Hi all,
Back on the 7th of June Lorna Mee emailed me from the Hunter wanting to know if I want to go on a trip to Newhaven. I thought about the offer for fully seven seconds and emailed back that yes, I would love to go.
We met in Alice Springs a week later and Jim had arranged to hire a Troopie and camping gear from Kevin Reid at Central Car Rentals. We thought that the Troopie would be more than we needed but it was the only 4X4 available and with a fuel capacity of 180 litres it was perfect for 5 days out at Newhaven as we had plenty of fuel without worrying about getting back to Tilmouth Wells to refill. The driving time from Alice to Newhaven, at birdwatching speed and with stops, is about 6 – 7 hours. Tilmouth to Newhaven is about 160 km.
The roads in Newhaven are good at the moment and the Troopies abilities were more than we needed. All roads would have been OK for a manual transmission XTrail, Subie or similar if you know how to drive in deep sand but the corrugations would really shake them up and I would not really recommend it. A small car would also need to take in at least an extra 40 litres of fuel over the standard 60 litre tank.
The campgrounds are wonderful and the volunteers keep the fireplaces stocked with firewood and the bathrooms are spotless. They even have hot water, hand towels and bathmats – how luxurious is that! We had rented swags and it was the first time I had slept in one. The nights were cool in all ways with temperatures around 2ºC and no clouds so that the stars shone brightly. Early each morning we even had the crescent Moon, Venus and Jupiter clustered together on the horizon. It was magical. During the days the temp got to about 26ºC and there was no wind at all.
The Princess Parrots showed up in pairs and gave us some good looks as they perched in front of us. They are harder to find now than they have been and Peter and Toni said the reduction in sightings seemed to coincide with an increase in the number of budgies. We saw one distant flock of about 20 PPs but all other sightings were of ones and twos. Peter and Toni have now left Newhaven so the guided trips have stopped but I do hope that some other volunteer carries on documenting the birds’ habits as Toni and Peter have been doing. It would be a real shame if the work stopped just as it looks like the birds might be going to nest.
Apart from the parrots, bandit Pied Butcherbirds in the campground that tried to steal food from the table and the Brown Falcons that perched on dead trees all the birds were extremely shy for some reason. It might be because of the number of raptors; we saw 12 species during our visit including Black-breasted Buzzard, Spotted Harrier, Little Eagle and Nankeen Kestrel. My total species count for the 5 days was 56 but I did miss a few such as the Peregrine Falcon as we drove out, the Cockatiels that did a fly-over one morning and the Southern White-faces that were found by another group of birders. Highlights, apart from the parrots, were the pair of Grey Falcons that circled briefly above the car, the Hobby, Brown Goshawk and Brown Falcon having a three-way dispute over hunting rights at the campground, finding Banded White-face and Rufous-crowned Emu-wren, at last, and finding more than one Grey Honeyeater.
The plant life is in wonderful condition and the birds all hide in it very quickly once they see you. We saw thornbills and fairy-wrens all over the place as they worked through the mulga and tall grasses but it was a challenge to work out what they were, especially the fairy-wrens that were nearly all brown birds. We saw and identified the Grey Honeyeaters twice with thornbills and had about three other probable sightings. Western Gerygone were also in the area and we had to look closely to make sure that we were not getting them mixed up with the Grey Honeyeaters.
The Princess Parrots seem to be looking for nesting sites so hopefully they will stick around but even if you don’t see them Newhaven should be on everyone’s must visit list. Joe and the volunteers are doing a wonderful job, the country is in good condition, the birds are plentiful and the scenery is spectacular. Even if you don’t see the parrots Grey Honeyeaters were not overly hard to find, the raptors are everywhere, the emu-wrens were calling all over the place (but VERY hard to see) and there are lots of other desirable arid-land birds like Orange and Scarlet Chats.
Back in Alice Springs we went out for a celebration dinner on our last night. Lorna booked us into a Vietnamese restaurant out by the airport and it was absolutely wonderful, as good or better than most Melbourne ones. It is called Tinh & Lan Alice Vietnamese Restaurant and you do need to book. The number is 08 89528396.
It is going to take me a while to work through my photos and get a longer report on my blog but it should be done by Friday.
cheers
