Category Archives: river/creeks

Waulinbakh Wildlife Sanctuary

4X4, Australia, AWC, ferns, forest, Landscape, mosses/lichens, NSW, Plant, river/creeks, Stroud, trees, Waulinbakh, Waulinbakh Wildlife Sanctuary

A few days ago The Doc and his friend Steve visited Waulinbakh Wildlife Sanctuary at Stroud New South Wales. Our guides for the day were AWC staff Elly and Josh.

Steve’s main objective was locating live myxos in the field. We had success locating 5 or 6 species. The Doc located the first myxos, but they were of poor quality, but later he spotted a large fallen tree which turned out to be a myxo gold mine. Steve’s find on the rotting tree included a myxo that had only ever been reported in NSW twice before (one of those sightings was by Steve). It was Steve and Josh who did all the heavy myxo lifting.

We met with three other AWC staff that day on site, one of the land managers Matt and two senior staff on visit to the sanctuary.

Steve and The Doc brought along morning tea and lunch, after an early visit to the Buladelah Bakery. Small thank you gifts to the AWC staff were also given.

We stayed at the Lady Jane Motel in Buladelah for two nights as part of the trip, run by a hard working family. They are in the process of renovating the motel. The room The Doc had was great, but the newly refurbished rooms were amazing. It was a great stay.

The myxos found are still being photographed by Steve. Steve has a self published a book of myxos here.

A big thank to Australian Wildlife Conservancy and the owners for allowing us to visit. Here are some images from the visit. The Sony P&S camera struggled in the low light conditions.

Arnhem Land Revisited – medium format style

4X4, Arnhem Land, Australia, camera, Kakadu, Kakadu, Landscape, landscape, mountains, Northern Territory, NT, river/creeks, trees

The Doc took two cameras on the helicopter, including a Pentax 645Z Medium format camera. The Pentax gives massive files which The Doc can crop how he wishes. The files have eye watering details, not always appreciated when you can only post small images on a blog.

The Pentax renders very accurate colours, more so than the Canon 1DX which was the other camera used. These images are a very accurate representation on what you see from the helicopter.

To be precise, these images are from the West Arnhem Region.

Arnhem Land Revisited

Arnhem Land, Australia, camera, Kakadu, Kakadu, Landscape, landscape, mountains, Northern Territory, NT, river/creeks

Some images reprocessed from The Doc’s 4 day helicopter trip around Arnhem Land and Kakadu in 2017. It was a great trip. Click on an image to see the slideshow. Enjoy.

Piccaninny Plains revisited

Australia, AWC, Cape York, forest, lakes, Landscape, landscape, Piccaninny Plains, plains, Qld, river/creeks, Uncategorised

AWC Supporter events are about to start at Piccaninny Plains on Cape York. The Doc visited back in 2014, and did a flyover in 2015 on Day 4 of the Cape York helicopter trip. It is a fantastic place and very different to others parts of Australia he has visited.

The Doc needed a break from the ongoing rehab and reprocessed some of his old images, using his new post processing techniques. They turned out great.

Most of the images were taken on the helicopter. Enjoy. Click on the first image to see a full size slideshow.

Bullo River Station Report finished

4X4, Australia, AWC, Bullo River Station, Kimberley, Landscape, landscape, NT, river/creeks

The longest report The Doc has done for an AWC Supporter’s Event. Lots of photos and an amazing experiences here.

Bullo River Cruise

4X4, Australia, AWC, Bullo River Station, Bullo River Station, camera, clouds, Landscape, Northern Territory, Plant, river/creeks, trees

At the recent AWC Supporter Event at Bullo River Station we had small groups doing guided tours along the Bullo River, with a cold breakfast supplied (fresh fruit, quiche, yogurt, nuts, freshly squeezed OJ and muffins).

A few images are below. Click on an image to see a slideshow at full size. Enjoy the beauty of God’s creation.

The Doc is still writing the longer Bullo report.

Corroboree Billabong – the Sony A9III in the field

4X4, ampihians, Arnhem Land, Australia, birds, camera, Landscape, NT, reptiles, river/creeks, Uncategorised, Wildlife, ,

The Doc took the Sony A9III out into the field for its first use. A few test photos on the ground at Bullo River Station, but the first proper test was the helicopter trip around the property. Report coming, with images, in due course.

