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gemfyre25/3/2011
I actually slept pretty well out at Billabong. Of course the flies appeared in droves as soon as the sun did, so I must have packed up the fastest I ever have. Due to the infuriatingness of the flies and the fact that I wanted some good roadhouse food, I opted for breakfast at the roadhouse – a chicken and cheese crumbed sausage and a bottle of V8. Worked for me. I was on the road by 7:30.
The usual method to get rid of flies in your car is to drive for a bit at speed with the windows down. While this does get rid of a lot of them, I've found that about 20 tenacious flies will grip onto the dashboard until I put the windows back up, then commence flying about and annoying me again.
I pulled in at Galena Bridge to take a look at the change in the Murchison. About this time last year it was just a series of pools and smelled pretty badly of rotting vegetation. This year the river has recently flooded and it is flowing healthily. Oddly this has resulted in less water birds (read – none), but at least the stink has gone.
It was about 10am when I got to the first of the gorges. Again, the river is flowing everywhere with rapids occasionally and the views were fantastic as usual. I opted to not take the track right down to the riverbank due to my dodgy knee.
I did however negotiate my way to Nature's Window, because I didn't get the opportunity to visit here last year because it was just too damn hot. It was pretty warm this year (and the flies, oh the flies), but there was a wind blowing (apparently the reason for the plethora of flies) and it was tolerable. More photos of breathtaking scenery were taken. I have visited a lot of gorges on this trip – Karijini, Millstream-Chichester, Cape Range and Kalbarri National Parks are all famous for their gorges. At least Nambung will give me some different scenery (and if you don't know what that is, you will have to wait until I get there to find out).
I decided to skip Z-Bend due to heat and flies and headed into town, arriving just after midday. After finding out that Rainbow Jungle is only $13.50 entry I decided what the heck, and headed out there for a look-see. Easiest birding ever. Check out my photos of Scarlet-chested Parrots, Hooded Parrots and Princess Parrots “in the wild”. It seems I am destined to not see Bourke's Parrot at all this trip. I missed them in the wild, and they also proved elusive in the walk-in aviary (along with the Varied Lorikeets, which were also hiding – at least I have seen them in the wild before). Most of the other parrots in there were sitting in plain sight, airing their wings and doing their darnedest to keep cool. Because they are all hand raised they're not fazed by people and you can walk right up to many of them, the photos speak for themselves. It was at Rainbow Jungle that I really started getting an idea of the amount of insects out here. Not only are the flies prolific, there are at least 3 species of butterfly swarming about the place, along with dragonflies and the odd grasshopper (these were more abundant further north and inland). Now it's dark the moths are having a party around all the lights – again in the tens of thousands. There are at least 50 on my camp-lamp alone.
I meandered back into town and booked my site. I chose to stay at Murchison Caravan Park this time because it's central. It was only after I booked that I realised that there was no pool here. Ah well. I couldn't really be bothered getting prepared to swim at the beach (the river is still a bit murky and the 'best' swimming beach turned out to be pretty damn choppy anyway). I sat at my campsite for a while (there is a picnic table already here) and managed to get the laptop charger working briefly and brought it back to half charge, before I tried to move the arrangement into the car and seem to have busted it for good. I opted for a powered site so I could recharge my almost flat camera and the jump-start battery.
I went for a brief wander down along the riverside then decided to check out some of the coastal gorges and the river mouth before heading to Finlay's for dinner.
Finlay's don't seem to be doing the whole “sing for your supper” thing anymore, but the place still has plenty of character. I ordered chilli mussles, “sans the chilli”. 18 huge greenlip mussels and chips and fried rice for $18. Not half bad. A couple from Tweed Heads who had seen me out at Nature's Window invited me to sit at their table and we chatted for about an hour about our travels.
So now it's two sleeps till home. Really looking forward to being cool and clean and insect-free. At least the showers here look pretty nice. About to utilise the facilities.
25/3/2011 (Billabong, Galena Bridge, Kalbarri National Park, Kalbarri)
Australian Raven
Australian Ringneck
Black-faced Cuckoo-shrike
Black-faced Woodswallow
Brown Falcon
Chiming Wedgebill (H)
Crested Pigeon
Crested Tern
Galah
Grey Shrike-thrush
Magpie Lark
Mistletoebird
Nankeen Kestrel
New Holland Honeyeater
Pacific Gull
Peaceful Dove
Pelican
Pied Butcherbird
Pied Cormorant
Red-tailed Black Cockatoo
Silver Gull
Silvereye (H)
Singing Honeyeater
Tree Martin
Weebill (H)
Welcome Swallow
Western Gerygone (H)
Whistling Kite
Willie Wagtail
Yellow-throated Miner (H)
Zebra Finch
All of today's photos are hidden behind this link.
I actually slept pretty well out at Billabong. Of course the flies appeared in droves as soon as the sun did, so I must have packed up the fastest I ever have. Due to the infuriatingness of the flies and the fact that I wanted some good roadhouse food, I opted for breakfast at the roadhouse – a chicken and cheese crumbed sausage and a bottle of V8. Worked for me. I was on the road by 7:30.
