Buangor State Park, Victoria, west of Beaufort

You would think there would be many many photos from a trip that took me from Alice Springs to Melbourne to Canberra to Wollongong to Sydney, Newcastle, Ballina, Burrum Heads, Rockhampton, Longreach, Mt Isa and then back to Alice Springs. Yes there are a few but not nearly as many as I would have thought. Sometimes life gets in the way of a passion and rather than devote my time to birding and photography, the main focus on the trip was to enjoy spending time with others.

But, of course there were a few photo opportunities along the way.

The trip from Alice Springs to Melbourne was fairly meandering once I hit the Victorian border. I had hoped to stay in National Parks, but quickly realised the rain they had had was making birding much harder than normal. Not only did I get the usual neck strain from looking up at and through tall trees, the grasses were so long it was very hard to see the ground dwelling birds. Until I reached Buangor State Park, just west of Beaufort.

Driving in on the dirt road, I noticed the lack of dust covering the trees by the side of the road. Windows down, I could hear both familiar, and not so familiar sounds. I pulled into a picnic area/campground, totally stunned to find I was the only one there. I headed over to the toilet block (one of my main reasons for choosing this spot), and stopped only five steps from the car. A male Flame Robin was sitting on a bollard, right there, right next to me. The an Eastern Yellow Robin, then Superb Fairy-wren, and the varieties just kept coming. The skies were filled with the calls of Yellow-tailed Black Cockatoos and Long-billed Corellas. Dusky Woodswallows raced around and Crested Shrike-tits. I wasn't sure what to do. Go to the toilet or return to the car to grab the camera. Nature calls, both very different, were having a tug of war inside me. The former won out. I figured if they were there now, they would be there post toilet. Thankfully I was right.

Here are some of the photos from that little adventure:

Flame Robin

Eastern Yellow Robin

Crested Shrike-tit

Dusky Woodswallow

Golden Whistler

Grey Fantail

Yellow-tailed Black Cockatoos

The various Cockatoos of Wee Jasper NSW - photos

Yellow-tailed Black Cockatoos, Gang Gangs and Sulphur-crested Cockatoos all graced the skies and trees around Wee Jasper, not to mention pierced the ear-drums every now and then. we normally see lots of Little Corellas as well but not so this time.

The Yellow-tailed Black Cockatoos were generally either at the tops of the pine trees, or soaring hundreds of metres above the valley floor, but occasionally I saw some sitting in lower branches of trees:

Yellow-tailed Black Cockatoos

The Gang Gangs are a species I haven't seen too often and was glad to see some come close enough for a few photos:

Gang Gang Cockatoos

The Sulphur-crested Cockatoos screeched down the river and then back up the river every now and then, but again, often settled on the tops of the trees. Here were some that were a bit closer.

Sulphur-crested Cockatoos