With any new camera there is learning curve concerning how to best set it up and use it. A few mistakes were made and a few images lost, but no disaster. The Doc was worried at setting the frames per second (fps) too low in the helicopter, but the culling of images showed that not to be the case.

The camera can go up to 120 fps in High Plus speed mode. 120 fps was not used on the helicopter, but it was on the Corroboree Billabong cruise, when The Doc had limited time to get images, including the old saltwater crocodile. The camera was amazing and this feature will come in useful for action shots. You must use it sparingly and cull images cull images, hard.

Having visited Corroboree Billabong before with Wetland Cruises, The Doc knew it would be a good day trip out of Darwin. Corroboree Billabong has the highest concentration of crocs in the world. It has both fresh water and salt water crocodiles. Corroboree Billabong is located on the Mary River floodplain.

The landscape images were being taken by the Sony P&S, not the A9III, as the A9III was fitted with a 135mm lens.

The harsh light in the middle of the day meant no brilliant images from the billabong.

The roadtrains and billabong images first, followed by the crocs close ups.

Now the croc images. The croc was getting close to 5 metres in length, so very dangerous to the stupid and unwary.

Bullo River Gorge – lots of bull

Australia, AWC, Bullo River Station, camera, Kimberley, lakes, landscape, Landscape, mountains, NT, plains, river/creeks, Uncategorised

The Doc is back in Darwin, sorting and culling images from the trip. He will spend a week here exploring, after a rest day.

If Bullo River Station sounds familiar it was made famous by Sarah Henderson’s book From Strength to Strength.

A superb all round experience. Amazing accommodation, great facilities, great food and support from both AWC Guides and Bullo River staff. The trip included bird watching, a morning river cruise, a guided helicopter trip, road trips around the Station and a last minute change in our arrival because of rain washing out the airstrip. We landed in Kununurra and were driven into Bullo River Station, down the Bullo River Access Road.

One place The Doc visited, on a helicopter trip around Bullo River Station, was Bullo River Gorge. More precisely, the part of the gorge known as Bull River Sands.

Earlier that morning, we had flown around the Bullo River and along the Victoria River to visit an AWC science team in the field, then we flew onto to Bullo River Gorge for breakfast.

The Bullo River starts and finishes on Bullo River Station, hence the Station’s name.

AWC runs the best supporter events, made even better when the Bull River Tourism team was involved.

A taste of what is coming. Enjoy.

Bullo River Sands, Bullo River Gorge, Bullo River Station

We were delivered in the bush taxi, a Robinson R44 helicopter landing in the gorge.

Bullo River Station: slight change of plans

4X4, Australia, AWC, Bullo River Station, lakes, Landscape, landscape, mountains, NT, plains, river/creeks, Uncategorised


There was rain overnight at Bullo River Station, so planes cannot land on the unsealed air strip. Guests are leaving earlier from Darwin and being taken to a nearby air strip – that would be a country “nearby”. Kununurra has the nearest sealed airstrip.

Then Guests have a 3 hour drive into Bullo River Station, which has the longest driveway in the Northern Territory. The driveway is the hard left off the Victoria Highway on the map below. All part of the adventure, for me. Plus The Doc knows how to drive into Bullo River Station in the Grenadier!

AWC just works around the challenges to get us there. Thank you AWC.

Derby helicopter trip – medium format style

4X4, Artesian Range, Australia, AWC, Charnley River, Charnley River - Artesian Range, coastal, Derby, Kimberley, Kimberley, Landscape, ocean, Plant, river/creeks, trees, Uncategorised, WA, WA

The Doc also took his Pentax medium format camera on the helicopter. A selection of a few images from that camera are below.

The original images are massive in size (around 250 megs), and have stunning details even when heavily cropped. Not an easy camera to use in a helicopter because of its size and its slow autofocus. Plus you do not want to take too many images with large file sizes, which are slow and hard to work with. But the images, when they work out, are just gorgeous.

Click on an image to see the slideshow. It is worth it. Enjoy.

Plus some assorted images from Yampi Sound Training Ground, Charnley River Gorge up in The Artesian Range and the Buccaneer Archipelago.