Friday, April 13
4:00 PM Canberra, ACT, Australia
4:10 PM Geocaching
In the morning Di drove us to Mount Ainslie where we had spectacular views of Canberra. There was a cache right at the viewpoint which we found fairly quickly. This wins the award for the cleverest hide on our Australian trip. We then drove a short distance to a trailhead and walked for about a kilometer to another cache site. This involved some cross-country scrambling as well as trail walking. We didn't see many birds. We then went downtown and had a cup of coffee at the Art Gallery. There were numerous fairy wrens on the ground and under the shrubbery.
In the afternoon we went to Aranda Bushland Forest where I found 2 more caches, bringing the total number of finds in Australia to 15. This was much more than I expected at the outset of our trip.
- GC21PET - The Pole Position Again
- GC11XXB - Underneath
- GC1M47F - Fore!mic Acid
- GC1VQT9 - You're pulling my log!
Finding GC11XXB - Underneath
Finding GC1VQT9 - You're pulling my log!
This was my most successful geocaching day of the entire trip. Thanks Di for making this possible.
4:10 PM Birding
The afternoon trip in the Aranda park resulted in the addition of two more birds to our lifer list. These are hard to come by and are most welcome when they occur. I was not aware that I had the Orange Chat (female) at the time I took my photos but was able to arrive at an identification by looking at about a dozen photos of it. It was very active and difficult to focus but I am confident of the result.
- Red Wattlebird
- Variegated Fairywren
- White-browed Scrubwren
- Scarlet Robin [LIFER]
- Orange Chat [LIFER]
- White-winged Chough [first for 2012]
- Sulfur-crested Cockatoo [first for 2012]
- King Parrot [first for 2012]
We have seen 13 new lifers on this trip, bringing the total number of unique species in Australia to 208, and our global total to 629. Seeing the Emu was a special one as although we had seen them many times in 1979, this was the first time we had seen one since we began keeping a tally. It was also nice to break the 200 plateau for Australia.
We saw these kangaroos as we neared the end of our birding trip to Aranda park. Thanks Di for bringing us here.
Then in the twilight we saw a tree full of Sulfur-crested Cockatoos.
A perfect end to our Canberra trip. Thanks again, Di. You were a terrific guide.