As we had already experienced Australian wildlife in Dreamworld, we decided not to go to the Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary as originally planned. We had also earlier considered going to the Tangalooma Dolphin Resort and the Catch-A-Crab tour but they were too far away and did not seem good value for time and money. So now on Christmas Eve, we decided to visit the nearby Super Bee Honey World.
We reached Super Bee at 10am. It was essentially a retail shop that stocked bee-based products and it also offered a live bee show at 11am. In the shop, we tasted different types of honey, including Macadamian honey, Yellowbox honey, Eucalyptus honey, Raw Australian honey and Floral Blend honey. The type of honey made depended on the type of flower pollens collected by the bees. Thus, bees that collected pollens chiefly from macadamia plants would yield macadamian honey and so on. Son No 1’s favourite was the Yellowbox honey. We got small bottles of different types of honey, gift-packed with miniature koalas, as souvenir gifts for hubby’s colleagues.We were a little early for the Live Bee show and we filled the time exploring the flora and fauna in the natural world outside. We saw creepers which gripped their host trees, an unidentified flower and a four-inch pregnant spider.
For the Live Bee show, we stepped into a giant hive and saw thousands of live bees, housed behind glass. We learnt about the three types of bees:
- The Queen Bee whose main function is to lay eggs. There can exist only 1 Queen Bee in 1 hive at any one time. If there were more, one of them (the most powerful) would kill the rest. It feeds on a special diet of royal jelly produced by the Worker Bees.
- The Worker bees are all female bees and they do all the work. They collect pollen, make the honey and the beeswax to protect the honey, clean the hive, embalm dead bees by making a special ingredient called the propolis and provide food for all, including the Queen Bee and the Drones.
- The Drones are the male bees who do nothing but fertilize the Queen Bee. In times of food shortages, the Worker bees will push the drones out of the hive – the Drones are the lowest in the bee hierarchy. Drones are born from unfertilized eggs while Worker Bees come from fertilized eggs.
We found the show educational and interesting. We also learnt that the bee has an acute sense of smell – it can smell a single flower from 2 km away - and it has 5 eyes – 2 compound eyes at the front of its head and 3 simple eyes at the back. And we also confirmed the fact publicized in the cartoon The Bee Movie - that once a bee stings another creature, the bee will die shortly after.
The Bee-keeper was friendly and knowledgeable. We were the only audience for the 11am show and we asked a lot of questions. In the end, the half-hour show was extended to a 40-minute session. During the last part of the show, we were introduced to a type of honey called Manuka honey that could be produced only in New Zealand. Manuka honey is said to possess strong antibacterial activity and has been known to benefit general health. We were told that it is actually used as antibiotics in some hospitals. We bought a 500g jar as the proposition was too appealing – imagine, if we were under the weather, all we needed to do was to take a spoonful of honey, instead of medicine!
On our way back, we passed by a suburb called Mermaid Beach and stopped to have lunch at a Chinese restaurant called Jimmy’s Kitchen. We all showed a healthy appetite and gobbled up the steamed duck with chinese mushrooms, brocolli with scallops and jumbo prawns and chicken with salted fish.
That afternoon, we made a last ditch effort to do some shopping. We allowed Son No 1 to stay alone in the apartment while the rest of us went down to Surfers Paradise to look for the Duty Free Shop as my mom has asked me to buy duty-free Elizabeth Arden skincare products for her. We had no idea where DFS was located but we asked around and finally found the store. The store was small, by DFS standards, and it stocked only 5 cosmetic lines and EA was not one of them. So it was a futile effort.
All was not lost though as we managed to grab some souvenir items from a souvenir shop next to DFS. I told the two younger boys that they could each choose one Australian soft toy for themselves as well as one for Faidu. There were koalas, kangaroos, wombats, platypuses, crocodiles, frogs, dingoes and so on.
The two boys went about their task excitedly. Initially, Son No 2 chose a koala for himself but just before we paid, he changed his mind. He said he already had his jaguar soft toy and did not want another soft toy - what a loyal little guy! Son No 3 got for himself a koala and together, they chose a kangaroo for Faidu (above left). I noticed that there were very few T-shirts of Australia on sale here – unlike in the past. Could it be it was now passé or tacky to wear those t-shirts to show where one had been to? Remember those that printed “My so-and-so went to XYZ and all I got was this lousy t-shirt.” Lol!
Along Cavill Avenue, I saw the engine-red signboard of the Royal Copenhagen Ice Cream (above) – the outlet was still around after 20+ years! I recall the first time I was in the Gold Coast in the mid-80's, with my younger sister, we were traveling on a shoestring budget. But we dipped into our pockets to buy this delicious, creamy, irresistible ice-cream. Ah, memories… light the corners of my mind….
That evening, Son No 3 and I walked to the Broadbeach Playground (below) by the beach. Son No 3 did not want to join his brothers to swim in the indoor heated pool because he had grazed his knee the day before.
Son No 3 and I enjoyed some quiet one-on-one time that beautiful summer evening. It was a time I treasured. Sometimes, when Son No 3 was with his brothers, we tended to treat him a lot older than what he really was – a 5-year-old little boy. He himself was also constantly in a rush to grow up so that he could be like his elder brothers.
As we passed by a campervan (left) parked near the playground, he was fascinated when I explained to him what was inside the campervan.
I am sure he enjoyed himself that evening at the park, especially the bicycle-for-two on tracks (below). I pedalled behind him and after two laps, I was totally out of breath. But I think he would have enjoyed the playground much more if he had his elder brothers with him.
T'was the night before Christmas. The restaurants were charging exorbitant prices and the smaller eateries were closed. We had a pizza take-away dinner and played Uno in the apartment. On TV, there was a live telecast of an outdoor candlelit concert from Melbourne and the singers sang well-loved Christmas carols.
Silent night, holy night...
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