*Sometimes the order in which sites are visited may be switched around due to availability issues.

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PLEASE NOTE: This itinerary has been slightly amended for the 2026 tour.

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Day 1: Arrival and afternoon birding in Cairns (Northeast Queensland)

The tour starts at 2pm in Cairns, set within the heart of the Wet Tropics of Northeast Queensland. Unlike our Eastern Australia tour, which often heads far south on our first afternoon, we will stay right around Cairns (within 30 minutes’ drive of the city at most). This will allow for a gentle, chilled afternoon, following our long inward bound journeys in recent days. Cairns is an extremely birdy city, and we are likely to see species like Magpie-lark, Rainbow Lorikeet, Torresian Imperial Pigeon, Willie-wagtail and Australasian Figbird with minimum effort! The parks in Cairns hold an abundance of weird and wonderful birds, such as Bush Thick-knee, Orange-footed Megapode, Australian Brush-Turkey and Black Butcherbird to name just a few. In the evening, we will take dinner at one of the many local restaurants in the small city of Cairns. Two nights will be spent in Cairns.
 
Day 2: The Birds and Marine Life of the Great Barrier Reef (Northeast Queensland)

If you are worried the long flight in may still be bugging you, worry not, for we have a very tranquil activity for this day to help you cope with that! We will take a boat out to a small sandy island on the Great Barrier Reef. The island is home to thousands of nesting seabirds in this season, and we are sure to get close ups of birds like Brown Booby, Sooty Tern, and Brown Noddy, and have chances at others like Great Frigatebirds and Lesser Crested Tern too during our landfall on this tiny island. After we have finished on the island, we will take a light lunch on board the boat, then visit Hastings Reef for the snorkelers of the group to enjoy. Snorkeling gear is provided on board the boat, and anyone who want to experience the tropical marine life of the Great Barrier Reef can do so at no extra cost; (if you do not wish to snorkel you can relax on the air-conditioned boat). The boat trip typically wraps up around 3:30-4pm, after which we will return to the hotel and wind down before an evening dinner at one of the many diverse restaurants in Cairns. For those who wish to do so, there will be an option to do some local birding for an hour or so, checking in on what we did not see during our first afternoon in Cairns.

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Day 3: Cairns to the Edge of the Outback (Northeast Queensland)

Today, we will start by birding close to Cairns, then cover a myriad sites north and west of Cairns (exact sites to be determined based on local news and tides etc.), ending the day by arriving in the town of Mareeba, set in dry country on the edge of the Outback, where giant termite mounds litter the landscape. A direct drive between Cairns and Mareeba is only two hours, although we will spend the entire day getting there, as there is a wonderful diversity of habitats at our disposal, including mangroves, lowland tropical rainforest, tidal flats, remnants of monsoon forest, and open eucalypt savanna. Some of our targets on this day are mouthwatering, like Buff-breasted Paradise-Kingfisher, Rose-crowned and Wompoo Fruit-Doves, Pied, White-eared, and Australian Spectacled Monarchs, Yellow-breasted Boatbill, and Lovely Fairywren! Two nights will be spent in Mareeba, in close proximity to an excellent pub for food, and a wide variety of birding venues for the following day.

 

Day 4: Julatten and Mount Carbine (Northeast Queensland)

This will be another day of extremes in habitats. In the morning, we will venture west to the Julatten area to explore remnants of Monsoon Vine Forest and Subtropical and Montane Rainforest on nearby Mount Lewis, but in the afternoon, we will have switched back to Open Eucalypt Savanna on the edge of the Outback. The morning targets will include local species like Bower’s Shrike-Thrush, Atherton Scrubwren, and Tooth-billed Bowerbird, as well as more widespread ones, like the gorgeous Golden Whistler. However, the afternoon could not be more different, as we seek Australian Bustard in grassy areas of savanna, and visit a wonderful, bird-friendly caravan park, where Blue-winged Kookaburras, Galahs, Pale-headed Rosellas, and Red-winged Parrots can all count themselves as regulars, as well as Tawny Frogmouths, a bold, cryptic nocturnal bird that can often be seen there in broad daylight. A bower or two of the Great Bowerbird, decorated with silver, gray or red items may also be seen there. We will return to Mareeba for a second night, checking for Eastern Gray Kangaroos on the local golf course or Red-tailed Black-Cockatoos coming into roost within the nearby savanna late in the day.

