It was nice to be able to visit the Zoo again. This was my first visit since the lockdown. Some new animals – a baby giraffe. And the return of the Lions. The new Safari section was now open.
I had to book my visit. Asa Zoo Friend this was easy to do, and just had to nominate a day for the visit rather than a time slot. When I arrived all the Zoo seemed to be open. Continue reading
Bob suggested a walk to Goochs Crater in Blue Mountains National Park. This sounded like a good idea. On the way we could visit the nearby Aboriginal site at Bald Trig.
Billabong Canyon
We turned off the Chifley Highway at the Zig Zag Railway and travelled out the Glow Worm Tunnel Road before turning off to Bald Trig. The past oar two the road was very rough, so we parked and walked he last part. I had been to the Aboriginal art sit there a few times, and on the second visit, knew it was hard to find. we were on the lookout for a small cave with a single faint hand stencil. This time it didn’t take too long to find – Continue reading
I joined Liz for a walk down Birdwood Gully at Springwood to look for fungi. I did not have that high hopes we would find a lot, but it turned out to be surprisingly good. We found quite a few waxcaps and also some other interesting species. There was also a lot of orchids out. This made for a nice morning.
Hydnoplicata convoluta
Early on, not far down the track from Poland Avenue, we found some Hairy Trumpet – Panus fasciatus out. Continue reading
I went on a walk to the Jibbon in Royal National Park that was organised by Brian Everingham for the National Parks Association of NSW. This was similar to a walk I had been on that Brian had led back in 2019.
We met at Bundeena near the Ferry Wharf. In the party were Brian, Sue B, Sue W, Valerie, Allen, Ken, John, Ross and myself. We had beautiful weather. Continue reading
Another day spent out on Malabar Headland. This was a day of rain and rainbows rather than birds and whales. I could see rainbows just about all the day – including from when I arrived to when I left. These were due to a lot of rain clouds that seemed to bring rain to the headland more than other places in Sydney. A long arc of rain clouds seemed to to be rotating around delivering rain most fo the day.
But it was still a good outing. I did see whales and Peregrine Falcons and other raptors. And I was able to shelter in overhangs near the sea cliffs. Continue reading
Earlier in the day, I had visited Ferndale Park at Chatswood. After that walked down the track towards the Lane Cove River. On the way I stopped at a picnic area for lunch. Not far after that, I was following the track down the river heading towards sporting field. Last year, I had observed a pair of Ospreys nesting there. I had heard that they were back and had rebuilt their nest. So it was time to check them out.
When I reached the sporting field, I looked up and could see their nest on top of the same lights that they had used last year. Looking carefully, I could see one bird was at the nest. Continue reading
I spent the morning at Ferndale Park at Chatswood looking at the fungi. Afterwards, I kept on walking down the track to the Lane Cove River, followed it downstream and observed the Osprey nest. I will put up a separate post about that.
The fungi at Ferndale Park was reasonable. A bit of hunting was needed to find the interesting ones. Here is selection of the waxcaps that I found – Continue reading
I attended the field study at Coachwood Glen at Blackheath with the Sydney Fungal Studies Group Inc. We spent the morning at the Glen looking for, photographing and in some cases collecting specimens of fungi. Then we met a Blackheath, at one of the parks, and water lunch we examined the fungi we had collected and tried to work out was we had. It was a very interesting day.
Here are some of what we saw. First the waxcaps – Continue reading
This was another in my series of fungi walks to parts of the Lane Cove River and its tributaries. On this trip, I walked from Eastwood Station, down Terrys Creek to the Lane Cove River, then down the Great North Walk track to the De-Burgh Bridge, which I crossed then went a short way downstream, before returning to walk out to Macquarie Park Metro Station.
I had been expecting good fungi along Terrys Creek, but on recent visits t has been a bit underwhelming. There was quite a lot of coral fungi out, but few waxcaps. Here are some of the corals – Continue reading
I had walked from Kurnell to Cronulla back in 2017. It had been a pleasant outing, and I had talked with Bob about being keen to repeat it sometime. This was a good opportunity, the forecast was good and there sound be some whales to see. It had walked part of the way a few days earlier – on the walk from Cape Solander to Cape Baily and back. But that is a very enjoyable section I was happy to walk it again.
We met, and drove in Bob’s car to park near Cronulla High School. On my previous trip, I had caught a bus from Cronulla Station to Kurnell. That bus had been crowded with students until Cronulla High, where they all got off. Getting on there would be a good way to avoid crowded bus. On our walk down the coast, we would be able to leave the beach a little early, and make the short walk across to where Bob’s car was parked. Continue reading
