--he's doing research into how and why their special roots form. Banksias, like many members of the protea family, grow these odd cottony roots to more readily extract nutrients from the soil, particularly phosphorus... but the curious thing they've found at UWA is that these plants actually secrete acids into the soil, all sorts of acids like citric acid, lactic acid, and others! These acids unlock the phosphate that's typically bound up in iron phosphate form, and the plants then suck it up. Pretty interesting. We chatted for a good ten minutes on plant growth between WA and California.
I did ask him what he was growing the plants in the hydroponic tanks. Surprise--it's just tap water! Every month they change it out, and put in some regular nutrient mixture off the shelf--something that sounds like "Hagland". He said many native plants are effectively grown hydroponically in their natural environment, as they grow in nearly pure sand. Interesting. I hadn't considered that.
I also picked up 11 back issues of Australian Plants, a newsletter. They were only 50 cents each, what a bargain. They'll be some good reading.
The Zoo
After dropping off our booty at the room, we headed off to the zoo. I was hoping to see numbats, but there weren't any around. Sniff.
Then it was off to Garden City mall, where Chris wanted to shop at Lush http://www.lush.com.uk and we planned to catch the movie The Bourne Identity. We did both... and we also sold the roof rack on the LandCruiser!
We've wanted to get rid of that for awhile, as there's nothing up there, and it no doubt contributes to poor fuel efficiency, as well as making the truck even harder to park in garages. So I placed a free ad in Quokka, got a call, and sold it for $250. The buyer got a good deal, and we don't have to worry about fitting the truck in garages or the roof rack dragging down the car. We still have probably 20,000 kilometers to drive before leaving the country, and even a 2 or 3% increase in fuel efficiency will save us \$100 in fuel costs.
Weird Wildlife Sighting
Nothing much. Zoo things can't be really considered wildlife, can they?
Where we stayed
- Quest West End Apartment Hotel, Perth $91
- One bedroom apartment. Same room as before!
- Yay! I love this hotel.