After riding out the
southerlies at Mackay, we had a great sail on full main and screecher to
Brampton Island. A couple of delicious
fish for lunch added to the charm of the island anchorage.
This year we walked the
Brampton Peak Track, not for the faint hearted and still covered in weeds, but
the orange-footed scrub fowls are working on those. Lots of butterflies, who also seem to like
the snake weed and cobblers peg flowers.
Among them tiger blues, common crows, grass-yellows and monarchs, others
could have been jezebels and pearl whites, but there were masses of them. 
Rainbow skinks darted
across the track and the melodic call of the local currawongs, so different from
the mainland birds, were among the few other visible wildlife along the
way.
The vegetation on the eastern
side of the island differs dramatically from the western side: casuarinas and
hoop pines with an understorey of ferns, and still more weeds...
The views from the lookout
made the effort worthwhile: islands dotted in the sparkling ocean for as far as
we could see.
On the short cut back along the beach the beach stone-curlews seemed reluctant to share their shore, calling and flying up and back to shoo us away.
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