2010/09 Australia trip - Goobang |
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Thursday September 23rd
Thursday was to be an easy day as there was no convenient park to camp at in the 2-300 mile range, and we were going just 100 miles 
or so to Goobang. On the way out we saw this gigantic variegated thistle, probably an immigrant species. Shortly afterwards we saw a fox, also an introduced species, You often see warnings that 1030 poison has been put down to eliminate them, but we’ve seen foxes all over Australia.
Partway to Goobang we saw a sign saying that the park was closed and flooded, but luckily this was only the southern
part of the park. The northern section with its campground was still open. On the way there we saw this dragon enjoying the heat of the road. Their defence is to sit absolutely still and look like a tree branch, not a technique that works well with cars.
Goobang is usually a dry forest but it had been flooded recently. All the park’s gravel roads were closed, and with good reason, as we saw one causeway blocked by a gigantic tree stump. Other places were still underwater. We went for a long walk through the forest and it was interesting for us as many of the trees and plants and birds were new to us, but the park doesn’t have any dramatic scenery other 
than the splashes of wildflowers. There were only a couple of people in the campground. However, it was 
notable to us as the first place we’d actually felt real heat since we arrived in Australia.
The spooky-looking bird on the left is a friar bird and the rather gaudy one on the right is an eastern rosella.