It is apparently the longest range in a single country!

Yes, the only thing great about it is the length.

I have a kickstand, so it is easy to park the bike and grab my stuff out of the handlebar bag. I sometimes use the saddle of the bike as a "beanbag" to get a steadier shot.

My apologies that my replies are piecemeal.

Most of my situational photos are done with my cellphone. Some are nicked from Leigh's cellphone.

I often stop and haul the camera out, usually having grabbed the binos from on top of them first to have a decko. Mostly this is to get a record shot to help confirm the ID of the bird but sometimes I get lucky and the conditions are suitable to get a better shot. Often the bird flies off before I can get a shot! I have three presets saved in the camera for static, moving and focus tracking shots with different focus zones, aperture and ISO settings etc for each but I often adjust exposure compensation on the fly.

Marc, that is tremendously informative and helpful to me. Thanks for taking the time to do the photos. Let me trouble you with a follow-up about how you use this.

I see that you have done birding days, from a blind, and I get that. But how about for example the Black Shouldered Kite on April 24. Did you spot this, put on your brakes without squeaking, dismount, unwrap the camera, and the bird waited for you to find it in the view finder, focus and shoot, and maybe have second thoughts about the exposure compensation, and shoot again? These are all areas that trouble me considerably!

How about that ute from the other. day, did you you shoot with the Leica, or a cell phone or point and shoot? There has to be another camera in the mix, such as to give the illustrations of the main camera that we have here!

Sorry to be a bug!

Hi Steve. I use an M43 setup that fits into my handlebar bag. M43 stands for micro four thirds, a format supported by OM (previously known as Olympus) ans Panasonic with lenses also provided by the best glass makers around, Leica. M43 effectively doubles the focal length in relation to full frame DSLR cameras. So my Panasonic GX85 paired with a Leica 100-400mm lens gives me an effective 200-800mm lens on a full frame body at a fraction of the size. Using Ortlieb's camera insert, i can fit the camera and lens with sufficient space on the top, bottom and sides for my binoculars (Leica Trin8vid 8x20 - really small!), wallet, passports and mobile phone. The photos I've added to this post should explain the setup.

I just thought I would jump in here with a question. Until recently I was taking photos on bike trips just to illustrate the narrative. But then I thought better landscapes would be nice, and went to the largest point and shoot that would still fit in a pocket. Then more birds began to creep in, and I am thinking of a bridge superzoom, mainly the Nikon P950. This would eat up my whole handlebar bag, and not be very quickdraw. Where do you store your camera (s) and do you get on foot to use them on planned walks or do you stop the bike, pull a camera, and try for a shot?

Even my hometown … only a village now… in northern NSW had a carriage building business until the early 1900s.

Horse drawn transport was a major part of the local economy. Saddle makers, blacksmiths, wheel wrights, teamsters and so on.

One of my grandfathers had a pair of draught horses which gave him employment for many years road building with a horse-drawn grader.

Motor vehicles quickly disrupted the horse based businesses, but I wonder how much the arrival of the mass produced safety bicycle (decades before cars) also affected horse based businesses in regional Australia.

It's a constant battle as to whether a data source can be trusted or not. Recently Google has kept on showing us alternative secondary roads we could take when the main roads were closed due to flooding while we knew that the alternatives offered were also closed. Nonetheless, Komoot is my first choice, largely because it gives a reasonably good picture of road conditions eg accurate elevation
charts and tarred vs gravel. Google helps with finding quieter roads. Maps.me almost always suggests the toughest route possible but we use it in a pinch when we don't have internet access.

Yesterday I had the same experience getting into Marulan from Goulburn, Komoot taking me into a quarry that wasn't a road.

I've got back to your blog - finally. I absolutely agree with your comments on war museums. Unfortunately, we live in a war-mongering nation. Imagine the day when there are no more returned servicemen. IAN

Looks like some kind of orb weaver.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orb-weaver_spider

No real ill effects apart from all the gas that was hidden inside the pie.

Strangely enough, I watched a clip of that scene last week. The actors were Marius Weyers and Sandra Prinsloo. Truly slapstick but it is still a classic. The vehicle in that scene was also a Series II.