Great Barrier Reef - Heron Island

As I enter a small man-made channel, heading towards the wooden jetty of Heron Island, I first pass by the sunken wreck of HMAS Protector, an 1884 Australian Royal Navy ship commissioned by the South Australian Government to defend its coastal borders. Built in Newcastle-on-Tyne, England, the boat made a long journey to Australia and served as a survey vessel for several years in China, followed by WW1 and WW2. In 1943, the ship was abandoned after it collided with a tugboat en route to New Guinea. Two years later, the wreck was purchased for ten pounds and towed to Heron Island to serve as a breakwater. Today it is home to the large seabird, the Brown Booby.

Like Lady Elliot Island, Heron Island is a coral cay of about 40 acres that appeared 6,000 years ago. There is no evidence of indigenous people ever inhabiting the island. The first European sighting was in 1816, but it wasn't occupied until the early 20th century, first by attempting to establish a turtle cannery that soon failed and later becoming a tourist destination.

For a small island, the vegetation is dense, and the forestry is diverse. Pisonia grandis, a flowering tree from the Bougainvillea family, dominates the central and southern parts of the island. To the northwest, the forest is more open, with Cordia subcordata as the flowering tree with pretty orange tubular flowers. The wild poinsettia, native to tropical America, has also been introduced and adapted well on the island. The vegetation is sparser on the northeastern side, where birds and animals dig nesting burrows.

The island is an incredibly important cay; each year, migratory birds such as the Black Noddies and Mutton Birds arrive in droves to breed. It is estimated that up to 200,000 birds may occupy the island during summer. At the same time, female turtles lay eggs, and as the hatchlings emerge, they head for the sea. In the winter months, humpback whales can be seen from the jetty. There is animal activity all year round on Heron Island. The hardest decision to make is which month to visit. For me, seeing the tiny green sea turtles hatch and waddle across the sand to the sea would be the absolute highlight.



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Kruger Park - Zebra

I made it through the night without any critters crawling or slithers around my cabin and before I hit the ground running, I checked my boots for any spiders making themselves at home in there.

As the gates opened just before daybreak, I headed north to Nhlowa Road (aka S28) with a brief stop at Gezantombi Watergat (waterhole). Scanning the area, I was hoping for a viewing, as animals are most active early in the morning or late afternoon, when the temperature is more palatable than the midday sun. The southern part of the park gets particularly hot during the summer season with temperatures soaring as high as 140°F (40°C) with a great deal of humidity.

Lucking out this time, I took a right turn onto the S28, a narrow gravel road and a mere 1.3mi (2km) later, I chanced upon my first sighting. To my left was a dazzle of zebras and to my right, albeit in the distance, was a herd of wildebeest. 

Commonly referred to as a ‘herd’ or ‘zeal’, a group of zebras is also known as a ‘dazzle’, which is a curious description with a very logical explanation. Apparently, it is due to the ‘dazzle motion effect’. When zebras move together, their pattern makes it difficult for a predator to focus on an individual target and thereby miscalculate the speed and direction taken by the prey. The military was quite fascinated with that theory, so much so that in the early 20th century (predominantly in WW1), US and UK warships were painted in ‘motion dazzle’ patterns in an attempt to confuse their enemies by making it difficult to gauge the ship’s size, speed, and direction. How effective they were remains questionable but by WW2 the practice began to fall out of favour.

Zebras are hard-wired to be wild, unlike their domesticated cousins, the horse and the donkey. Sometime in the late 19th century, humans attempted to domesticate zebras and use them for transportation, but the zebras continuously escaped their enclosures and thwarted their training. Clearly those strong survival instincts could not be tamed.

Of the three zebra species – Plains, Mountain and Grevy – the ‘Plains’ is the one most commonly found in the park. Its long distant relative, the quagga, was endemic to South Africa until it was hunted into extinction by 1878. The quagga was a fascinating species as its brown and white coat pattern was zebra-like at the front and horse-like at the back. This also raises the question whether a zebra’s stripe is black and white or white and black. Scientific research concluded that although a zebra’s belly is white, the skin beneath the hair is actually black. As such, the zebra is considered to be black with white stripes (although some debate continues) and the stripe patterns are like fingerprints because they are unique to each one of them.  

Moving on from the zebras, I kept my eyes peeled on these vast open plains and even up in the trees, seriously hoping I would see a big cat lazing on a branch. It wasn’t long though before I laid my eyes on a small herd of antelopes in the distance.

This was a good start to my safari experience. What’ll be next?


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