Golden Chain Tree

Dark clouds hung above West Coast Park gathering intensity by the minute. A huge crowd of students converged on the park for a school running event and the carpark in front of MacDonalds was jammed with parents unloading their kids dressed in PE attire from their cars. The portion of West Coast Highway next to the park was also lined with slow moving vehicles caused by the excessive presence of cars at the park.

Everyone focused on making his or her way to the tents set up in the large field within the park. I took a gamble that I would be able to walk around the park once and see things in a different light without being caught in the rain.

As I walked towards the park I saw a few of these trees all decked out in golder showers of flowers looking like Christmas trees dripping with ornaments. I stopped, as usual to take some shots. They were below my expectation in terms of quality and I blame the poor lighting caused by the impending heavy downpour. I also realised that the camera has a shortcoming that was overshadowed by the other features. It has a very limited aperture range and that made manual focusing not as desirable as it should be.

Lophanthera lactescens

Family: Malpighiaceae
Common Name: Golden Chain Tree
Origin: Brazil, Uruguay