We spent a few days in the Grampians at the beginning of December. We camped at Smiths Mill campground for three nights and it was very relaxing.
We stopped at Cafe Merkama in Ballarat on the way there for lunch. It was great! Love a dairy free meal especially.
Spot Scott.
Mackenzie Falls.. now with less dead bodies. They’ve blocked it off quite a bit now so you can’t even really touch the water.
I took quite a few long exposure pictures with my ND filter but when I got home and looked at them on my computer I found out that they had really strong reflections from the camera lens. Whoops.
New Holland Honeyeater?Eastern Spinebill.Scarlet Robin.
We saw lots of birds. Scott spotted several Scarlet Robins, which we had never seen before. And we saw a lot of types of honeyeaters. I’ve got a bunch of new pictures to add to my bird album on Facebook.
Scott must read really boring books because he falls asleep 5 minutes after he starts reading. Every time.
I entertained myself with a $5 Kmart embroidery kit.
We played games of course. It was not windy at the camp site so we could even play Wingspan Asia!
There was a campground emu. At first we thought it was cool seeing an emu so close, but he turned out to be a bit of a pest. Continuously circling the area looking for snacks.
One time he snuck up behind me and I didn’t notice until his head was right beside my head. Scared me!
The emu also did several big poos right in the middle of our site.
We went to the Balconies lookout at sunset. I thought it would be busy but we were the only ones there! Very beautiful.
Need to learn how to take better sunset pictures…
We did a fun hike up Hollow Mountain. It’s only just over 1km long but it goes straight up! But it’s way more fun than like the 1000 Steps or something because you have to scramble up rocks and do some light bouldering. Some parts felt scary! But I think it’s now in my top 5 favourite hikes (don’t ask me what the other 4 are).
Then it rained the whole last evening, even though the weather report said 0% chance of rain. I failed as a Girl Guide and didn’t make a deadman in the tent that morning and my pillow got wet. Bah. Luckily it was dry out while we packed up the next morning though.
Normally I end up planning the majority of our holidays. But, for the first time ever, Scott planned this whole trip himself and I just got to show up! It was a treat!
We flew to Sydney, picked up a rental car, and drove into the Southern Highlands via Wollongong.
Fan-tailed Cuckoo.Pied Currawong.
We went for a walk in Barren Grounds NP, which was supposed to have lots of cool birds, but we didn’t see that many. Just the usual suspects. Although I’d never actually ID’d a Fan-tailed Cuckoo before so I guess that’s a new bird to me. It got cloudy and misty as we were leaving.
We had a delicious dinner at Leila’s at the Grand in Bowral. The skewers, dips, bread were all fantastic.
The next day we went to a couple waterfalls. The first was Fitzroy Falls. This is what happens when you bring your telephoto lens to a very big waterfall… you can’t even fit the whole thing into the picture. Whoops.
Then we went to Carrington Falls. Again, brought the wrong lens with me.
Caught in the act.
We had very nice pies for lunch at Robertson Pie Shop.
A quick photo stop atThe Big Potato.
And then we drove back to Sydney to see the Lonard’s! It was Michael’s 40th birthday. He had a party at the pub where we could watch Australia play in the World Cup.
The last morning we went to watch Ava play in her touch rugby Grand Final. It was very cute. She is 7.
Our friend really likes this fried chicken place so we stopped in and ordered two pieces of chicken and pickles. It actually lived up to the hype! Would recommend.
It was jacaranda season so we went to McDougall St to take some pics. Was very pretty and very busy!! They have to close the street at this time of year because there are too many idiots like us standing in the middle of the road taking pictures.
After that we went to Rae’s new house to see her family, but took no pictures. It was really nice to see her. I wish we lived in the same place because I think we would be really close friends.
And then we went back to the airport and flew home! All in all a successful and fun trip. Good planning Scott.
The beach at the campsite. So peaceful. Everyone says Cape Tribulation is where the rainforest meets the ocean. You can’t swim there though, too many dangerous things in the water.
At the end of the beach there is a short trail that leads to this stunning creek. I had heard there was a four meter croc that lives in the creek but didn’t know how hard it would be to see.
Turns out NOT HARD AT ALL. I walked about another 50m down the path around that bend and saw this big boy lying on the other side of the creek!
I’m glad he was on the other side. That was my first crocodile sighting on my own ever.
Accurate signage.
I walked the last boardwalk that I hadn’t gone on yet. Still no cassowary.
I did an exotic fruit tasting. We got to try:
Bread fruit – Roasted like chips. Very potato-y. Apparently a very sustainable food.
Soursop – Fruit salad flavour, cotton wool texture.
Yellow mangosteen – Extremely tangy like sour candy. Yum.
Ice cream bean – Soft fluffy mild fruit. The beans grow to like 1 meter long!
Black sapote – Mild chocolate pudding, v creamy.
Turmeric – Spicy carrot.
Cacao – Slimy nice fruit around a bitter seed that you can eat
Mamey sapote – Kind of the texture of avocado, but sweet.
Nagami – Like a mini-orange but you can eat the whole thing, peel and all. Delightful!
