90.) Bikrams' Yoga - all the time

Red-browed finch in Mebbin National Park

It is 7 am, 80 degrees with a reported 98% humidity. Don't people go to yoga studios and *pay* for this?

Last week, Nancy and Michelle (our temp flattie, aka flat-mate and Aussie language coach) and Terese climbed the leech infested choss pile called The Cougals (both summits). At least they avoided the multiple leech bites they got on a prior rainy-run in Springbrook. They are still itching those! The Cougal trek was hot and muggy by Nancy-standards, but beautiful by subtropics-loving Aussie standards, and ticks and snakes basking in the heat of the jungle were more of a concern.]








Laughing about the hundred metre drop just behind us, the vertical cliff-face is obscured by vegetation, so there'd be some stuff to grab on the way down if there was a mis-step along the ridge dividing the volcanic Cougals...









This is an oddity we only identified after the fact. The leaves have been eaten away by some sort of very tough bug - this is a Tree of Pain - (aka "Stinging Tree" reportedly the worlds most painful plant. There are six species including Dendrocnide moroides. "Even if they don't hunt in packs, the stinging trees are pretty vicious"). These trees have very fine silica needles on all surfaces. These have been described as non-transparent tubes of glass filled with a very stable neurotoxin. Touching one of these results in a sensation ranging from mild irritation to excruciating pain and death (one case) and takes weeks to go away.

Recommended treatment? Duct-tape!

Another of the charming nasties of AU!!!


That is why I stick to the ocean - even if the waves are really messy, they are dumping - hard - and there is no wind.







Very Dangerous - you go first.......








A dense salt-spray forms an early fog on the coast.





But where's the fun in viewing from afar? It's time to get up close and personal with the beasts of the jungle again...



So today we opted to head south to Mebbin National Park. We should have recalled that it is adjacent to Night Cap NP - where we have watched the rain sluice down the last 2 trips down there. But there were new birds to seek out.

Today was no different as far as the rain. Even on the Gold Coast, it's been raining for 14 solid hours with no end in sight (8 inches in last 24 hrs). But we still managed to squeak in a few new bird species between the downpours. Here's a Black-faced Monarch, (a flycatcher). The bugs we saw them catching were pratically as big as his head!.







This bird is aptly named the White-headed pigeon. There's several species of pigeon-types here that are quite striking and have wonderful jungle-y calls, like the Wompoo pigeon, who has a "deep, carrying, bubbly 'wallock-a-woo'" (we heard one in the Cougals), and the Topknot pigeon whose "Rusty crest sweeps back from eye over crown to nape" which we spotted in the treeptops from a Springbrook lookout.
Also of note: a Forest Kingfisher, Fig Birds (with a wild red eye patch), Cattle Egrets in orange breeding plumage, satin Bower Birds, Superb Fairy Wren)










And we were amused by this flock of yakkety Yellow-Tailed Black Cockatoos. About 10 of them came noisily wheeling in to land in the trees, and horse around feeding and picking on each other, including a begging juvenile who didn't stop whining for food for 15 minutes or so. They're very acrobatic, as well as graceful flyers.











We found a brochure for birding in the Tweed Valley (just south of us), and so we also tried stopping at Crams farm (take Kyogle road from Murwillumbah through Uki to the Doon Doon turnoff. That makes sense to us - kind of scary!). There were some White Breasted Wood swallows perched on these posts, and some marsh hens wandering around oblivious of the rain, but otherwise everybody else must have been hunkered down and not visible. Maybe another time in less rain, if that's possible.


Or maybe it doesn't stop raining here in this part of the rainforest, where a local resident has protected their kangaroo postal box with a permanent umbrella!

















Molly doesn't think much of the rain which prevents her from going out on the deck for some cat-grass snacking, so instead she's taking a snooze in her favorite bed - a discarded mango box she enjoys chewing to bits!.