Visiting Hagley Park this week for a catch-up girly lunch, bought back a wonderful memory involving a Southern Giant Petrel.
Now this all happened 10 years ago, I had taken Poppy into the city during the weekend. And we had parked at Hagley Park, walked through the grounds to the museum, and then visited the Art Gallery. We came back via the Arts Centre hoping to get something yummy to drink and eat as we were feeling pretty hungry by this time, everything was shut. And at Hagley Park the cafes were also shut.
We stopped at the pond and there was a large bird hanging around the pond with an unusual looking beak, and I asked the bird
‘What’s up with your beak?’
and the bird replied back ‘I am a Petrel, and my beak is supposed to look like this’
‘Oh, okay, never seen a bird like you before. Where are you from?’
‘Antarctic, I have flown a long way, and resting. I need some food. Go get me some food’
‘We tried to get some food for ourselves and everything close by that sells food is shut. We will have to go for a drive to get you some food and we might be awhile. Don’t leave we will be back’
‘You don’t have to go far if you walk down that path, it will lead you to a large tree by the glasshouses, and there is food waiting in the tree for me, go fetch it.’
‘Why don’t you go get the food yourself?’
‘Don’t want to, too many people to encounter and I am quite comfortable resting by the pond.’
‘There are a lot of trees in the park.’
‘You will know what tree it is, it is quite distinctive looking, and children like climbing the tree, it has quite a distinctive fork in the branches, and the food has been left in the fork’.
Mmm maybe we would be going on a wild goose chase to try and find the tree, We meandered off down the path and lol and behold yip there was the tree, and yip someone had left their lunch in the fork in the tree. We went back to the pond…
‘Are you allowed to eat this sort of food?’
‘Can do on occasions, the food won’t harm me, the food will fuel me and that’s what I need at the moment and then I can get on my way, I’ve got lots to do, and it has been nice to meet you, I just stopped by to say hello to you, and thought you could do me a favour also’.
