21- 28 September 2022
We left Cable Beach after a week and made a quick stop in
town to pick up a couple of things we needed, and to have a coffee, then drove
the short distance to the BBO further around Roebuck Bay. We had stayed there in
1991 and a return visit was essential. Mick had phoned to check that we could
get onto our site early and we were set up before lunch. There is a great
visitor centre, a well-equipped “shade house” with kitchen facilities, showers
and toilets, rubbish, compost and recycling bins, but no powered sites. We hoped we
could sustain our power supply for the six nights we had booked.
Our site had good afternoon shade and it looked like we
would be able to get the solar panels into a good enough position for much of
the day. A birding friend arrived not long after us, so Mick swapped notes with
her before we went for a walk onto the beach. The tide was quite low so Mick
walked out past the mangroves while I sat in the shade. The temperature was
about 38°,
and the forecast was for 41° later in the week, but there would be
no swimming here.
Mick had booked to go on the "Lakes Tour" on Thursday morning so he had an early start to depart at 7:00am. The tour would last all day and would hopefully result in at least one new bird. With the expected extreme temperatures he was sure there would be heat haze playing havoc with his photos. Mick returned home hot and tired but very keen to have a look at his photos – he had managed to get a couple of “lifers” that took his tally to 600. Despite the conditions he also had a few good shots of other birds on what turned out to be a very productive and enjoyable tour.
Mick had booked to go on the “Yellow Chat Twitch” tour on
Saturday but swapped to the “Shorebirds” tour on Friday morning as he came back
from the Lakes tour with some great shots of the yellow chat. This one was only
a couple of hours long and departed at 7:30am so no need to get up too early. He
came back from this tour with some more good shots and spent some time in the
shadehouse escaping the heat and looking at the latest photos. The following
morning we both drove down to one of the shorebird viewing places as Mick
wanted to show me the amazing sight of up to one hundred thousand migratory birds
all sitting in one spot.
There are a number of parking bays along the road to the BBO, and we only had to go a short way to find the best one to access the beach. A short walk along the track and we could see a mass of grey on the edge of the water. While we were there a tour boat cruised past and many of the birds took flight making for some potentially great photos.
Mick spent time most mornings and afternoons on the beach
looking for particular birds and he had some success thanks to one of his birding friends. She spotted the one he was after and alerted him to its
whereabouts. They went searching together for another bird one morning in the
mangroves at Crab Creek and became quite lost and covered in mud before
eventually finding the right spot – just as the very high tide was rushing in.
To add insult to injury, Mick didn’t manage to get a shot of the bird even
though he had employed the “hit and hope” technique in the rush to get some
photos before the tide cut them off.
After some discussion we agreed to stay an extra night so
that Mick could go on the Mangrove Tour on Wednesday morning. We would then
leave straight after to go to Eighty Mile Beach for at least one night, maybe
two. Because we had an extra day we set off early on Tuesday morning to go back
into Broome to check out some birding spots and also to do some grocery
shopping. Our first stop was the Broome Recreation and Aquatic Centre (BRAC)
ovals which unfortunately had dogs off-lead running everywhere when we arrived.
Patience did pay off and once the dogs were gone Mick did get some nice shots.
From there we went down to the Broome South Wastewater
Treatment Facility (or poo ponds as they are colloquially known). A road runs
around the fenced perimeter so it’s not great for photography, but there is a
good viewing platform from which Mick was able to identify a couple of good
birds.
After the “poo ponds” we went into the town centre to
Streeter’s Jetty where Mick had been told he could find Red-Headed honeyeaters.
They were exactly in the spot described by one of the BBO wardens and he spent
a good while down in the mangroves getting some great photos, while I window
shopped in the numerous pearl emporia.
After morning tea we drove out to the port and Entrance
Point where the views are fantastic and where some of the migratory shorebirds
have a rest when they first arrive. The high tide meant there weren’t any on
the beach – which was covered completely with water – but there were some on
the nearby rocks. Some were close enough to identify but not photograph.
After a great week at this fabulous place, it was time to set off and head south. We had booked a site in Millstream - Chichester National Park and now had four days to fill in before then. Our next stop would be Eighty Mile Beach.
Broome
28 – 29 September 2022
After a very productive week (from a bird photography perspective) we set off to go to Eighty Mile Beach. Travelling along the unsealed Crab Creek Road from the Bird Observatory, I checked the tyre pressure monitor and noticed that one of the tyres had gone down considerably and was sitting on 22psi – not good. We continued to watch it and it looked like a slow leak so we decided to drive back to Broome when we reached the bitumen, and have it fixed before continuing. Unfortuately the tyre businesses in Broome were all flat out but we could have it fixed at 3:30pm that afternoon. This would mean we wouldn’t be able to get to Eighty Mile Beach so we booked into another caravan park at Cable Beach and moved our Eighty Mile Beach booking.
We made good use of the extra night on a powered site after a week without power and charged up all the devices and batteries, as well as doing a load of washing. Once the tyre was repaired we returned to the oval and water treatment works in search of some more bird photos. We also went down to the oval before we left town in the morning.
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