Wayne and I spent a beautiful morning photographing in his back yard and at a couple of lily ponds just down the road. We saw some nice birds and I was able to photograph a few birds that I had not photographed so all in all it was a good morning. We spent most of midday around the house doing a bit of planning for the next few days.
In the afternoon, Wayne's camera club had an outing scheduled at a couple of local beaches to work on portraiture. Since portraiture isn't really my speciality, Wayne assured me that there were usually some shorebirds on teh rocks that would be nice targets for me if I wanted to tag along. I decided that it sounded like a good idea so off we went.
The plan was to meet at one beach and photograph there before moving to the next beach south to photograph the full moon rising over the ocean. However, when we arrived at the first beach we found that there was a lot of seaweed in the surf that gave off quite a pungent odor. It was decided to try the other beach to see if it was weed free so while the club drove there, I decided to work along the rocks and photograph my way down there. I had qutie a nice walk along the rocks and did manage to photograph a Striated Heron which I had seen only one other time and almost got photos of a Brahimny Kite as it flew by but it turned away just as I got my camera on it.
I arrived at the other beach to find the club out on the rocks and after a while Wayne suggested we go work around the corner to see if we could find some oystercatchers which apparently hang out there. Sure enough, we found a very cooperative pair of Sooty Oystercatchers, the less numerous of the two Australian oystercatcher species. As the sun sank in the sky we were treated to wonderful light on the birds and the blue Pacific Ocean providing interesting backgrounds. It was one of the best photo shoots I have had in sevearl weeks.
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