Notice the spikes on these bike helmets. We have seen this often and asked this friendly couple why. They are to detour the Magpies (birds) that swoop down on bicyclists who unknowingly get too close to nests and mating areas. Apparently these Magpies attack intruders by landing on their heads and pecking.

November 4, 2011 Friday

After researching the internet and making a few calls, we found a synthetic grass tennis court just a ½ mile from the marina near the Manly train station. It is in someone's backyard and he charges $10 per use, the money to be left in a mailbox. After 1 ¾ hours we exhausted ourselves and walked through the neighborhood back to the marina. We noticed lots of "tank in use" signs on fences in front of people's homes. We stopped to ask someone who explained the whole water shortage situation in Australia. A few years ago, there was a drought and the government encouraged installations of water tanks by heavily subsidizing them. The "tank in use" signs were put up to notify officials and neighbors that they were using tank water to irrigate their lawn and not city water which was prohibited. Last year in January, the drought turned to massive flooding. Now, the tanks are used to save having to pay for city water. We have found the Australian people to be very friendly and talkative. Steve stooped to pet a dog (Steve just can't let a dog pass by without touching it!) the other day and we had an interesting 15 minute conversation with the owners about their travels to the United States. The bicyclists with spikes on their helmets were very informative about the Magpie and Ibis birds, plus they had also traveled to the US. Often when Steve takes a load of garbage to the marina trash bins he returns 30 minutes later because he got to talking with some local.