Camooweal Revisited

2^nd August – 6^th August 2025

188 km west of Mount Isa, 440 km from the Stuart Highway and 12kms east of the Northern Territory border, is Camooweal, our next stop. Now, back in 2018, Peter, his brother Les and I did a three-week camping trip through outback Qld with two cars, a tent, a swag and a shovel. Now that’s bare camping in its truest form. Part of that trip took us to Camooweal where we caught up with Peters’ other siblings, Hazel and John, Robynn and Gil. We found a great place to camp on the Georgina River and had a fantastic time. So, we were really looking forward to getting back there.

The Georgina River doesn’t flow constantly; it relies heavily on the tropical summer rains. Yet there are two water catchments, Lake Canellan and Lake Francis that retain water most, but not all of the time between rains.

As always Peter found us the best spot for our camp on the banks of Lake Canellan.  It was pretty, chocked full of birds and we had our very own resident Brolgas to share morning coffee with.

The sun rises yes, I did see them (well one) were lovely, but the sunsets offered much better lighting for photography, that kept me happy. As for Peter, there were plenty of areas for him to go for a ride, Including Lake Francis. This was two to three km further down the road from Lake Canellan, and it too offered some lovely scenery.

Camooweal was just as we remembered. We camped about three hundred meters from where we’d camped with the family on our last visit.  But the birds, oh my, the birds! I identified 35 species but I’m sure the experts would have recognised many more So, right here and now I will warn you, there are going to be a lot of photos of birds. I’ve culled and culled and there are still too many but here we go.

First up was a big surprise and a first sighting for me. We drove up to the far end of Lake Francis, and I could not believe my eyes when I saw this pair of spectacular Jabiru (Black-Necked Storks).

The females have a yellow iris where the males have a brown iris. Hard to tell from a distance but easy from these photos

I mentioned Brolgas, we actually saw seven in the area. Two couples and a family of three. To me, Brolgas are a mix of elegance and comedic charm. They are devoted couples and are never far from each other.

Brolgas love to dance. Apparently their most elaborate dances are generally for courtship or strengthening their bond. I think they just love to dance and they dance like no one is watching.

They are big birds and need a decent runway for take-off. Elegance takes no part in this action.

There were a good number of Cormorants in the area, and it wasn’t hard to see why. This fellow got the catch of the day, lord knows how he swallowed it, it took some doing, but he got there in the end.

But there were plenty of small fish to feed the rest of the population. I’d like to say that only a few fish were harmed during the taking of these photos, but there were actually quite a lot.

And at the end of a hard day’s fishing, it’s off to find a roost for the night.

There were plenty of Raptors in the area.

Now you may notice the next three images are not birds, but is this or is this not, the prettiest caterpillar you’ve ever seen?

He was quite big, I’d guess about 75mm long and was all by his lonesome.

 From the prettiest caterpillar to the cutest ducks. This pair of Pacific Black ducks were just having a ball. I watched them for a good ten minutes and could almost hear them laughing.

There have been a few birds I wouldn’t expect to see this far inland, including this randy pair of Black-Fronted dotterels. There were also pied stilts, some sort of Tern and a solitary Black Swan.

So, we’re nearly at the end. Here a is a small sample of some of the other birds around our camp.

Dusk provided me with perfect light for the birds and the water.

Congratulations and thank you, if you made it through all these images. You might think I posted every single image I took – believe me…I didn’t.

See you out there somewhere

On tow and on the go!