Burramoko Head and Hanging Rock 5 – 6 January 2017

Posted on January 7, 2017 by Dave Noble

This was another walk from Blackheath Railway Station out to Burramoko Head, camping there overnight and walking back the next day. My third walk out to the head in recent months.

Hanging Rock

The walk out along the fire road is quite pleasant. Not too long that it becomes tedious, and no big hills to toil up. Also, on the way out and back there are many beautiful things to be seen. The last two trips there had been a multitude of waratahs. This trip it was orchids. It was nice to spot five different species of orchid. Continue reading →

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Erskine Creek Walk 1-2 January 2017

Posted on January 4, 2017 by Dave Noble

A canyoning trip had been planned, but a few of us had gotten sick with colds and flu, so a shorter walk to Erskine Creek seemed a good idea.

After meeting at Glenbrook, five of us, Wendy, Keith, Peter, Steph and myself headed out into Blue Mountains National Park for the Pisgah Rock Track. It was a short walk to the lookout at Pisgah Rock, but on the way, we had detoured to visit the Attic Cave. This historic camping place was used as accomodation by some of the early bushwalkers to the area. Continue reading →

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Horseshoe Falls Walk 24 December 2016

Posted on January 4, 2017 by Dave Noble

This was a very short walk I did to fill in some time on Christmas Eve. I was visiting at Hazelbrook, and this walk on the north side of the town was nearby. To get good photographs of the waterfalls you need to visit the area just after a period of heavy rain. This I did not have – there was barely a tricky of water going over the waterfalls.

Horseshoe Falls

I headed down the track that leaves Oaklands Road. As you proceed, you discover there are a multitude of tracks on different levels. I followed a lower one that was signposted to go to Horseshoe Falls. On the way, I passed a small waterfall – perhaps only 2 m high. I think this one is unnamed.  Continue reading →

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Deep Pass – Camping and Canyoning – 19-20 December 2016

Posted on December 22, 2016 by Dave Noble

Martin had his brother and family visiting from Sweden, and had planned two days camping at Deep Pass Clearing in Wollemi National Park. His parents and wife Steffy joined him, and I tagged along with John, Chuin Nee and their two sons. It was a very pleasant two days spent at a delightful place in the bush.

Deep Pass Clearing

We walked the 800 m  from the carpark to the campsite, and had plenty of room to find a shady campsite in the large clearing.  Continue reading →

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Orchids and Waterfalls – Wentworth Falls Walk – 18 December 2016

Posted on December 22, 2016 by Dave Noble

I spent a very pleasant day at Wentworth Falls wandering around the tracks below Wentworth Falls. My aim was to photograph more of the waterfalls.

Hippocrene Falls

On this trip, I had hoped for higher water levels after recent rain (22 mm the day before and 28 mm two days before 0 measured at Katoomba) – but levels were reasonable, but certainly not as high as I would have liked. Also – the weather forecast had been for cloudy conditions – nice for waterfall photography. But it was a mixture of sunny and cloudy on the day. This meant, that at waterfalls I wanted to photograph I frequently had to wait for the sun to go behind a cloud to soften the lighting. Continue reading →

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Christmas Lights Ride – Leichhardt – 17 December 2016

Posted on December 21, 2016 by Dave Noble

Except for the previous Christmas, when the weather was not so good, I had joined a group of friends for a bike ride around the inner west looking at some of better Christmas lights on display. This year, we continued the tradition, but started from Leichhardt and rode around that area.

The weather was fine and the lights were quite good. For the four and a half year old in the party – the best house was the one with the snow machine and a bubble machine. Continue reading →

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Orchids at Wolli Creek – 17 December 2016

Posted on December 21, 2016 by Dave Noble

I had some spare time, so headed out to Wolli Creek for a short walk. On some previous visits I had seen some Hyacinth Orchids developing, and I expected this time for them to be out in flower. They were, and not only that, I found a few more clusters of them. They were all quite close to Girrahween Park near Earlwood.

These Hyacinth Orchids are all Dipodium variegatum. Continue reading →

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Antlions

Posted on December 16, 2016 by Dave Noble

I have recently been investigating antlions. When I was a science teacher, I often used to get year 7 students to find and collect ant lions from the playground and then set them up in the lab and feed them for a few weeks before letting them go.

Their traps are easy to spot – small conical pits in sand, usually dug out in dry locations like under buildings or in small caves. My students used to use metal beakers to scoop up the sand where the pit was, and then empty the sand onto a large sheet of newspaper and slowly sift through the sand looking for the insect. Once found, they would place some sand in beaker and add the antlion and observe it. Continue reading →

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Photographing the Moon – 8 December 2016

Posted on December 16, 2016 by Dave Noble

I was preparing to photograph the Moon again. Another Supermoon was  occurring later this month. I was after some better images, but using the same equipment – a hand held camera and telephoto lens. This time I wanted to take a series of photos and then stack them using software to produce a higher quality composite image. I hadn’t done this before, so watched a video on Youtube that demonstrated the technique with the Moon and gave links to the software (a program called Registax).

Well, a few days before the Supermoon, I took 15 or so pictures of the Moon and tried out the software. The video warned that it may crash a few times during use (it did), but I persevered, re-cropped my original images and tried again and it worked quite well. Here is a final image –

And here is one of the set of images that I included in the stack –  Continue reading →

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Taronga Zoo – New Squirrel Monkey Walkthrough – 13 December 2016

Posted on December 16, 2016 by Dave Noble

Another day at the Zoo. This time, as a Zoo Friend, I had been invited to a preview of the new Squirrel Monkey Walkthrough.

It was a very hot day in Sydney and the animals were feeling the heat. I was too! My booking for the Squirrel Monkeys was not until the middle of the day. Due to the heat, I arrived early and spent a fair bit of time in the Platypus House and the Nocturnal House. These are always challenging places to try and get photos. Continue reading →

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