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PLEASE NOTE: In recent years Mount Lewis has been closed for an extended period and little information on when it may open again. If Mount Lewis cannot be visited, we will visit another area of the same habitat instead over the coming days. In the fall of 2025 the lower slopes of Mount Lewis at least were accessible, and more than worthy of visiting.

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Day 5: Mount Hypipamee, Hasties Swamp & Yungaburra (Northeast Queensland)

Today, we will head up to the Atherton Tablelands, where multiple habitats await, again! We will start out in something similar to the morning before, Subtropical and Montane Rainforest, although this time we will be hoping for one of the rarer forest birds of the tour, the gorgeous Golden Bowerbird. We will visit a traditional bower site for this species by walking inside the forest. This species constructs a maypole bower and decorates it with fresh pieces of white lichen. While there, we will also have the chance to see White-throated Treecreeper, Gray-headed Robin, and also visit the impressive crater, a short walk from the parking lot. This is a volcanic pipe, which extends to the water’s surface 58 meters (190ft) below the viewing platform, and a further 85 meters (280ft) below that!

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Once again, we will be in easy reach of other habitats, as next we will visit Hasties Swamp, a Tropical Wetland closer to the town of Atherton (where we will take lunch in one of the excellent cafes in town). Hasties typically hosts species like Plumed and Wandering Whistling-Ducks, Hardheads, Australasian Swamphens, and Australasian Grebes on the swamp itself, while the surrounding vegetation often holds Sacred Kingfisher, Yellow-faced Honeyeater, Red-backed Fairywren, and Chestnut-breasted Munia. Our final stop of the day will be at Peterson’s Creek in Yungaburra, where we will search for Platypus in the late afternoon, which is the optimum time of day for them to become active. We will spend the next two nights in Yungaburra, a wonderful town close to the Curtain Fig Tree, and with a wonderful variety of cafes and an historic pub in which to dine in. There will be an option on this night or the next (after dinner), to go out in search of local nightbirds, which include Barking Owl, Large-tailed Nightjar and Australian Owlet-Nightjar. For those who do not wish to do so, they can opt out and have an earlier night!

 

Day 6: Atherton Tablelands (Northeast Queensland)

This is another day with a diversity of close birding habitats at our disposal, and so it is hard to know which of these we will visit, as this will depend on what we have accrued up until this point. However, we will be targeting Atherton specialties, like Chowchilla, Tooth-billed Bowerbird, Spotted Catbird, and Victoria’s Riflebird. If needed, we can also return to check in on Platypus, should we have missed it the day before (with 3 different days to look for this at the best site in the area, we do have a good chance of seeing one). At some point on this day or the next we will also make a visit to nearby Curtain Fig Tree, more than anything for the dramatic tree itself, although birds can be found there too. If fruits are in abundance fruit doves may be around, and Pied Monarchs are also possible there too, should we not have caught up with one just yet.

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Day 7: Return to Cairns via Etty Bay (Northeast Queensland)

For our final birding day in the Wet Tropics, we will head back to Cairns via Etty Bay, a beach which flanks Lowland Tropical Rainforest that is home to several habituated Southern Cassowaries. Let’s hope they are around for the time of our afternoon visit. As this is the best time to see the cassowaries, we may not reach Cairns until 6:30-7pm on this night. A single night will be spent at our previous hotel in Cairns.

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Day 8: Cairns to Brisbane (Southern Queensland)

In the morning we will travel to Brisbane in Southern Queensland via a 2-hour flight from Cairns. From 2026, we have added this night in Brisbane, to give us extra time to look for Koala within the city and also have chances at other exciting local birds, like Powerful Owls (they are sometimes available at a roost site in the city), Mangrove Honeyeater and Mangrove Gerygone, and possibly too Striped Honeyeater. If we are lucky, there might be an active Square-tailed Kite nest during our visit, and if there is, we will make this a priority on this afternoon. A single night will be spent in Brisbane.

