Australiana Pioneer Village - Working Bee - Nov 28

With our opening day of Australia Day 2011 coming closer the pressure is on to have everything ready for the big day.

(Left) Our concentration was on the chapel, which will be the venue for a wedding in December - now it needs a bit of TLC

(Right) The entrance had a nasty vine entanglement, which needed some cutting and lots of tugging


(Left) One up, and one down!!



(Right) Meanwhile outside the weeding and gardening continued




(Left) Lots of implements - and discussion

(Right) Inside, work continued on the pews




(Left) Ride on mowers are very handy for large areas





(Right) Gardening and wood restoring



(Left) The good old rotary mower comes into its own


(Right) The Iron Chefs of APV cook up a storm





(Left) The hungry crowd gathers

(Right) Tucking in



(Left) The Village is looking great



(Right) The buildings are getting ready for the big re-opening



(Left) Being the 40th anniversary of the original opening, it was commemorated by the planting of 4 trees (plus one for inflation) - 4 red cedars and 1 Australian Christmas

(Right) Another tree another hole


(Left) Down to a tube this time




(Right) Can't say that we don't get down to work on these working bees

(Below) We finished the lunch with some good old fashioned melodies - click on the start arrow underneath the picture to share the music

Australian Age of Dinosaurs - The Museum

(L & R - The Museum for the Australian Age of Dinosaurs is built on a mesa about 20 kms out of Winton. Access is by a good road to the top, where the Museum is located and the view is superb)






(L b& R - Inside we have displays describing the area, and also we store all the bones already prepared and also store those still awaiting work)






(L - The palaeontologists discuss some recent finds


(R - Part of the display includes reconstructions of the animals found so far, and a reproduction of the appearance of one of the hind legs of Banjo, one of the dinosaurs discovered)



(L - More displays)


(R - A thigh bone of Matilda)







(L - A full reconstruction of the forelegs of Matilda)


(R - Plans are underway for the construction of Stage 2 of the Museum n- Dave Elliott explains it all)






(L - WE had a picnic lunch by a pool on the mesa)

(R - The outlook from the mesa)





(L & R - Our picnic site)








(Below - A whip snake searches for some food)

Dino Digging - Week 1 - 2010

(L - Our tent and headquarters for the duration of the week long dig)


(R - Our dig site - still covered from the prior year's dig)



(L - Our individual dig buckets are laid out ready for our collection)

(R - Our supply cart, with extra supplies)






(L - Starting to dig)

(R - We receive our instructions for the dig)






(L - The dig gets deeper)

(R - We bring in the "big guns" for removal of heavy overburden)





(L - Our group digs, and digs, and digs!!!)


(R - More digging)





(L - For smaller, but still heavy duty digging, we have a small mobile digger, which is more gentle)


(R - The diggers spread out)



(L - Dig, dig and dig some more!!)



(R - After a full day of digging, we enjoy a nice cold beer outside our hut)


(L - The sunsets can be quite beautiful)


(R - We sit down for a large dinner one night)




(L - We transferred to another site to carry out some black soil exploration, where the bones slowly rise to the surface with the passage of time. The bones can be easily picked up on the surface)

(L - A lunch break in the tent)


(L - A digger gently works on a "possible" find)



(R - The grader blade uncovers an interesting object)


(L - Work out here is hard on both man and dog!!)



(R - Our dig team poses for our group photo)