Stone the Beach Curlews!

Bird of the Day:  No-one gets near the Beach Stone-curlew.  Rare in NSW and the first time I have scored it here after about 5 attempts!

Plant of the Day:  Wallum plant community

Scene of the Day;  Red Rock Headland

Art of the day;  Grafton Anglican Cathedral – in its widest sense.  As an alternative - noting that art includes dancing - the comments by the folk from Bangarra about how they design their work in a landscape was fantastic.

Typically Australian thing of the day:  Surf lifesaving clubs

Maximum Temperature 21 Minimum temperature  10

Distance traveled with camper 0 without camper 160

An excellent night's sleep, lulled by the white noise of the very rough seas crashing on the beach a few metres away.  And what a great beach it is, running South for about 4km to Arrawatta and North for 6.5km to Red Rock.  It is all off leash area for dogs (although we were reluctant to let herself off).

I shall fix up the names of flowers when I have finished the first draft.  This is I think a Scaevola.

Definitely a Blue-faced Honeyeater!

Our first call was to Red Rock which is the next settlement to the North.  These are the red rocks in question.

We ducked over the headland and on to a small beach at the mouth of the Creek (which is actually bigger than any River in South Australia, except the Murray).  More nice rocks

The idea of coming here was to look for Beach Stone Curlews for which this is the best site in the area.  I'd tried for them several times and dipped, but this time as soon as she looked Frances commented on the 'funny looking waders'.  Bingo: two Stone-curlews.

I went a bit further up the Creek to get closer to the birds and while I was looking at them I heard youth-type noises from where Frances had stayed but there didn't seem to be any issues so took my snap.

On rejoining Frances there were a fair bunch of indigenous youth with an older bloke - Mark -talking to them.  Frances said to keep quiet and listen as it was very interesting.  Indeed it was: it seemed to be a formal education trip for them to learn about their history and culture in the area.  Mark stressed that it was up to these kids to learn the stories and what they mean.  He then told "what he could" about the history of this area including a massacre that happened on the headland in the 1880s. The linked page gives a fair summary of the story and the background to the project.

Mark introduced a couple of other folk who were from Bangarra Dance Company and they explained a bit about how they visit places and take films which the dance designers build into their performance.  Again they stressed the importance of learning the stories and passing them on.

I am often cycnical about such matters, but this was very interesting and the sincerity so obvious it was very moving.

Moving away from the mouth of the Creek we passed the surk life-saving club and walked though the canophobic campground.  (We would have stayed there if they allowed dogs, but I really think Corindi is better! So we got lucky!)

Behind Corindi is a nice heathland and some of it is not in the National Park so we could explore with Tam.  The most obvious flowers were these Phyllotus sp.

Epacris sp. were doing their stuff, well before those in the Canberra area perform.

Hakea sp.

I think this is a Callistemon sp. ...

.. and this is a Melaleuca sp. ...

.. but as the forces of evil have lumped them, to quote Buddy Holly "I guess it really doesn't matter anymore."

This one I can remember: although the flower looks a bit like a Kunzea parvifolia it is actually Melaleuca thymifolia!

A Fan-tailed Cuckoo was posing nicely and sending a message that Spring is on the way (at least it is, 700 km North of Carwoola)

Stackhousia sp?

I think the second line makes the fourth line redundant!

A Yellow-tailed Black Cockatoo destroying a Banksia cone.

We then zipped on back up the road to Grafton, where a set of old bridges - the high is road and the lower rail -were interesting.

We then visited a Cathedral of Commerce (aka Dan Murphy's liquor store) to replenish essential groceries in the form of wine.  Next was a peek at and into the Cathedral

I rated the mural in a side chapel very highly.

This is the Court House: as usual one of the most imposing buildings in the town

The War Memorial was right beside the Clarnce River and had a most interesting set of memorials.  I have included this plaque because it commemorates a local boy who made good and because later in the day ....

... abut 5km out of town we came across this

at Swan Creek, commemorating the same guy.  I presume this was his family home.  More from the main Memorial Park.

A fairly common view about the RTA, expressed on the side of a large shed at Swan Creek.

I presume the shed is felt likely to be in the way of an RTA road widening project.

Outside the Cathedral these sculpted Magpie Geese adorned a fountain.

A bit North up the Highway these Magpie Geese adorned a small swamp.

We also explored some of the birding drives suggested for the area, but they were not very productive as it was still windy.  So returned to the camper.

A large group were having a party - of an exceptionally quiet nature, but still enjoying themselves - in the camp kitchen.  It turned out they members of Sutherland Shire Probus clubs who have a trip way every year which includes a Christmas in July event.  This was it.  Lovely people one and all!

