BUTTERHIKING  

A year later, Derek and I again made our way up the coast to the north of Perth. This time we took a little detour to visit The Pinnacles, a curious part of the Nambung National Park in which several thousand narrow limestone pillars rise about 3 metres from the ground. It’s a popular port of call on the tourist trail as it provides plenty of scope for interesting selfies. It’s worth Googling images of “The Pinnacles WA” as the search returns a host of very impressive photos of this moonscape. I didn’t take any, which is a shame because a colourful photo of the area would have looked really good at this point of my book.

The scenery was all well and good, but of course we were there for more important business, namely an attempt to get close-up shots of Satin Azures (Ogyris amaryllis). I’d seen photos posted online of these Azures settled low down in bushes around the Visitor Centre and car park, and as this butterfly usually flies high up around tree tops we thought this was an opportunity worth looking into.

The moment we got out of the car we were accosted by flies. Billions of flies. They were everywhere, and it was extremely aggravating as they were covering our faces and getting into our eyes, ears, noses and mouths. This was clearly a common occurrence here because, in addition to the usual paraphernalia, the souvenir shop sold fly nets designed to be worn over the head to keep pesky insects off. They worked well, except for one enterprising fly which wriggled its way inside my net and then buzzed around like a mad thing. I tried to swat it, but in a predictably slapstick moment I missed and hurt my nose instead.

With the help of our head nets we were able to look for the Satin Azures. It didn’t take long for Derek to spot one; it flew rapidly around the tops of the bushes and then settled, albeit much higher than we would have preferred. It’s unfortunate that these butterflies always close their wings when they land; their upper side is a dazzling iridescent blue which you can briefly glimpse as they fly at great speed above you, but upon landing they instantly close their wings so only the mottled grey underside is visible.

By standing on a low sandstone wall we were able to get one or two photos, though far from the close-ups we were hoping for. We decided to split up and search for more promising spots; I went across the carpark then followed the sealed road further up the hill, before cutting across to an unsealed, but firm and smooth, track of orange earth. I quickly got a photo of an amaryllis feeding from a flower at a reasonable height; he wasn’t a great specimen but I was hopeful there would be others around.

I have to admit, I’m not the world’s greatest multitasker and it seems that walking and looking for butterflies, whilst at the same time trying to ignore the fly inside my head net, was simply too much for me to process. The end of my right shoe caught in the blameless surface of the track and slowly, but surely, I began falling forwards. I tried flailing my arms around but gravity got the better of me and I realised that my slow-motion descent wasn’t going to end well. I had my precious camera in my hand; both it and the macro lens were quite expensive items. To avoid damaging anything important I deliberately kept my arms up, ensuring that my face broke the fall instead. It must have been funny to watch; the people in the 4WD vehicle passing close by certainly seemed to be enjoying it. I’m surprised they didn’t post a video on YouTube – it would have gone viral for sure.

Having been planted firmly into the bright orange dirt my face, deeply ingrained with coarse grit, was approximately the same colour as an Oompa Loompa, or even Donald Trump after a heavy session at the spray tan salon. I had a couple of bloody cuts and scrapes, to the great delight of the fly trapped inside my head net, so I hustled back to the car and made liberal use of the antiseptic cream in Derek’s first aid kit.