The “12 Apostles” on the Great Ocean Road on the southern coast of Australia. There were never 12 pillars and were originally called the “sow and piglets”. However, the Australian tourism folks figured more people might come to see apostles than pigs and changed the name in the 60s!
After one day in Melbourne, we borrowed Bethany’s car and headed out to the Great Ocean Road. Unfortunately, grey, wet weather put a damper on the trip. It was hard to get too excited about ocean waves crashing against the beaches while facing a stiff southern wind from Antarctica! We did, however, find a nice inland hike at Mogg’s Creek, where we tramped through eucalyptus forest and sighted several new birds: Spotted Pardalote, New Holland Honeyeater, and Crescent Honeyeater. Unfortunately, we didn’t see any koalas sleeping in the eucalyptus trees.
Having made it to Port Campbell on the first day (just past the 12 apostles, pictured above), the second day we returned to Melbourne via the inland route.
Our first, unscheduled stop, was just a few miles outside Port Campbell where we spotted a large gathering of ibis in a field. As we are accustomed to seeing these wading birds on the shoreline, we stopped to take a look. As soon as we got out of the car, our ears, eyes, and noses gave alert that there were hundreds of the birds nesting in the large pine trees next to the roads. Apparently the local irrigation ponds and fields must provide a nice spring-time larder for these birds.
Just a few of the dozens of ibis nesting in the trees near Port Campbell.
By a bit of luck, we found the Botanical Gardens at Colac, which kept us entranced for several hours. In addition to a lake full of black swans, grebes, and ducks, they had quite a large formal botanical garden. As we walked around one large tree, Mike stopped in his tracks and said “Wow” –- there was a beautiful Kookaburra sitting on a branch just a few feet away. We followed him as he let loose with his strange cackling laugh and swooped from branch to branch. As we followed him around another tree, there was a flock of bright green and red King Parrots foraging on the ground. We also spotted the Red-backed Kingfisher and Red-browed Finches. As we returned to the car we also spotted another birdwatcher with binoculars trained on a large nest and confirmed that we were seeing a Whistling Kite.
The Kookaburra at Colac Botanical Gardens.
As a last stop for the day, we went to the You Yangs State Reserve. The name apparently means “mountain in the middle of the plain” which is exactly what it is. The trail to the top has 450 steps on it, but the view from the top was wonderful – scrubby Australian bush to the west, the skyline of Melbourne some 30 miles away to the north, the sea to the east, and farmland/pasture to the south.
A shadow selfie, taken from the top of the You Yangs.
Our bird spotting here was limited to small birds like the Scarlet Robin and the Yellow and Striated Thornbills. Icing on the cake was a sighting of a wallaby as we drove out of the park.
Sunday we gathered with approximately 35 others for worship at the Melbourne Quaker Center, just a short walk from the bustling Victoria Market. As so often happens, we found that we had met at least one of the Quakers before, and nearly everyone we spoke to knew some Quaker that we also knew, whether in New Zealand or in the USA.
Later that day, we joined the Melbourne Shape Note Singers for their monthly sing. (We were introduced to this traditional Appalachian Mountain style of hymn singing several decades ago, but only manage to participate about once a year.) There were only 9 of us singing, but the old church hall we were in had wonderful acoustics and made us sound like a much larger group.
Appalachian shape note singing in Melbourne, Australia!
It was amazing to realize that we had spent the day in Australia worshiping, singing, and interacting with family and friends in much the same way as we could do in Durham, NC!
Green Edges 