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Day 9: Brisbane to O’Reilly’s Rainforest Retreat (Southern Queensland)

After a morning chasing whatever we still need in the Brisbane area, we will depart for arguably the best birding lodge in Australia, O’Reilly’s Rainforest Retreat, set within cool subtropical rainforest on a plateau in the Green Mountains sector of Lamington National Park. Most likely in the morning before that, we will visit a superb local wetland, where birds like Brown Quail, Spotless Crake, Variegated Fairywren, Australian Reed-Warbler, Tawny Grassbird, Gray Butcherbird, White-throated Gerygone, and Striped Honeyeater can all count themselves as regulars and are all likely to be new for us. Lunch will be taken en-route to O’Reilly’s, and we will arrive there in the late afternoon, checking a camp of Gray-headed Flying-Foxes (a huge fruit bat), and for Bell Miners and White-naped Honeyeaters on the way up to there. We may arrive in time to see some of the more common and conspicuous O’Reilly’s birds, like Crimson Rosella and Australian King-Parrot after arrival.

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Days 10-11: O’Reilly’s & Lamington National Park (Southern Queensland)

Unlike all of our other Australian tours, we will have TWO full days to explore the wonderful surrounds of O’Reilly’s and neighboring Lamington National Park. O’Reilly’s is something of an Australian icon when it comes to birds and birding and is well recognized as one of the most productive birding sites in the country. The set of birds it has there are fascinating, and many of them are easy to find without significant effort. The lodge has feeding areas for Regent Bowerbirds, Satin Bowerbirds, Australian King-Parrots, and Crimson Rosellas for starters, and it is not uncommon for other birds to get in on this act, like the barrel-chested Wonga Pigeon, and handsome Red-browed Firetail. Other species, like White-browed and Yellow-throated Scrubwrens, and Eastern Whipbirds can be remarkably tame there too. Aside from these, there is plenty of other avian highlights to look forward to, like Rose Robin, Green Catbird, Albert’s Lyrebird, a masterful mimic, as well as the colorful Noisy Pitta. Early in the morning, or late in the day, cute Red-necked Pademelons, a wallaby that appears like a shrunken kangaroo, can be found right around the cabins. It should also be where we get our first looks at the delightfully abundant Superb Fairywren, which is sure to feature multiple times later on the tour.
 
As we have three nights at O’Reilly’s, there will be time to have an optional night session on one of the final two nights there after dinner together. This may see us run into one of the local mammals, like Mountain Brushtail Possum, or one of the night birds, such as Marbled Frogmouth or Australian Boobook, or if we are lucky, the bright blue Lamington Crayfish, a very local specialty.

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Day 12: O’Reilly’s to Tasmania

After a final few hours around O’Reilly’s we will return to Brisbane airport and fly south to Tasmania. We will aim to take an afternoon flight to Hobart (that often goes via Melbourne and is not direct). This does mean a late arrival at our Hobart hotel (after 10pm). However, this allows time to chase any further O’Reilly’s or Brisbane birds in this final morning, and we will not start until 07:30am on the following day.

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Day 13: Hobart & Mount Wellington to Bruny Island (Tasmania)

This day will start late (around 07:30am) right around Hobart visiting two fantastic sites close to Tasmania’s laid-back capital. First there will be the Hobart Waterworks Reserve, where mammals like Tasmanian (Rufous-bellied) Pademelon might feature alongside endemic birds like Tasmanian Native-Hen and Black Currawong. Mount Wellington offers spectacular vistas over the city of Hobart, but also some stellar birds like Flame Robin and Crescent Honeyeater within the alpine heathland near the summit. In the afternoon we will travel over to beautiful Bruny Island for a two-night stay, arriving at our hotel in the late afternoon. On one of our nights in Bruny Island, we will head out in search of nocturnal critters. Bruny Island is famed for its nighttime mammals, and hundreds of individuals are often seen, mostly conmprising Bennett’s Wallabies and Rufous-bellied Pademelons. However, on Bruny, the rare and local White Wallaby can often be found (an albino of Bennett’s Wallaby), and we may also bump into an Eastern Quoll or two. Birdwise there will be but one target in the area, the endemic Tasmanian Boobook, which can usually be found close to our hotel. The nightbirding will be done after dinner and so those who do not wish to do so can further relax at the bar or in their wonderful rooms, with a scenic view over the coast of Bruny Island.

