After a shot of cortisone in my elbow on Monday, I’ve had to avoid, frustratingly so, the surf & hot room in favour of taking it easy (honey). I self-practiced midweek in the heat before class but it was a little too early, considering the $150 spent to inject and the pain poked me back into submission. It really is hard to back off sometimes and it’s funny how expectation of practice (yours or others) can mess with logic.
So after a little sleep in and late breaky, I took my hot head north to Mt Coolum. It’s been a few years since I scrambled up the 208m face with my brother Ian. This time Veronika and I wandered up. Then we’re sitting, marvelling the view, wondering why we aren’t getting outside more often. A short jaunt before I was back inside teaching the 4:30pm but the lesson was learned.
It wasn’t till tonight, that I realised how special Mt Coolum really is:
Ecologically, Mount Coolum is one of the most important square kilometres in Australia. The diversity of plant life within such a confined area is unequalled. The site has been intensely studied and over 700 plant types are now documented. This includes 590 flowering plants, 49 ferns and over 100 species of the lesser plants such as mosses, liverworts, lichens etc. By way of comparison, there are only 1400 species in all of Great Britain. Deserving particular note is the fact that the 49 ferns belong to 20 distinct families, some 40% of all fern families living on earth today.
All in one square km; wow!
