"The wonders of the Australi ..." a Australia Travel Page by iandsmith

One of my passions is bushwalking. From bandicoots to bats, kangaroos to koalas, lizards to lyrebirds, platypus to parrots, wombats to wallabies; it's all here and it's wonderful.
This is the great difference between the forests of Europe and New Zealand compared to Oz - the wildlife.
Birds are abundant and in all sorts of shapes and sizes. Stop anywhere for ten minutes on your walk and I'll guarantee you'll see at least one but probably dozens.
I'll continually add to this site and I hope you enjoy.

This is a blue-faced honeyeater (a lot of thought went into that name) and it can be found in groups of 2-10 especially where nectar is available. It's also known as a banana bird because it likes to eat bananas as well.
If you know where banksias flower then you will find a prolific number of wonderfully coloured birds who will generally let you get really close to them.
Everywhere you go in the bush there are birds - small ones, large ones, pretty ones, dull ones, shy ones, bold ones and the most incredible noise making bird in the world - the lyre bird. It can copy any noise you care to make - other bird calls, camera clicking, police siren. It is truly amazing.
The best place to see these is in the southern highlands.

There are some people who just love being out in the bush (other than myself that is). This is one of those people. His name is Frank and Frank is someone who has shown me the New England area and awakened an interest in the region, one that I knew little about.
As you can see here, granite is the base on which this part of the Great Dividing Range is places and it is apparent in many places.
It goes for hundreds of kilometres and appears in many different shapes, usually of a rounded variety.
This shot was taken near the town of Uralla.

Trees are homes. Old growth forests mean there are holes in the tree where animals can live, faults where lizards can hide and an assortment of other indignities that go with the territory.
This Myrtle has three trunks which indicates it used to grow around something else and has survived whilst everything else has perished. It's a survivor in a harsh world, this time in southern Victoria where heavy rainfall (for Australia) and strong winds can make life precarious.

This is one of N.S.W. better known falls. I suspect the reasons for this are: ease of access and ease of viewing. Personally, I only rate them as average but, if it gets people thinking about the beauty of nature then I shouldn't complain.

Dangar Falls is well worth a look if you are in the New England area of N.S.W. It is a spectacular drop and gorge and, if you walk on further you can just about guarantee that you will come across an echidna.
This shot is taken at the top, before the falls, just on sunset.

This place is primaeval. Tasmania's west coast will stay that way because (a) the environmentalists want it to and (b) the weather can be really crap!
It was very near here that the background scenes for the BBC documentary "Walking with Dinosaurs" were filmed.
Lake St. Clair is at one end of "The Overland Track". At the other end is an Australian icon, Cradle Mountain. The walk between them takes about four days and the words "wild" and "wilderness" will cross your lips often should you choose to take it.

In certain places you will see fungus; especially on fallen trees. It comes in all shapes (but mainly round), sizes and colours. This was taken at Washpool National Park on the Gwydir Highway

Many of the wonderful forests have made walks, many do not. The choice is up to you. This shot is taken at Henry Falls in an obscure part of the Guy Fawkes National Park.
To get there involves going through some private property (you have right of way) before manouvering your way down a steep gorge.
There have been more people on Mount Everest than have seen these falls, a situation not unique in the forests of Australia.

These falls are in Dorrigo National Park. This is about half way up the north coast of N.S.W. and it has been declared a National Heritage Area.
To get to these you should go via the Redwood Creek track which is a wonderful bushwalk as it follow the stream for about half and hour or more.
The sound of cascading rivulets amidst a backdrop of eucalyptus rainforest and abundant birdlife will bring your senses to life.
If you go while it's wet you can even pick up some wildlife (or maybe it's the other way around). I'm referring to leeches here! I picked 6 off and my partner scored 7 when I stopped to take this pic.

This is part of a place on the Gwydir Highway between Glen Innes and Grafton called Washpool. It's a National Park and you have to pay a small fee but there are plenty of walks and facilities there. If you can manage to get there after rain the experience will be better and the streams present a more active landscape.
Hear the gurgle as the streamlet slips between the granite boulders babbles into the next pool? The chatter of scrub wrens and the on high rustling of the eucalypts as the afternoon breeze wafts across the rain forest canopy. Everyone should learn to enjoy nature.