Waterfalls and Striped Possums

Atherton Tablelands, Queensland, 11 August 2022
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Click on any image to see it larger (If you are on a PC at least).

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Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls

In our third full day in Atherton Tablelands, we first headed off to Mount Hypipamee National Park.  Here we are walking the Dinner Falls circuit.

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls

Falls on Barron River near Dinner Falls.

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls

Dinner Falls.

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls

Next we walked on to the Mount Hypipamee Crater.

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls

This is of course a volcanic crater.

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls

From the viewing platform, there is a drop of 130 metres to the lake which is then a further 73 metres deep.  It’s a long way down.

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls

I was intrigued by the patterns on the surface of the lake.

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls

These are partly natural and partly created by people who frequently throw rocks down into the lake.  (Personally, I’d prefer it just to be natural).

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls

Panoramic view.

After that, I decided to head off to Zillie Falls again.  I had carelessly exposed my images there at high ISO the previous day so thought to try again.  This image is from a viewpoint on the way.

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls

Zillzie Falls.

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls

In the late afternoon I was shooting into the light and I didn’t bracket enough, so there is no detail in the sky.

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls .

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls

I decided to head back via the bird hide at Hastie’s Swamp.   That meant a long trip on the back roads, late in the afternoon.  I can’t show you much of what we saw because often the light was fleeting and the narrow winding roads often meant nowhere to pull over.

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls .

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls

At Hastie’s Swamp I took some more photographs of the plumed whistling-ducks in challenging low light conditions of the late afternoon.

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls .

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls

This is the opposite shore, which about 200 metres away.

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls

Back with the night life where we were staying, the sugar gliders were there initially but when one or two much larger striped possums turned up, they made themselves scarce.

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls .

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls .

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls

Here you can see the elongated fourth finger with a long hooked nail that it uses to extract insects and caterpillars from bark and cracks.  In this it is similar to the very weird Aye-Aye from Madagascar.  They are not related though.  The Aye-Aye is a lemur and a very primitive primate whereas the striped possum is a marsupial found mainly in New Guinea and West Irian but also in coastal North Queensland.

. Atherton Tablelands, Dinner Falls, Hastie's Swamp, Landscape, Mount Hypipamee National Park, Nature, Photography, Striped Possum, Sugar glider, Travel, Wilderness, Wildlife, Zillie Falls .

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