Day 14: Bruny island (Tasmania)

Bruny Island is a magical place, that offers the full crop of the dozen endemic birds of Tasmania, and some very attractive other specialties all within a variety of beautiful landscapes. Clean white beaches, rocky headlands, wet temperate sclerophyll rainforests, and lowland, coastal heathlands can all be found on the island, and all will hold alluring birds for us. The beaches are home to Pied and Sooty Oystercatchers, hulking Pacific Gulls, and nesting Hooded Plovers. In the quiet, calm bays that link these together, Black Swans are a common sight. The heathland is home to Beautiful Firetails, Yellow-tailed Black-Cockatoos, sharp-dressed black-and-white New Holland Honeyeaters, and Flame Robins, while the rainforest boasts the pretty Pink Robin and unobtrusive Scrubtit. In groves of distinctive stringybark trees within the wet sclerophyll rainforest the endemic Strong-billed Honeyeater can also be found. We will also visit areas where large White Gums can be found, the lair of the endangered Forty-spotted Pardalote, and we will be on the lookout for white blossoms within the eucalyptus trees lining the beach at Adventure Bay, a favored hangout for migrant Swift Parrots that migrate from mainland Australia to Bruny Island to breed. 
 
Day 15: Bruny Island to Hobart (Tasmania)

After some further time on Bruny Island, we will take the car ferry back to the Tasmanian mainland, where there may be time to sneak in other local sites around Hobart before the day’s end to seek birds like Musk Lorikeet, Musk and Freckled Ducks, or even Australian Crake. A final night will be spent back in the same Hobart hotel we used on day 12.

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Day 16: Departure from Hobart (Tasmania)

There is no birding planned on this day, and you are free to depart Hobart’s small international airport at any time that suits you.

Day 16: Departure from Hobart (Tasmania).

There is no birding planned on this day and you are free to depart Hobart’s small international airport at any time that suits you.

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Trip Considerations

PACE: Easy to Moderate. This tour is less intense than our Eastern Australia (Top to Bottom) tour, with less one-night stays than that tour, and all the domestic flights have been planned to avoid very early departures. However, there is a late arrival needed on the day between Brisbane and Hobart (Tasmania), as this is the nly way to avoid a very early departure from O’Reilly’s. Although this will see us likely arrive at our hotel later than 10pm, the activities the next day will not start until 07:30am to balance this!

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This tour aims to get a good sample of the habitats, birds, and other wildlife of the region, and does not try and get every bird, unlike the Eastern Australia tour! Starts will still be early, mostly around 6:00am, although there may be just a few optional 5:30am starts. Throughout the tour we expect to arrive at all of the lodges/hotels before dark. We will generally aim to get back/reach the hotels by 6:00-6:30pm, with the one exception to this being on Day 7, when we MAY not reach the hotel until 7pm (this depends on the Southern Cassowary, which can still be seen earlier than this).

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Several, optional, nighttime activities have been planned on this tour to look for nocturnal birds and mammals. The first of these will be on one of the nights in Yungaburra (i.e., day 5 or 6), to look for Barking Owl and Large-tailed Nightjar. The second of these will be on days 9, 10 or 11 at O’Reilly’s Rainforest Retreat, to look for Marbled Frogmouth and Australian Boobook. The last one will be on one of our nights on Bruny Island (i.e. day 13 or 14). The exact night chosen will depend on weather conditions at the time. These are all optional, post-dinner, activities, that you can choose to opt out of if you wish to do so.