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To (and at) Newcastle

Packing the car was completed with relatively few problems.  We have always employed a division of labour under which Frances packs all the items into containers and I fit the containers into the car.  Of course having  car available (even with the back seat occupied by a small dog means we get to take a fair bit of stuff with us).  This image shows the unpack at Mullaway.

 The sink and washing machine aren't ours!

The day started a little strangely as we had to go to Queanbeyan to pick up the modem for Virgin Broadband, in the expectation that it would work somewhere along the way.  The background to this is discussed on my other blog. 

Another strange part of the day was that I had only scored about 3 hours sleep the night before and as a result was not feeling too flash.  In fact I felt rather rats faeces (isn’t it interesting that faeces is OK, but a word meaning the same, but beginning with ‘s’is rude?).  A brewing sinus didn’t help!  However I pressed on and the drive to Sydney was pretty reasonable.

Surprisingly there were no cop cars visible on the drive up to Sydney.  The only noteworthy thing seen was a people mover coloured pink and apparently belonging to Susie (as per the number plate) of the St George Dragon Girls (as per the lurid text over the rest of the vehicle).  The 8km of roadworks around Campbelltown was a pain in the gluteal region (isn’t it interesting that gluteal region is OK but a word meaning the same, but beginning with ‘a’is rude?).

We filled up with petrol in Pennant Hills and appeared to be getting >33mpg!  Is this a side effect of the new Cooper tyres?  We moved right along towards Newcastle which Frances navigated us through – displaying great lateral thinking in realising the importance of the location of Mater Hospital in getting to Stockton Bridge.

The business at Stockton was birding. I was initially pleased to see a hide and despatched Frances and Tammy off to other parts while I birded.  Then I found the hide to be locked.  Drat!  On noticing the number of beer bottles and bongs around the place I could understand this. Despite most of the shorebirds being on breeding duties in the Arctic I added a few species to my year-list and got the trip-list kicked off. 

On to the B&B which we found easily in Hamilton.  After a minimalist install there we went for a wander off to Beaumont St to get some tea.  We concluded this area was the equivalent of Paddington. With a horde of restaurants and at least 6 pharmacies in 500m all our needs were soon satisfied (including a snorter for the sinus).

Due to my tiredness I was not awake for long after getting back to the B&B: some of the take-away Green Chicken Curry was to accompany us when we departed.  I got into bed about 1845 and sacked out immediately.  Despite a few disturbances as Tammy was agitated by another guest pooch I slept until about 5:30 the next morning.  I felt a lot better!

Onwards to Mullaway

On waking I went to take Tammy for a walk.  Drat: the sky doth micturate (isn’t it interesting that micturate is OK but a word meaning the same, but beginning with ‘p’is rude?).  What is it about short words?

Breakfast (definitely in the gourmet category) was enlivened by conversation with Laraine and Colin (our hosts) and another two guests.  Much amusement was generated by trying to sort out what would happen if Tammy and the other two guest-dogs (a Ridgeback and a Wiener-dog) got together.  The answer was going to be “apocalyptic devastation” so separation was enforced.  A great start to the day. 

The rain continued until we got almost to Kempsey where we refuelled: again over 33mpg!  Interestingly we were told where the discount petrol stations were by a cop who gave me an RBT (I passed, as I would hope to after only 1 glass of red last night – and none for breakfast today).  The other intriguing factor about the Kempsey area was the number of Cattle Egrets around the paddocks in the flood plain (a bit of foreshadowing there in the use of the word ‘flood’): possibly because this was the first area where we had been able to see paddocks rather than bush!

The driving was quite easy apart from the activities of a caravan-towing driver who drove at 10kph below the limit on 2 lane and 10kph over the limit on overtaking lanes.  Ban the van – or allow RPG launchers on other vehicles!  The only mentally ugly roadworks (physically/visually there is no other form of roadworks) were from Sapphire to Woolgoolga where we were limited to 80kph for (a) 10kms and (b) no apparent reason.  Obviously as it was a Saturday no-one was working.

As we drove along we heard a weather forecast.  It was talking about a flood warning for the North Coast.  Oops: we are not heading South!  The forecaster then said something along the lines of “This forecast is probably conservative” and mentioned 40 –70mm Sunday and 30-40mm each for Monday and Tuesday.  Oh poop.  (Watching TV in the evening the weatherperson singled out Coffs Harbour for mention of thunderstorms! But we are about 15km North of Coffs so perhaps it won’t affect us?)

