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Bird of Paradise flowers, Strelitzia reginae, are very common in Brisbane and are flowering nicely right now. I photographed this one in our village garden.

They originate in South Africa and were introduced to European botany in the 1780s by Sir Joseph Banks, head of Royal Botanic Gardens Kew. Banks had been offered, in the early 1770s, a place on Captain Cook's second long-distance voyage (on the Resolution) but he declined and instead sent Scottish botanist Francis Masson. Cook dropped Masson off in Capetown in October 1772 and continued south to make the first recorded crossing of the Antarctic Circle. Masson botanised for 6 months or so, and one plant he collected was subsequently named Strelitzia reginae by Banks.