New Arrivals

• Mattador's Profile
• About this blog
• Entry from Wallaby Creek

Trip Start Sep 04, 2007 Previous
Entry Trip End Feb 08, 2008 Next
Entry

  Wallaby Creek, Australia
Thursday, September 20, 2007

Day 14 (7 at Wallaby Creek)                                                                   September 19, 2007
 
Today has been a great day for a few reasons.  One, we only had to trap for two hours because Linda had to go into Warwick to pick up the two new girls and therefore couldn't band the birds we caught.  Two, it meant I got to spend the day being handiman -  fixing the propane stove that wasn't distributing the gas properly, building a small dam in the creek for capturing dishwater, and setting up a fire for later tonight when Linda gets back with our new companions and PIZZA!  Third, and possibly most importantly, today my ear no longer hurts from where the wasp stung me on the ear lobe a week ago.  And I have now officially  been in the Australian wilderness for three months.  Or, actually, one week - but it seriously, and we all agree on this, seems like a much longer time.  We get up before dawn, get to witness breathtaking wildlife all day, and don't have the confusing effect of television distorting our perception of time and the real.  We are aware of life at every shivering or sweaty, skin shredding, mosquito slapping, tick pulling, dirt caked, wondrous moment.  And I love it.
 
Speaking of breathtaking wildlife, yesterday I caught the catbird.  I know it was the same one I saw before because it had one band on its left leg, as if someone had started banding it, thinking it was a female bowerbird, only to realize upon hearing its truly eerie cry that it was not.  The shamrock green feathers, snowy spots, and penetrating ruby eye should have given it away, but who knows what really happened.  In any case, I brought the bird back to the cabin and everybody was fascinated and got to have a photoshoot before I let it go.  It was making some seriously scary hissing noises -  like a cat thrown into a pond filled with chocolate labs swimming around with vaccination syringes poking out of their mouths.  But according to Abe and Linda this is not the famous sound for which the catbird is named.  I am still waiting to behold the so-called 'demon baby cry'.
                
Incidentally, I read in my bird guide today that unlike my polygynous friend the satin bowerbird, green cat birds are monogamous, and aid in parental care.  In satin bowerbirds, on the other hand, males compete for mating rights to basically all the females.  Whichever male has the best bower and courtship display will father most of the chicks.  It's a high pressure winner-takes-all world of dating among the bowerbirds.  And it's too bad I'm human, because I could make a stack of snail shells and parrot feathers so high the ladies would be flockin' from Perth just to get a chance.  Oh well, I guess I'll have to try and impress human females some other way.  Maybe use some big words in my travel blog or something.
 
Anyway, back to the bizarre and unceasingly awesome world of Australian fauna.  This morning I was relieving myself out back of the cabin (this is apparently frowned upon back home) when Brendan gave me a shout and I came running.  Apparently Abe was in his 'room,' or curtained section of the cabin, folding clothes or something, when he noticed a head poking out of a box on the bunk above his.  He was intrigued by this, as you might imagine, the head being of a reptilian nature.  Upon closer observation it turned out to be a four foot carpet python.  That's right, a small, but considerable constrictor snake had for a still unknown period of time been living just inches from Abe's head.  To his credit I heard no shouts or exclamations of, "Holy *&$?%#' Lance Armstrong's kneecap!  There's a #@*!%$ snake over my bed!"
 
When I rounded the corner of the cabin, I instead found him calmly holding the snake for a crowd of animal Papparazzi, which seem to mircaculously appear each time we find a new animal.  I myself suddenly had an irresistible urge to lie on the ground within inches of the python in order to get the closest possible shot afforded by my wide-angled lens.  (*Note to any grandmas who might be reading this: I am, of course, exaggerating for storytelling effect, so no need to worry.  *To anyone else reading this:  the snake's mouth was six inches from my lens and people were making terrified imploring squeals to get me to move away.)  And that's what happened.  We let the python go by the creek and watched it amazingly climb straight up a tree and stretch out on a limb.
---------------------------
 
Linda, the pizza...oh yeah, and the new recruits (Jenn of Massachussetts and Kate of New York) arrived at just past seven.  Now in the following description I don't wish to demean Kate or Jenn in any way, nor to diminish the excitement surrounding their arrival, but rather to underline the extremity of our hunger at that point in the day.  We had been working diligently all day at various tasks -  fixing cookware, checking electronic equipment, cleaning the outhouse (I had somehow landed myself this job by not quickly looking busy, as everyone else did at the chore's mentioning.)  And through all this there was one haunting and relentless word that kept slipping slyly onto our lips: pizza. 
 
And so, huddled around our blazing fire and peering down the road in search of headlights in the newly fallen dark, we had allowed ourselves to become overwhelmed by our hunger.  Whereas we had awoken as any day before, normal, civilized people, the mere suggestion of the possibility of an Italian pie had transformed us into gollum-like savages, slavering ravenously and speculating in an obsessive way about the type and quantity of the soon-to-arrive flat bread with cheese, tomato sauce, and God only knows what other sundry and delicious toppings!  So, when the SUV finally pulled into the paddock, like a well-trained defensive team, we descended upon it.  A hurried hello, a name thrown, a pizza caught, and we returned to the fire to horde over the cardboard boxes and their contents like feral dogs, until our stomachs were quite satisfied and our minds were again capable of nongustatory considerations.
 
There was only a short time for the meet-and-greet, since Kate and Jenn had to move their stuff into their tents (we have a nice community of four in the horse paddy now) and everyone had to help unload the A$500 worth of groceries Linda had somehow managed to bring back with her from Warwick.  And then, despite the animation of the evening, we had to retire, as it was already well past our normal bedtime of 7:30 and we would be getting up 15 minutes earlier from now on so as to be ready at the traps by 5:30am.  So, with a short howl at the Cheshire Cat moon,* I stalked off to my tent, did two circles round my sleeping bag and slept the placid sleep of a hunger-sated wild thing; a stomach full, a smile split across my toothy snout.
 
 
 
 
*-I should point out for those (like me) who are not very familiar with the astrophysical peculiarities of the austral sky.  Well, at least for the moment, the moon is rotated ninety degrees clockwise, so that a waxing crescent resembles the smile of the Cheshire Cat from Alice in Wonderland (a comparison I am copying from Linda).

Print this entry Share Sydney hotels

Previous Entry Next Entry