The usual method to get rid of flies in your car is to drive for a bit at speed with the windows down. While this does get rid of a lot of them, I've found that about 20 tenacious flies will grip onto the dashboard until I put the windows back up, then commence flying about and annoying me again.
I pulled in at Galena Bridge to take a look at the change in the Murchison. About this time last year it was just a series of pools and smelled pretty badly of rotting vegetation. This year the river has recently flooded and it is flowing healthily. Oddly this has resulted in less water birds (read – none), but at least the stink has gone.
 |
Galena Bridge - Murchison River Taken from the lower crossing, which I have no doubt was impassable in the flood. |
It was about 10am when I got to the first of the gorges. Again, the river is flowing everywhere with rapids occasionally and the views were fantastic as usual. I opted to not take the track right down to the riverbank due to my dodgy knee.
| Kalbarri National Park The rock formation that is actually the "Hawks Head" (looks nothing like a hawk to me). |
 |
I did however negotiate my way to Nature's Window, because I didn't get the opportunity to visit here last year because it was just too damn hot. It was pretty warm this year (and the flies, oh the flies), but there was a wind blowing (apparently the reason for the plethora of flies) and it was tolerable. More photos of breathtaking scenery were taken. I have visited a lot of gorges on this trip – Karijini, Millstream-Chichester, Cape Range and Kalbarri National Parks are all famous for their gorges. At least Nambung will give me some different scenery (and if you don't know what that is, you will have to wait until I get there to find out).
 |
Kalbarri National Park The famous Nature's Window. I took 3 photos of this, but my camera ate the other two. This was the best of the three though. The window isn't in a wall of rock, the outer edge is just out of shot in this photo. |
I decided to skip Z-Bend due to heat and flies and headed into town, arriving just after midday. After finding out that Rainbow Jungle is only $13.50 entry I decided what the heck, and headed out there for a look-see. Easiest birding ever. Check out my photos of Scarlet-chested Parrots, Hooded Parrots and Princess Parrots “in the wild”. It seems I am destined to not see Bourke's Parrot at all this trip. I missed them in the wild, and they also proved elusive in the walk-in aviary (along with the Varied Lorikeets, which were also hiding – at least I have seen them in the wild before). Most of the other parrots in there were sitting in plain sight, airing their wings and doing their darnedest to keep cool. Because they are all hand raised they're not fazed by people and you can walk right up to many of them, the photos speak for themselves. It was at Rainbow Jungle that I really started getting an idea of the amount of insects out here. Not only are the flies prolific, there are at least 3 species of butterfly swarming about the place, along with dragonflies and the odd grasshopper (these were more abundant further north and inland). Now it's dark the moths are having a party around all the lights – again in the tens of thousands. There are at least 50 on my camp-lamp alone.
| Rainbow Jungle Princess Parrot. Very hard to find in the wild (due to them hanging about at places like the northern Canning Stock Route), but a very common cage bird. |
 |
I meandered back into town and booked my site. I chose to stay at Murchison Caravan Park this time because it's central. It was only after I booked that I realised that there was no pool here. Ah well. I couldn't really be bothered getting prepared to swim at the beach (the river is still a bit murky and the 'best' swimming beach turned out to be pretty damn choppy anyway). I sat at my campsite for a while (there is a picnic table already here) and managed to get the laptop charger working briefly and brought it back to half charge, before I tried to move the arrangement into the car and seem to have busted it for good. I opted for a powered site so I could recharge my almost flat camera and the jump-start battery.
 |
Pot Alley One of the many coastal gorges south of Kalbarri. This is the southern end of the Zuytdorp Cliffs - which end at Steep Point near Shark Bay. |
I went for a brief wander down along the riverside then decided to check out some of the coastal gorges and the river mouth before heading to Finlay's for dinner.
| Kalbarri - Jacques Point There is no 2WD access to the northern shore of the river and the next bitumen road heading west is the one out to Shark Bay. I have been on that far beach on a horse, back in 1996. |
 |
Finlay's don't seem to be doing the whole “sing for your supper” thing anymore, but the place still has plenty of character. I ordered chilli mussles, “sans the chilli”. 18 huge greenlip mussels and chips and fried rice for $18. Not half bad. A couple from Tweed Heads who had seen me out at Nature's Window invited me to sit at their table and we chatted for about an hour about our travels.
So now it's two sleeps till home. Really looking forward to being cool and clean and insect-free. At least the showers here look pretty nice. About to utilise the facilities.
25/3/2011 (Billabong, Galena Bridge, Kalbarri National Park, Kalbarri)
Australian Raven
Australian Ringneck
Black-faced Cuckoo-shrike
Black-faced Woodswallow
Brown Falcon
Chiming Wedgebill (H)
Crested Pigeon
Crested Tern
Galah
Grey Shrike-thrush
Magpie Lark
Mistletoebird
Nankeen Kestrel
New Holland Honeyeater
Pacific Gull
Peaceful Dove
Pelican
Pied Butcherbird
Pied Cormorant
Red-tailed Black Cockatoo
Silver Gull
Silvereye (H)
Singing Honeyeater
Tree Martin
Weebill (H)
Welcome Swallow
Western Gerygone (H)
Whistling Kite
Willie Wagtail
Yellow-throated Miner (H)
Zebra Finch
All of today's photos are hidden behind this link.
