The Hinterlands
Driving back from O'Reilly's we saw a few roadsigns advertising some
interesting points of interest that we wouldn't have time for. So the
next day we set out again to the hinterlands west of Surfers Paradise
to visit a few other national parks.
Our first stop was a small rainforest that had a waterfall that flowed
into a sort-of cave. The forest was beautiful on that sunny day. We
followed the loop trail around the trees and easily found the waterfall.
It was pretty, but virtually unphotographable since the contrast of the
sunny day on the top severely interfered with the darkness of the cave
below. The hike was fairly short and we were on our way to Springbrook
National Park.
Driving through the ranchland Kelly spotted a large white bird that
landed in a huge tree near the side of the road. And then another one
landed in the same tree. I pulled over and we got out of the car to
get a closer look.
They were sulfur-crested cockatoos and they were eating the bottle-brush
flowers on the tree in between their raucous squawks.
Springbrook was interesting because it seemed to encompass lots of small
towns and roads. It wasn't just a parking lot and a visitors center.
Many people lived in the park.
The first hike we stopped at stopped us short. Only the waterfall lookout
portion was open. The path down to the base of the waterfall was closed
due to fire danger. Back in the parking lot we heard a lot of squawking
coming from a tall tree and saw our first rainbow lorikeets (we got great
pictures later on in the day). We also spotted a pair of pigeons on the
phone wire nearby. Even the pigeons in Australia were unique - check
out their party hats.
We drove towards another trail that lead to another waterfall. The
overlook was vast and the falls tall. On the way back to the car, we
spotted some more crimson rosellas. And then Kelly spotted a huge,
thick, black snake just off to the side of the path. We froze and
readied our cameras as we pondered how we were going to get past it
without getting eaten. A click and a single step later, the snake
crawled away. Yup, it had legs. Turned out it was a black skink that
was way more afraid of us than we were of it.
We had lunch at a tiny restaurant with a beautiful outdoor garden patio.
More crimson rosellas were landing in the feeders there. Several other
colorful and skittish birds were dashing in and out, too quick for a picture.
We continued our drive to a lookout over the hinterlands. The short
path to the lookout past a massive tree labeled Antarctic Beech Tree.
The sign attempted to explain that they thought this tree originated in
Antarctica, but I've been there and I didn't see anything that even
resembled a tree. The exceptionally clear day allowed for a beautiful
view at the lookout.
Well, we exhausted the scenery at Springbrook and headed home. On the
way I saw a turnoff to visit Hinze dam and lake. On a whim, we turned
down that road and found an isolated tourist café. The sign said that
bird feeding began at 3:30p, and it was already 3:00p. We decided to
hang out and wait.
Good thinking. It didn't take much effort to notice all of the birds
sitting in the trees and bushes around the area impatiently glancing at
their watches. We saw a few kookaburra and got an accidental shot of a
magpie bothering them, a bunch of lorikeets, and a galah (accent on the
2nd syllable). A galah is basically a pink cockatoo. We saw a few of
them here and there, but never in flocks like the sulfur-crested ones.
We got ourselves an ice cream at the café and waited with the birds for
feeding time. The kookaburra got small meat scraps thrown in the grass.
They gently swooped down from their tree perch, picked up the scraps,
and returned to their perch. They are sometimes called laughing
kookaburras because their call sounds like uproarious laughter. It
started with short, staccato ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh followed by longer
(and louder) ahhhhh-ahhhhhhh-ahhhhhhhh. They
sounded
more like a monkey in the jungle than a bird.
The café brought out slop made from bread, water, and honey and poured
it into a tray elevated on a post. Urgently and noisily the lorikeets
descended. What a racket. Their bright colors in the sun made for some
great pictures while their antics kept us quite entertained.
We returned home after another great day to debate the rest of our stay
in Surfers Paradise.
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