We found the letting agent and the house and got into it.  The back yard is basically dog fenced but I suspect Tam could find her way out.  The place seems great and the surroundings just what I wanted with a nice dog-allowed beach and some nice heathland to check out.  Some of the Melaleucas are very photogenic as were the Pandanus tectorius (Screw pine) fruits

and the banksias.

We will now have a commercial break.  We were lent, by a naturalist friend, a copy of “Noosa’s Native Plants” by Stephanie Haslam.  Although we are a fair few km South of Noosa we were told this was going to be very helpful and such has proven to be the case.   We also have with us “Ocean Shores to Desert Dunes” by David Keith which covers the native vegetation formations of NSW and the ACT.  As well as describing the vegetation and the soils and situations in which they are found it also gives typical species.  So I am hopeful that by melding these two sources of information we’ll know a bit more about what we are looking at.  A future post on my main blog may cover more on this topic.

After traversing the beach – no signs about banning dogs (Great Lakes Shire please note) – the walk took us on a good bitumen path around a headland.  The only other folk we saw at this stage were three young blokes rock fishing below the cliff.  This may correlate with the memorial sign to “a great dad” at the top of the cliff.  As we came back (since rain seemed imminent) we met the three young persons, each carrying two or three fish, described as “only tailor”.  Since we had seen the remains of a tuna (ie a metre long fish, missing the fillets)

on the beach I could understand the inclusion of ‘only’.   Shortly thereafter we saw, and heard a member of the local intelligentsia doing burnouts with a ute.  The first mild negative for the area!

Getting back to the beach we saw a young woman with two big dogs there. Tammy was hot to go and discuss issues with them, but it didn’t happen: given the relative size of footprints that was probably a good thing!

Several birds were added to the trip list (now at 32) including Torresian Crows and Australian Gannet.  These and 9 other species also did some good for my year list.  A very pleasant evening ensued watching the huge plasma TV with Austar access.

La Nina gets upgraded (again)

As forecast the rain has continued more or less constantly through the night.  I recall a trip to Cape Yorke in which there was quite a lot of rain and I decided that the term ‘La Nina’ was not really good since it only reversed the gender. Having in the interim improved my Spanish (from zero to trivial) I now suggest that the better term for what is going on here is La Vieja which also reverses age.  I will also note en passant that yesterday’s temperature range for Coffs Harbour was 13 min to 14 max!

I have just checked in to ABC News 24 TV.  The two places which have received the heaviest rainfall seem to be Yamba (in a straight line, 75kms North of here) and Evans Head (about 100kms).  They have both scored over 120mm of rain in the past 24 hours, with Evans Head coming in at 184mm.   When I get back to internet access I will put in some details. 

The news also covered the impact of the volcanic ash cloud from Chile: we may be getting a bit damp, but at least we haven’t spent 2 days waiting for a flight to happen.  I am astonished that an ash cloud is still an issue after it has blown from Chile across the Atlantic, Indian and (a fair chunk of the) Southern Oceans.  One news service implied that the people providing the advisory service are a private enterprise group – this immediately called to mind the episode in Sydney where a group marketing a water testing service ‘discovered’ a problem, later found to have been introduced by pterodactyl poop.  To misquote from ‘Field of Dreams’: if you monitor it you will find it.

I am beginning to rethink my plan of taking the back roads to Tomewin: the rivers around this way are rather more serious than the two in South Australia! (Possibly because they normally have more work to do in returning rain from whence it came.)

Today’s post could be called “Walking a Soggy Doggy”.  About 10am we decided the rain had calmed down enough to go for a stroll.  Frances had remembered to pack our waterproof trousers so they were donned and off we went around the roads towards Arawarra headland.  I thought this would be about a 6km trip.  I think I got the distance about right but our expectations about the lack of rain were well wrong: it pissed down.  (Sorry about the rude word but it was well past micturation level.)

The next image shows the drain imaged in yesterday's post.  Or at least it shows the torrent overflowing it!

However it was an interesting walk around the area.  There are an interesting mix of houses, from fibro shacks

to rather large architect-designed places. 

There are a number of nice gardens around (hint: lush gardens do not signal a drought zone) with lots of tropical/subtropical plants such as gingers. 

Some of the buildings have unusual designs painted on them.

An interesting observation was the number of tractors around (typically Fergsuson TE 20s – the world’s greatest agricultural device).  They seem to be used mainly for pulling boats down to the water.

Two good birds were added to various lists during the walk: Wonga Pigeon and Spangled Drongo.  The secenery was still great.

Although distinctly wet, the small dog seemed to enjoy herself greatly.  Even at the end her tail was still curled forwards and she was still keen to sniff things and mark her territory.  The latter possibly enabled her to pick the right turn off the main road and swing into ‘our’ drive. (Later evidence suggests this was coincidence.)

