Murwillumbah, the town that parking forgot!

This morning’s pleasant sight was mist in the valley.  It was pretty dense up the Tweed Valley past Mt Warning but pleasantly patchy out on the flood plain.

We decided that today was the day to go and explore Murwillumbah, starting off with an alleged Egret nest site just out of town.  Before getting to town we found a bunch of Royal Spoonbills dining in a ditch beside a cane field. 

That is more than was at the Egret nest site (to be fair the Tweed bird guide did say they nested in Spring, not mid-Winter).

We then went to the Visitors Centre to see what they had in the way of walks around the town.  The short answer was very little: it was almost as though there are the beaches to the East and National Parks everywhere else and no history in the town itself.  The people at the centre were extremely helpful and gave me some stuff, and suggested that Nobby’s Creek Rd would be a good place to go for a walk with a dog because it had very little traffic. 

Before doing that I needed to access the internet so we headed to the library.  Nowhere to park there.  There was a street next door with a car park off it: all spots reserved for Shire employees.  Various other streets were tried and no sensible parking was on offer.   After about 15 minutes searching I found a tightish spot on the main drag and parked there.  Frances went for a wander avec chienne while I checked who was trying to contact me (and the rainfall for last week).  In the course of this stroll she noted a sign on a gate “Warning Security dogs on duty.  The remains of trespassers will be buried”.

So we then needed nutrients (a pie and an apple turnover in my case) which required a park in the CBD.  I presume all the shop workers park out front of their places of employment because we drove right along the street before we found a spot.  Possibly this isn’t bad, but I have grown used to there being parking lots around to which one is directed.

Having got enough calories to feed a village in a developing country we headed off to Nobbys Creek Rd.  It was an interesting road through pasture, with some remnants of forest here and there.  The little traffic was a relative term: compared to the Pacific Highway (or the New Jersey Turnpike) it had little traffic.  Compared to Widgiewa Rd, Carwoola it was 4 times as busy as when all the slaves are heading to work or dropping the kids off at the school bus stop.  (Looking later at a topo map of the area it emerged that rather than 2.5 km long, as implied by a sign at the start, the road was about 10km long with about 100 homes along it.  No wonder it was busier than expected.)  However we did find some good birds: a flock of 20+ Topknot Pigeons (the first I have seen for about 20 years) and a Little Shrike-thrush (my second ever).

After this stroll we went back to our abode where I went exploring the garden and surrounding rainforest.  Herewith a few images (nothing is named because I really don't know what they are, other than very pleasant to look at.

One item that was recognisable was the biggest cane toad I have ever seen.  Not quite the size of a football as some were reputed to be before inbreeding got to them, but still about 2x the size of yesterday's specimens.  The strip of tape was >15cm long.

One issue with walking around in rainforest is that some of the vegetation is rather unfriendly.  After looking at plants like those in the next two images, and thinking about Mr Weissmuller swinging from vine to vine, I have concluded that "Tarzan" is actually a Bantu word word meaning 'person with no skin on hands'.