Camping trip and hiking in Southern Highlands

I celebrated my birthday by going on a camping weekend to The Southern Highlands.  Juni, a lovely, friendly girl from Indonesia kept me company on the drive.  The camp site was situated on a beautiful, tranquil river in the midst of nature, 45 km's away from civilisation.  We went on two hikes and on Sunday, visited a nearby tulip festival to enjoy a riot of colour.  A great weekend.

Hiking

Camping

 

Tulip festival

Birthday cake

Blackbutts Reserve (Newcastle)

George and I were ecstatic when this little baby koala emerged from it's mum's pouch.  It was very unexpected!  And set up some gorgeous photos.

Dubbo Zoo

We chose a very hot day indeed to explore the famous open plain zoo in Dubbo but had a great time cycling around checking out all the animals.  I used my big 400 mm lens and Dani borrowed my almost as big 200 mm one, so we looked like professionals.  Thanks goodness the bikes had handy baskets to keep the camera in, or our necks would have been very sore by the end of the day.  Dani's favourite animal is the Zebra and it was wonderful to see her enthusiasm when we came across them.

And the award for the cutest goes to...

... and a close runner up 

Award for the best rear end was tied three ways

The big cats were out...

... as were the buck

The last remaining African elephant in Australia

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Rhinos

And yet more animals

Wild birds we saw

Intrepid cyclist

Giraffing around

Next stop

Mudgee