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Birding Australia from N Queensland to Tasmania, Oct-Nov 2019

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Birding Australia from N Queensland to Tasmania, Oct-Nov 2019 Birding Australia from N Queensland to Tasmania, Oct-Nov 2019 - practical logistics, guides, locations, and birds - by Steve Johnson and Lynn Rafferty (stevejohnson2 at verizon dot net) Contents of this report: 0) Overview. 1) General trip planning. 2) International flights. 3) Domestic flights. 4) Driving and rental cars. 5) Navigation. 6) Lodgings. 7) Food. 8) Birding destinations. 9) Guides and Tours. 10) Birding planning. 11) Resources. 12) Phones and Internet. 13) Packing. 14) Sightseeing. 15) Birds seen / heard, selected notes. 16) Other taxa seen. 0) Overview. We visited Australia for 5 weeks starting in late October 2019, primarily for birding but also some general tourism. We stayed in these locations: New South Wales: Sydney and Kiama; Queensland: Julatten, Yungaburra, Cairns, and O'Reilly's (near Brisbane); Victoria: Healesville (east of Melbourne); Tasmania: Cradle Mountain, Bruny Island, and Richmond (near Hobart). Our birding was mostly self-guided, with several one-day guides hired along the way. Much thanks to Kurt Gaskill, who was on a long stay in Victoria, and kindly showed us around some of his favorite spots. 1) General trip planning. Travel agents and travel insurance are both a good idea. We did not use the first and if we had, we might not have needed the second. We have purchased insurance for this and several other trips from Travel Insured International (underwritten by United States Fire Insurance Company). This is the only time we've made a claim and they paid it in full, no problem. We will use them again. We relied heavily on other birder's trip reports published online. I owe a lot of thanks to many birders for those. If you have a critical connection, such as an international flight, either book all connections on a single ticket - so the airline is committed to get you to your final destination that day - or else book in a full day layover at the connection, to accommodate unexpected and unavoidable delays. We might have avoided such an “amateur error” if we’d used a good travel agent. In our case, we had (we thought) a comfortable 5-hour layover in Sydney between our domestic Australian flight, and our international flight home on a different airline. The domestic flight was canceled with little notice, and that carrier’s later flight would have made us miss our connection home. So we had to purchase much more expensive tickets at the last-minute, which left very little time to make the critical connection. Many of our eco-lodgings, tours, and birding guides became heavily booked even 12 months out. Several of them (listed below) were close to full booking when we reserved them about 10-11 months in advance. Plan and make reservations well in advance. After planning your trip, continue to monitor the latest local conditions. You may want to change plans. We planned one lodging largely to visit Bunyip State Park in Victoria, but the Park was closed due to a large bushfire which occurred about 6 weeks before our trip began. If we'd been monitoring news from that area, we might have re-booked that lodging. We prefer to stay longer at each location, then many other birders do. It means spending less of your time packing, unpacking and traveling. It means having a second and maybe a third chance to see birds you missed on your first attempt. And it provides a little chance to “get to know” the birds there, more than a brief look and a tick mark. Traveling often means spending your mornings traveling instead of birding; or else, traveling late in the day after birding, which can be problematic in several ways. As we changed time zones etc., our phone, camera, computer, etc. all developed incorrect date and time settings. At the time it seemed like a lot of work to reset them. But it would have been worth the effort to reset them immediately – easier than deciphering later when all those photos, videos, etc. were really taken. Either that, or make copious notes connecting your digital information with the correct date and time. 2) International flights. We used United for the trans-Pacific legs to and from Australia. Everything was similar to their domestic U.S. service except for more free TV and movie options, and three meals included with an economy seat instead of one meal costing extra. So each 13-14 hour flight to/from San Francisco began with a hot dinner followed by a sandwich, and ended with a hot breakfast. We were surprised to experience fairly little “jet lag”. We were able to function fairly well on the first day, after each long flight and time zone change of 16 hours (or 8, depending on how you view it). The main effect seemed to be some uneven sleep during the subsequent 2-3 days. 3) Domestic flights. Checked baggage and carry-on baggage rules are very different on all Australian airlines compared with U.S. carriers. All of the limits were tighter (lower) than we were used to. We also misunderstood the limits described at the carrier's web sites before our trip. So when we arrived at the airport, we had to frantically rearrange our stuff, and paid higher last minute baggage fees. So for several reasons, you should study the rules carefully (maybe even review the specifics with an airline agent), before you pack and before going to the airport. Plan what you'll bring on board with you, given the low limits on carry-on weight, keeping in mind that if you change airlines, the lowest limits will apply. Jetstar failed to put one of our checked bags on one flight. However they did put it on the next plane, and a courier promptly delivered it to our lodging. Qantas cancelled their flight to our crucial international connection (on a different airline). But to be fair, it was due to unusual and extreme weather, and they did grant a full refund when we had to switch to a different carrier to make our connection. We also flew twice on Virgin Australia. In general all three domestic airlines had a similar level of comfort, cabin service, etc. Our choices of carrier for each leg were based strictly on schedule convenience and ticket cost, and we found nothing to support any other preference between the three. 4) Driving and rental cars. We rented 5 cars from Apex in 5 different cities. They are much less expensive than most of the major car hire companies, the cars were all excellent, unlimited mileage, and top rate customer service in every case. The one negative thing is that they are all located off-airport. You call them for shuttle pickup after collecting your baggage; and after returning the car, they shuttle you back to the airport. For after-hours return (e.g. before an early flight), they rely on a third-party parking service. We used that twice, and in one case it took over a half hour to get us to the airport. Our other 9 shuttle rides to/ from the airports all went very quickly. If you are comfortable planning for an extra 10-15 minutes for their off-airport locations, Apex is a great bargain. Or, if you already have to get up early because of an early flight, it might be worth using a more expensive on-airport company to get 15 minutes more sleep. Note that most rental companies have restrictions on where you can drive. Check on that for your planned routes. Apex has some restrictions too; but they do permit their cars on Bruny Island, which some companies do not. 5) Navigation. In the past we have successfully navigated in foreign countries, driving in remote areas without a network connection, by pre-loading local maps under Google Maps in the Offline Maps section. That mostly worked again on this trip, except that both the brand-new Telstra cell (local phone, see below) and also our old iPad seemed to have frequent problems with their GPS navigation. It appeared the problem was that the devices couldn't correctly determine our location. (i.e. a hardware issue, not the Google Maps software). I don't know the reason for this, or a good solution, other than navigating the old way: with a paper map. 6) Lodgings. We highly recommend the following 4 lodging options. O'Reilly's Rainforest Retreat (near Brisbane) deserves its reputation as a great place to see birds, both accustomed to people and also wild ones. But plan ahead how you will eat there. Three meals a day at their restaurants was well beyond our budget. Instead we stayed at a self-contained villa. More expensive lodging of course, but we more than recouped that by cooking for ourselves. And of course, we were able to cook and eat on our own schedule which was quite different from the times at the restaurants. (The restaurant breakfast appeared to be quite sumptuous and the one dinner we ate there was excellent). Kingfisher Park Birdwatchers Lodge in Julatten in North Queensland. Besides hiring Carol or Andrew Iles to provide excellent guiding, it also really pays off to stay there at least 2-3 nights. Because one, you will receive a daily wealth of current gen on the birds in the area, and advice on where to find them. And two, many good birds (and platypus and pademelons) are to be found around their property. "43 Degrees" is the name of a unique eco-lodging (cottages) in Adventure Bay on the south portion of Bruny Island.
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