After the walk I went to the Mullaway Store to get a loaf of bread and enquired of the lady there what the rainfall had been thus far.  She said that someone had reported 190mm not counting this morning’s contribution. The weather forecast has got Evans Head up to about 240mm by Monday evening.  The rain is supposed to start moderating tomorrow!

Shortly after returning the sun shone briefly!  This made me think about going to take some snaps of the nice gardens etc.  Of course as I walked out the door it began to rain again!  This meant I stayed around the house and thus added Satin Bowebird (4 green birds and one beautiful blue bird)

and Common Myna (boo, hiss).  This has the trip list up to 49 and the Mullaway list to 36.

Mullaway’s ambience has taken a bit of a hit on the Monday as the neighbours appear to have returned (or at least their children have become evident through auditory channels).  That being said, when met they seemed quite reasonable kids.

Rain total today was 121.0mm: that is getting a bit serious.

Where Canberra birds spend Winter

An excellent nights sleep and up to find the fire had kept going all night and thus warmed the lounge quickly once I got up.  As we are only about 10km in a straight line from coastal rainforest it is thought provoking how cold it can get overnight.  I initially suspected this might be to do with altitude: my research on Google Earth suggested this area (like the place we stayed at Tomewin, which also needed a fire in the evening) is about 300m elevation.  However my GPS, used in situ, suggests 36m which is much more in line with my memory of the vertical relationship between this place and the sea.  Possibly the on-line system is registering somewhere else as Topi?

When we last stayed here we were visited by a Staffordshire Bull Terrier.  Pebble the Ravens: it turned up again on our first morning!  A very affable pooch but as I said before, if things got serious Tammie would, I suspect, be mincemeat (and so would anyone that tried to intervene).  Eventually I persuaded it to disappear from whence it came (which turns out to be a house about 1500m away) and we took Tammie for a walk along Topi road.  A very pleasant stroll recording several additions to the trip list (all common Summer birds in Canberra).  No more signs of the Staffie but a small white hairy beast did come and work its way through the entire sniff-routine with cooperation and participation from herself.

After a few hours creative sitting on the deck reading an excellent book (‘Bad Form” by Simon Brett) I decided to go on a bird prowl and explore the firebreaks being created round the property.  My idea in doing this was to get into some of the areas from which I could hear birdcalls.  Being a twerp, I went out without my camera. 

[A small parenthesis.  Some readers of my efforts have been known to say that orchids are more important than birds.  To quote the late Frankie Howerd: “No, no: don’t laugh at the afflicted!”.   The following may keep them happy.]

After sloshing around a bit in the swamp downstream from the dam the fire break got a tad scenic so a need to follow a contour kicked in.  Almost as soon as I got off the break I realised the forest floor was carpeted in orchid leaves.  And greenhood flowers!  Reverting to an earlier thrust about the length of acceptable and unacceptable words I believe the 6 letter word ‘sodomy’ is acceptable while another 6 letter word, beginning with ‘b’ and meaning the same, is only accepted in special interest groups. So, not wishing to offend anyone I will say ‘Sodomy it!  I don’t have my camera.’  I marked my point of departure from the track with a branch laid across it and headed for the house.  I got there having reminded myself a couple of times how Lawyer Vine got its name.  (Once it gets its hooks into you it never lets go.)

On getting the camera I took off and bush bashed my way back to the track, about 5m from my marker!  A few snaps were taken and I suddenly realised that as well as the greenhoods

there were midge orchid (Acianthus sp) leaves.  And one of them had a flower.  The greenhood has been identified as Pterostylis nutans (thanks Tony Jean and Denis)

I planned to take Francie back to see these but she didn’t fancy battling the lawyer vine so I marked the spot with surveyors tape and wandered back to the house.  We all then went for a walk and found an absolute heap of midge orchids.  Some difficulty followed in getting decent images in this dark forest in mid-Winter but the following are not too bad.  I checked the area again the next day and – to my surprise - everything was as before!

 These have since been identified as Acianthus fornicatus.  Again thanks T, J and D.

To top off a lovely day Frances spotted a Bar-shouldered Dove: an addition to my Topi list albeit the second on this trip.  As a slight counterpoint to these good vibes I should note that invertebrate wars reared their head again today: we saw a leech as we looked at one bunch of orchid rosettes and when I took my boots off I found a red patch (not wine – too early in the day and I am drinking the Chardonnay tonight) on a sock.  As far as I can establish Tam has not participated in this struggle.  That statement is made after I gave her a fair searching when I had to wash her thoroughly following her finding both fox and ‘roo crap to roll in!