Yellow sapote/canastelle – Like a cooked yam.
Abiu – Watery, sweet, nice.
Overall very cool. All of them were pretty nice, probably the Yellow mangosteen and the Nagami were my favourites. And I didn’t get itchy!
That night I did a nocturnal tour. It was a semi-interesting tour… we saw a few sleeping birds (cute little balls of floof), another Forest Dragon (much further away), a cool triangle-shaped spider, and a few other things. The guide was a little strange, very dry humour which was hard to interact with. I didn’t take any pictures because I don’t really have the right equipment for that, but I did learn a bit about spotlighting and I would like to do that again.
Day 6:
I did one last cheap crocodile cruise because why not and also I thought it might be another chance to see some fun birds. We did see quite a few crocs but surprisingly not a single bird. The boat captain looked about 95 years old and I was not entirely sure he could see ANYTHING, but he did point out all the crocs somehow!
Then I drove to Port Douglas. I stopped on the way for a scoop of mango sorbet, and did another quick lap of the Jindalba boardwalk, but still no cassowary.
I booked snorkeling for the next day and had a fancy lady late lunch in Port Douglas. But I got overwhelmed by how busy it was everywhere so I just grabbed some groceries and headed back up the squiggly road to the Tablelands.
The van. Organising and charging stuff.
Day 7:
More snorkeling! #YOLO. The boat was much bigger so even though the weather wasn’t great again, it was slightly more comfortable for the much longer trip.
We went to three different spots on the Agincourt Reef.
The first one was much deeper than the other day. The coral was not as colourful and the current was much stronger. I saw one very massive fish that both me and my snorkel buddy immediately looked at each other and were like WHOA BIG FISH in sign language.
The second one was two “underwater mountains” you can snorkel all the way around, however the current was very strong on one side and it was quite hard work. Didn’t really enjoy.
The third one was the best one!! No currents! It was deeper, and had these massive coral walls. There was one spot we went in that was almost 360 degree bowl of amazing coral all around us, but then the guy in the safety boat told us we had to go out of there because soon the tide would be down too far and we might get stuck. We saw lots of interesting fish: long skinny yellow ones, ones with unicorn horns, ones that bury themselves in the sand. It was nice and relaxing where you could just float in one spot and just spend some time looking around at everything.
Proof of life photo.
Super low King tide. Even the guides were surprised to see so much coral sticking out of the water. It can’t be good for the coral. But also it must be fine because this is a thing that happens every year. And aren’t ocean levels rising?
I didn’t really talk to many people on my whole trip so I think this is my only non-selfie picture of me, lol. But my snorkel buddy ended up being quite interesting, even though initially I didn’t really want a snorkel buddy. I’m not sure how we started on the topic but he was actually a big board game enthusiast and we spent the whole boat ride back talking about games.
Day 8 (Last Day):
Went to a mango farm in Mareeba to try mango wine. I wasn’t a big fan of the wine but I found the farm interesting. Apparently December is when everything just goes bonkers and there’s tons and tons of (delicious) work. I want to live there.
I quickly stopped in to Barron Falls for a last ditch attempt to see a cassowary. I’m pretty sure this is where MEP saw one!! I did not.
I had a quick sushi lunch and visit to Birdworld in Kuranda. There were indeed a lot of birds in there but zero educational info, which I found to be a bummer. Also I don’t think people should touch birds.
I came back to Cairns and cleaned up the van. I had a bit of extra time so I went to the Esplanade again. Even at low-tide, and only in about 20 minutes, I saw a lot of humongous mud crabs, a Masked Lapwing, Sacred Kingfisher, and a Scaly-breasted Munia. I was quite pleased. Apparently you can see even more when it’s high tide because the water pushes all the birds closer.
I had to drop off the van at 4pm, and couldn’t really do anything more since I had my suitcase so I just went to the airport, even though my flight wasn’t until 8pm, which got delayed to about 10:30pm. Got a lot of knitting done, the first time I’d gotten it out all trip. I got back to Melbourne at 1:30AM, yuck. Took an Uber home and collapsed in bed and slept for ages.
Overall the trip was 10/10 amazing. I spotted 71 different types of birds. Saw impossible looking insects. I learned about rainforests and mangroves and other nature-y things. I learned new birdwatching and spotlighting techniques. I got to do so many fun activities and also relaxed a lot. I read 1.75 books. I sweated. I’d go back any time!!
I had a lot more holiday than Scott and was feeling cold so decided to go on a trip by myself. I flew up to Cairns, rented a campervan, and spent a week traveling around Far North Queensland. It was great.
DAY 1:
Had to wake up at 4am to go to the airport. Scott drove me even though I insisted that I could just take an Uber. Why is he so nice.
Esplanade Pelicans.The Prawn Star boats.
I spent the first day in Cairns. I picked up the van and then checked out the Brushturkeys and mosquitos in the Botanic Gardens. Then headed into town to eat some seafood and get supplies for the week ahead.
Then I drove up the hill into the Tablelands to spend the night at the Mareeba Drive-in. I had a vegan burger and watched Where The Crawdads Sing and then fell asleep 20 minutes into the second movie. A long day.
