AUSTRALASIA

Images of Australian cities, as beautiful as they are, cannot compare to the wildlife lying only an hour from any major airport. You soon feel the differences between Australia and the rest of the world as the Aussie bush absorbs you. Most people appreciate that Australia is huge, but it is the vast range of habitats that stuns all visitors: rainforests, coral reefs, coastal heaths, stony deserts, sandy deserts, alpine meadows, savanna grasslands, and Eucalypt woodlands are all here in the one country. Australia, with its excellent infrastructure, small population, and well-maintained reserves, remains under-birded, and you only rarely bump into other birders. A sense of isolation, just you with the birds in the bush, is very easy to achieve here. It is obvious why so many foreign birders immigrate here; when you are outnumbered 10,000 to 1 by a parrot flock, it is hard to go back home. We currently offer a tour to Eastern Australia that takes in the all of the major faunal zones, and we expect to pretty much clean up this part of the vast continent. Tropical Birding also has a trip through The Outback, where we visit areas as different as Ayers Rock in the Red Center to Kakadu in the Top End.

Unique, one of a kind, exceptional, and matchless are adjectives that don’t even come close to describing New Guinea. The huge highland populations were not even known to westerners until the 1930s when some gold explorers flew over them by chance. Logistics today are still a hassle (ours not yours), but some of the lodges are terrific and the birding is so rewarding that it is nearly impossible to imagine people leaving Papua New Guinea disappointed. It may be expensive, but worth every penny, especially if you feel that irresistible need to add 20 birds-of-paradise to your list.

New Zealand is far more sanitized and offers very easy birding. This region has stunning scenery and the remaining forests hold some very special birds. New Zealand also offers some of the best pelagic birding in the world. Only there is it possible to have the very surreal experience of watching a multitude of albatrosses cruising just a few feet away with high mountains rising up behind them.

We also have a range of custom tour itineraries to central, northern, and western Australia, Irian Jaya, New Guinea, New Zealand, and even New Caledonia.