Back to Loch Ard Gorge

Even though it was quite overcast we thought we'd go back to Loch Ard Gorge, since we'd only just walked around one small section at sunset a couple of days before.  We had a few glimpses of sun, but it was mostly overcast.

We had hoped to see a rufous bristlebird, which are relatively rare, and when we saw a bird in the low scrub we thought we'd found it.  An initial photograph revealed it wasn't... it was a striated field wren.  We started playing the call on our bird app, and it  couldn't contain its curiosity at the sound of another bird in the area!  It sat up on a branch for a long time and kept calling back to us.  It gave us some great photos!

As we walked around we could occasionally hear rufous bristlebirds, and at a couple of points they must have been within only a couple of metres of us, but the undergrowth they run around in is so dense we had no hope of seeing them.  Using the bird call on the app didn't seem to bring them out either.  We had given up hope of seeing one and were walking back to the car.  As we got to the car park there was one, eating crumbs off the bitumen next to a small tour bus and its driver!