Day 1 – Sydney to Mudgee

Today I embarked on an Australian odyssey. I met a friend of mine, Richard Reams, at Sydney Airport and we headed off to pick up our rental car. After getting lost in Sydney for about an hour, we finally made it out of the city and into the Blue Mountains. It was quite an overcast day, but we did manage to see a small skink scurrying around a walking trail. We didn’t manage to identify it, but it let us know that there was at least one reptile active in the less-than-ideal conditions.

Somewhere in the Blue Mountains

We left the Blue Mountains and headed towards our first major destination, Warrumbungle National Park. Along the way we saw a road-killed wombat on the side of the road.

Road-killed common wombat (Vombatus ursinus) – it wasn’t us, I swear

While photographing the deceased diprotodont we saw a little skink moving through the nearby leaf litter. This time we were able to identify the critter as a red-throated skink (Acritoscincus platynotus).

Red-throated skink (Acritoscincus platynotus)

After taking some happy snaps of the skink we headed to the town of Mudgee, our first night-stop. After sorting out a place to stay, we headed down a nearby road to see what we could see. We saw an eastern pobblebonk, Limnodynastes dumerilii (pobblebonks, by the way, are the best sort of bonk). We saw nothing else except a bunch of road-killed creatures, including an apparently not-cunning-enough fox (Vulpes vulpes).

Eastern pobblebonk (Limnodynastes dumerilii). Dedicated to Evan.

We called it a night and got some sleep. Next stop: Warrumbungle National Park.