Stanwell Tops

I’m breaching a hard and fast rule of this blog by putting up this photo. It was taken by my good friend Vic, not long after I landed from my first experience hang gliding. You can tell, by my face, how disappointed I was with my experience.

By many, hang gliding is considered an extreme sport. But while you’re in the air, soaring majestically above the cliffs that separate national park from ocean, it seems anything but. It is calm. The winds buffet and dictate where you may travel but the feeling is serene. Even as you glide through falling rain, it peters against your face in gentle droplets.

I was lucky. It was well into twilight before I took flight. When I landed, for those on the ground, it was already dark. We owned those skies and did not need to heed the course of others on the wing. I am truly inspired and want to find ways I can take photos from the air to help those with deep roots, find a way to explore their world from an alternate perspective. I am both a simple man, and a fortunate bloke.

Black cockatoo

The tentacles of winter do not extend this far north. There is always a certain balminess to Slade Point that staves off the cold. It makes it far easier to lie in wait for the fauna that greets the dawn.

A cockfest of them arrive, screeching loudly in the twilight air. Black and bold, they come to feast on the seeds from this grove of umbrella trees. As they hop from one spot to another, the horizontal band of red and orange that adorn their tails, flashes in the brightening day.

For the locals, it is an everyday occurrence. But not for me. I am used to the brilliant white and sulphur cresting of their cousins.

I always find the black cockatoo inspiring. It reminds me of places less domesticated than the capital cities to the south. A smile is splashed generously across my face as I lie on my stomach taking photos. It is obvious that this is where I prefer to be.