Australia – Chiming Birds

Ellen cleared her rather hectic schedule to a degree (no pun intended) and we headed inland for a couple of days. This was quite special because she had made time away from her immediate family too (I know this is often hard to do when your kids are at school). We drove out of the city towards Warwick where we would be staying with Ellen’s parents. About an hour out and as we started to climb into the Main Range, (a mountainous region) she opened the windows. Despite the traffic on the road we were serenaded by a curious chiming. Bell Birds, or more specifically Bell Mynah Birds. For Ellen this is something her family do when traveling this way.
We stopped for a walk at Cunninghams gap (named after the English botanist and explorer, actually there are a number of botanist Cunninghams, this one was Alan).
I think we were walking in temperate rainforest, there were lots of unidentifiable ferns.
I tried to find the chiming birds but they were so hard to see, in part by because they high up in the canopy and in part I had no idea what I was looking for.
We had a lovely walk on a rather precarious track (a bit of landslip). As we got a bit higher and the trees opened up and we were able to look down on the canopy to see these pealing birds. Small green with orange beaks and legs, how could I have missed them?

The following recording was made in another location but I wanted you to experience the magic too.

Again this is part of a landscape formed 24 million years ago and now part of World Heritage Places – Gondwana Rain Forest ( http://www.environment.gov.au/heritage/places/world/gondwana) I’ll have a go at describing Gondwana especially for my two young readers in another blog.
There was a notice explaining all the peaks and ridges we could see in the distance were once covered in volcanic debris. They stand out now because of erosion. They were made when magma solidifies in the vents of the volcanos causing a plug of very hard rock.

On our way to Ellen’s parents we picked up local cakes called Lamingtons. These are named after Lord Lamington (Governor of Queensland during the end of Victoria’s reign). According to folk law someone in his household dropped his favourite sponge cake into melted chocolate. Waste not, want not, they picked it out and quickly rolled it in dessicated coconut and a new favourite cake was born! I sampled two the following day! Yum!