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There are no especially long drives on this tour (unlike all of the other Australia birding tours). Most of the drives on this tour are under 2 hours, although there may be one or two that reach three hours (NOTE: these are direct drive times and do not include stops for birding within the travel times). All of the drives on the Cairns leg (i.e. Days 1-7) are 2 hours or less. On the Brisbane leg, on Days 9 and 12, the drives may reach 3 hours in length). On the Tasmania leg (i.e. Days 13-15), the drives will all be 90 minutes or less. Almost all of these drives will end up taking longer than stated here as they will be broken up with birding stops along the way.

 

PHYSICAL DIFFICULTY:  Easy. Most of the birding will be done from roads and mostly flat, well-maintained trails. There are no very long walks/hikes, and the few times we are on trails they are well maintained ones, which are not difficult, and are only undertaken for short distances (3km/2 miles or less).

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There are no especially high-altitude sites; the highest points of the tour will be on one day on the Cairns leg (Day 4 on Mount Lewis if it has reopened-1200m/4000ft), and during one of the days in Tasmania, on Mount Wellington, which reaches 1270m/4,170ft at its summit. These areas are both driven to with very limited hiking on site.

 

CLIMATE: Highly variable. In the Cairns area, it is tropical and humid, with highs of around 86°F/30°C, and humidity generally reaching around 75%. There is typically little or no rain at this time of year on the Cairns leg, as it is the dry season. However, even in this season, there is a chance for rain in the highlands part of this leg (i.e. around 3 days). Temperatures in Brisbane are typically between 57°F/14°C and 75°F/34°C at this time of year. The Brisbane leg principally covers a mountain site (O’Reilly’s) where the climate can be significantly cooler (40-46°F/5-8°C) than in Brisbane in this season. On average there are about 4 rain days per month in this season for the Brisbane leg. Tasmania will be the coldest part, with temperatures typically 48°F-64°F/9°C-18°C, but may be significantly cooler in the early mornings, when temperatures can drop to near freezing. There are around 8 days per month of rainfall in Tasmania in this season. Thus, in general, you will be visiting during the Australian springtime, which is largely a dry time of year, but some rain can be expected, being most likely in Tasmania, or for several days in Queensland.

 

ACCOMMODATION: Good throughout. All accommodations have private bathrooms, full-time hot water, and 24-hour electricity. All of the hotels on this tour have Wi-fi.

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Other Information

TRAVEL REQUIREMENTS: A valid passport is required for entry into Australia. It should be valid for at least six months past the time of your scheduled return.  An electronic visa is required for citizens of the USA, Canada, the UK, South Africa, and most Western European countries. This can be done through an app or online application.  

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WHAT’S INCLUDED?: Accommodation from the night of day 1 through to the night of day 15; meals from dinner on day 1 to dinner on day 15; safe drinking water throughout; most hotels in Australia provide a kettle and tea and coffee; Tropical Birding tour leader with scope and audio gear from the afternoon of day 1 to the night of day 15; transfer by taxi to the airports at the start and end of the tour (NB: Only if these are on the official arrival and departure days); ground transport for the group to all sites in the itinerary in a suitable modern vehicle driven by the tour leader; one boat trip to the Great Barrier Reef on Day 2 (this will be shared with other people); entrance fees to all birding sites mentioned in the itinerary; a printed and bound checklist to keep track of your sightings (given to you at the start of the tour – only electronic copies can be provided in advance).

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WHAT’S NOT INCLUDED?: Optional tips to the tour leader; international flights; domestic flights (THESE WILL BE BOOKED BY THE TROPICAL BIRDING OFFICE TO ENSURE THE GROUP ALL HAVE THE CORRECT FLIGHTS); excess baggage fees; snacks; additional drinks apart from those included; alcoholic beverages; travel insurance; excursions not included in the tour itinerary; extras in hotels such as laundry service, internet, minibar, room service, telephone calls, and personal items; medical fees; other items or services not specifically mentioned as being included.