Flemington Race Course

24 January 2009

After sightseeing in Beaumaris, we decided to visit Footscray and Maribyrnong.

Footscray is a "Vietnamesetown" famous for its market with a lot of cheap and good food. Since it was quite late by that time, the town is almost dead.

We continued our journey to Maribyrnong just to look around since one of my colleague is living there. I saw the sign to Flemington and got a bit excited since that is the home to Melbourne Cup, the annual international horse racing event. So we went there and I managed a few shots of the place. From the stands, the scenery is great as we can see Melbourne's skyline all the way.

Ricketts Point, Beaumaris

24 January 2009

After leaving the Chinese New Year Carnival at Box Hill, we decided to go to Sandringham, which is south of Melbourne. We ended up on a beach a few kilometres further down in another town called Beaumaris.

The beach is very quiet and peaceful. I took the opportunity to take some shots while Johanna waited for me in the car.

I particularly love the shots taken in the glaring Australian sun's direction. The photos came out almost colourless.

I was surprised to see swans in the sea




A pelican with a few other big birds











More photos at my Flickr.

Chinese New Year Carnival at Box Hill

Saturday, 24 January 2009

Johanna and I drove to Box Hill on the Saturday before Chinese New Year to have a look at the Chinese New Year Carnival over there. We had witness the Vietnamese one at Richmond one week ago and was expecting something bigger and better as Box Hill is literally a "Chinatown", where the whole town is full of Chinese - from the people to the shops, etc.

However, to our disappointment, the carnival wasn't that great. Other than some stalls selling food, there wasn't much to see. We left after only one hour.

Police force entertaining the crowd




Lamb satay - most likely from Xin Jiang











More photos at my Flickr.

新年快樂 万事如意

Happy Chinese New Year to all Chinese friends and readers of this blog.

The 4 characters in the Chinese couplet above reads - nian nian you yu, meaning abundance year by year.

Melbourne Zoo

Johanna's friend Leanne invited us to her birthday celebration in Melbourne Zoo - picnic style. It was partly because of this that I rushed to purchase the EF18-200mm as a zoom lens is good for taking photos of animals which are usually to far away for normal cameras and lens.

Johanna with birthday girl Leanne


Leanne and boyfriend Cody


Leanne's friend Loan and her cute baby girl


Beautiful day, but very hot!


Lion - unfortunately had to take through the fence


Johanna with her new Canon SX110IS - her Christmas gift from me


Bear searching for something in the water


A smaller bear


My favourite subject - the peacock


The head of a giant tortoise - he's huge


Meerkat is very good in posing for photos


A cute little boy on a merry go round


Nice flower - I realise that my lens is no sharp enough for good macros. Johanna's SX110IS (has 0cm macro) can take better macros even though it's a consumer camera.


No title


A group of hungry little penguins waiting to be fed


Little penguins running towards their food


The brown bird does not belong to the zoo. It's a smart bird that will pick up any fish that is dropped on the ground. Little penguins do not pick up their food once they drop it.


Ah... finally managed to get one fish


Happy little penguin after being fed - shaking his bum while walking


They may look small, but they are also worried about the state of Australia's economy. Just in case no more fish.


This very charming bird broke one of its wings 6 years ago, causing it to lose the ability to fly. Poor thing.


Once again, I'm not happy enough with the quality of macro shots produced by EFS18-200mm


Photographer photographed


New addition to the zoo


Very colourful mandrill. It has an equally colourful butt. Check this out.


Elvis or John Travolta?


Pelican spreading its wings


Giraffes munching


Never know flowers can grown in multi level fashion


Nice butt


Zebra grazing

More photos at my Flickr.

I've learnt something important from shooting the animals. First, don't be stingy with ISO. Animals can move really fast. Coupled with zoom, it is going to be difficult to freeze their action. I thought hundredth of a second is good enough. Many photos turned out not sharp enough in the end.

Many animals are either behind fence, cage or glass in Melbourne Zoo. We also missed out on the snow leopard and tiger, the former sleeping, the latter nowhere to be seen. I hope to visit Werribee Zoo next. It's more of safari style. But wonder if my zoom lens is good enough. Itching to get EFS100-400mm.