Douglas and the Royal Botanical Gardens.

Today Douglas and I took a trip to the Royal Botanical Gardens. The plants, trees, and general nature was something to be admired.

Douglas and I needed to have a good lunch before we head to the gardens. Got some sushi from a sushi bar and then a coffee and scone from Gloria's Cafe. Didn't eat too much of the scone, but we snacked a bit.

These birds are everywhere there are pigeons. They're called Australian White Ibis. My friend Linn thought they were a little creepy

Douglas with his favorite new street performer. Check out the video of his awesome performance on my Instagram @skburky (Not Douglas's performance. Douglas hung out in my backpack)

The "Hugantis Gluteus Maximus Arbor" aka Big Ass Tree. I forgot to look at the name plate. But it's so big, if I put Douglas on him, you'd never find poor Douglas. EDIT: I looked up the tree, it's called a Moreton Bay Fig Tree

That's the ocean!

This is a slit-drum from the island of Ambrym in Vanuatu. The people of Ambrym call this drum "atingting". I tried to drum it, but Douglas wasn't impressed, I'll leave it to the people of Ambrym. 

Another Moreton Bay Fig tree. Douglas liked this one because he could climb it. 

A castle! JK it's the Government House. You can read all about it on Wikipedia here.

Pretty picture of the skyline

Flowers! If you look towards the middle you can see artichokes getting ready to bloom. They're related to the thistle.

Douglas dreams of artichokes for dinner.

Another shot of a blooming artichoke. 

It looked like a tomato! But I don't think it was, I didn't walk to the other side of the bed to look for the plaque

The elusive scrunchy seed. Very rare.

I didn't have the heart to tell Douglas he wouldn't be able to read the sundial while it was cloudy. He tried mightily.

Some pretty wildflowers for the bees

Wild flowers and a duck!

I liked these wild flowers quite a bit.

The duck and I are close friends. I tried to get Douglas to pose with him, but the duck was not having any of it. You can see him giving me the side eye here.

Douglas camouflaged into the Chinese Weeping Cypress well.  I made this picture extra big so you could find Douglas

More pictures of the wild flowers

A fuzzy flower that reminded me of a sea urchin

Douglas enjoying a tiny rose bush

He enjoys the pink flowers.

Douglas and I learned a lot today. We learned to always double check your bag for your OPAL card so you can ride the train. Take a little cash with you to tip entertainers. Wear appropriate walking shoes to the botanical gardens. Don't steal the plants. Really, don't steal plants, it's not nice. The bus won't tell you if you've passed your stop, you have to tell it to stop, so know the area. And if you give your local spider a pet name, you won't be as scared of it. Meet Chuck Norris:

Chuck Norris is a small huntsman spider. He eats bugs, is good for the environment, and looks exceptionally scary. He enjoys hanging out on my door frame to hunt bugs at night attracted by my indoor lights, but does not particularly enjoy my handyman for installing a door handle and lock to the door disrupting his daily sleep ritual. He also enjoys hanging down from the ceiling of the patio to scare housemates. He is about the size of the palm of my hand (with legs), and still growing!