Beach

Today is Groundhog Day in the United States.  I don't think groundhogs live in Australia.  There are definitely opossums.  They live in the park and come out at night.  We have seen a couple of them.  But there is no designated animal to tell me if I get six winter weeks here in the middle of summer.  I guess there is no point in having a Groundhog day in mid summer. 

Yesterday the weather was not too hot, and not too cold, so we finally went to the beach, this time dressed in our swimming suits.  It took about half an hour to put on sunscreen when we decided we were ready to go.  Then it took about another half an hour from our door to catch the tram and ride to the St Kilda beach and spread our towels on the sand.  As you would suspect, most of that second half hour was spent on the tram, not spreading the towels (but you never know). 

The beach was clean, the sand smooth and warm, the water a little cool but not cold and a nice shade of blue-green. 

The above photo makes it look like we had the beach to ourselves, which we definitely did not, but it was surprisingly un-crowded for one of the nearest beaches to center city Melbourne on a warm summer day -- at least at 11:00 in the morning.  I'm guessing more people came in the afternoon, but we had our fun and left before 2pm. 

There were a lot of families at the beach, including families with very small children, because the water was shallow for a long ways and there were only very small waves when boats went by further out.  We didn't see any jelly fish -- you have to worry about jelly fish in Australia -- but not today.  There were a few cute little fishes that occasionally darted past our toes in the shallow water.  And clams in the sand.  Those are the only aquatic animals that I identified.  After wading around in the water, Jonathan dug in the sand, Tim walked along the shore, and I lay in the sun (heavily sunscreened) and smelled the sea air and thought to myself, "Ah.  This is February." 

February is truly lovely as a summer month.

And according to Tim, my skin was easily the brightest shade of white in the whole ocean.  Easily.  That is a family trait I inherited from my father.  Luckily I didn't also get his matching black chest hair.

But that, my friends, among other reasons, is why the only photos you get of the beach do not include me in a swim suit.