DAY 2:
Sarus Crane.Straw-necked Ibis.Cattle egret.Great Bowerbird and bower.
Chestnut-breasted Mannikin on sugarcane.
Woke up at 6AM to drive to Atherton to meet a bird nerd for a birding tour. There was another couple around my age from Sydney on the tour as well, which was cool. We drove all around the area and looked at tons and tons of birds. The guide, Patrick, knew every single bird and was very good at making sure that each of us got a good sighting of each bird. It was very cool, and very overwhelming. I really want to get a nice pair of binoculars now, it makes a huge difference.
I didn’t get many good pictures that day because a lot of the birds were teeny tiny or fast moving. But I saw heaps of cool birds like Pacific Baza, Blue-winged Kookaburra, Red-winged Parrot, Pale-headed Rosella, Scaly-breasted Lorikeet, Red-backed Fairywren and tons and tons more.
The Bowerbird was probably the easiest bird for Patrick to show us, but was still one of my favourites. They’re just so weird and unique! Great Bowerbirds like white shiny objects (and Satin Bowerbirds like blue things).
Bananas in bags.
After birding all morning I made a quick stop at Granite Gorge to see the tiny rock wallabies. Then drove down the twisty road towards the Daintree. I saw lots of banana, avocado, mango and sugarcane fields. Why do I love seeing different crops so much.
Big tree at the caravan park in Daintree.
DAY 3:
The Daintree River.
Rainbow Bee-eater.
Azure Kingfisher.Great-billed Heron.Shining Flycatcher.Common Tree Snake.
6:30AM wakeup! This time for a morning bird watching river cruise. Was cool to get a bit closer to the birds. I think that Rainbow Bee-eater pic is my favourite of the whole trip. We also saw a few snakes and crocs.
Tropical AF.
Boyd’s Forest Dragon
I continued driving towards Cape Tribulation, constantly on the lookout for cassowary. Jindalba Boardwalk is supposed to be a common place to see them but all I saw was a stupid dragon. Just kidding, the dragon was SUPER AWESOME. I went around the boardwalk two times.
I remember stopping at this ice cream place FOURTEEN YEARS ago. This time I was very happy that they had a dairy free version of their special tasting cups. This had coconut, mango, soursop, and something like razzleberry?? I couldn’t really understand what she said. They were yum.
The boardwalks around Cape Tribulation are awesome. Madja Boardwalk was very mangrovey. I saw this crazy bug! How does this exist in real life?
That night I went out for dinner and had to eat on a couch because I didn’t make a reservation (Queensland tourism is booming yo). I felt like I was at home. Then I read my book and went to bed early. Delightful.
DAY 4:
7AM wakeup for snorkelling! The company kept telling us that it was going to be a really rough day. It definitely was a very moistly boat ride out to the reef. Thankfully it was only a 30 minute trip, which is very short for the Great Barrier Reef. And thankfully we had wetsuits and raincoats to help with the constant drenching splashes.
The weather was great out at the reef!!
Nemo.
Big ass clam.
The snorkelling was ok! I thought the reef would be in worse shape, tbh. I saw a turtle, some type of ray, a few clown fish, lots of other fish, and heaps of really really big giant clams… like as big as a car. They look like galaxies on the inside.
It was not the easiest snorkelling, a lot of waves and a bit cold. Visibility was great though. I was extremely greatful for a hot shower afterwards.
The lunar schedule aligned with a weekend with no hockey so I booked us a weekend away in the country to attempt to do some astrophotography.
We went out for dinner at Fergusson Winery in the Yarra Valley on the way out. Good thing I made a reservation! Haha. I told Scott I reserved the whole restaurant for a truly romantic experience.
We had cured kingfish and beef carpaccio, Angus beef and confit duck. Everything was lovely except for the potato with the steak, very paste-y.
The Airbnb had a wood-fired hot tub. Like Kyla’s hot tub! They had it warm for us when we got there, so we stoked the fire and sat in it until we got too cold. We could see a bit of the milky way but by the time we got out of the hot tub it had clouded over.
The cabin was on a little farm overlooking a valley. Very scenic.
It was a cold weekend. We spent a lot of time on the deck with the heat lamp blasting, reading and knitting and crocheting. Very cozy.
I also spent the entire second day trying to heat the hot tub up again. It took FOREVER.
The lamb was only one day old!!!
Scott doing a dramatic horse rescue. The horse had hooked himself on to the fence and we knew the owner was going away that day! Scott used my advice of saying “easy” a lot (I learned that from Heartland), and managed to set him free. Good job Scott.
Trespassing (not really) to look at birds. My friend helped me identify a new to me bird: Grey Shrikethrush.
How is this comfortable for either participant?
Kind of a nice picture until you realise that they’re standing in a horse poo and their beaks are covered in poo from them digging around in it for snacks. Yum!
I don’t have any astro pics to show you. The second night was even cloudier than the first. A lot of things have to come together at the same time to be able to shoot the milky way. Especially when really don’t like staying up very late. I probably won’t have another chance until next winter, but I’ve resolved to plan a bit more ahead next year.
