Gara Gorge in Winter

Last Sunday we took a picnic lunch and an afternoon bushwalk at Gara Gorge in Oxley Wild Rivers National Park. It was considerably less green than the last time we were there a few months ago.  Overall a bit gray, with the exception of these one type of wattle or acacia tree. (Feather wattle? Not sure what it is exactly, but you could tell they were all the same thing because they were the only green things.) (I will probably never know for sure.)

(This pied currawong doesn't like you looking at him but I couldn't resist.)

The scenery has become a bit monochromatic in the winter

(Except for these bright green trees.)

The difference is startling--looking back I had forgotten how lush and green everything seemed three months ago.  It seems like it's been winter for a long time... (about ten months, to be exact.)

Then... (April)

...and now.

We didn't see very much wildlife for most of the hike; lunch by the lake was accompanied by ducks and some loud amphibians (assumedly frogs), and of course currawongs and magpies and a couple noisy miners, but once we left the picnic area it was pretty quiet.  Once in a while there was the chitter-chattering of these tiny birds, always clustered in small groups. They are unbelievably small--so tiny they can hang upside down from the thin, feathery leaves.  (Reid reminded me that we also saw some other tiny birds, so tiny they were hopping on the thick algae on top of a pond, walking on water.  I think they might have been fairy wrens, but either way: so tiny!)

Towards the end of our walk we also saw some white-eared honeyeaters, and then a kangaroo, bounding across the hill.  It's always really cool when you can see them jumping for a longer period of time; they're always surprisingly graceful, and utterly silent.

Lichenostomus leucotis