Everybody was Kung Fu fighting

You know that feeling? The one when you’re so tired it’s hard to get out of bed, and you just want to stay there snuggled up under the covers.

Well, it had been a big week, and that’s how I was feeling when we set off for a weekend’s camping with friends at Lake Arragan, about an hour’s drive away from our home near Byron Bay, on the north coast of New South Wales.

Lake Arragan is nestled in the middle of the Yuraygir National Park, and it’s one of those magic spots where the lake flows out to meet the sea. Camping there is basic – no showers and a long walk to the long-drop toilets, but also sublime. The bird-life brings bird-watchers from around the world, and there is a protected population of kangaroos and wallabies, who regard the visiting campers with a fair amount of disdain, as if we’ve invaded their territory, which, of course, we have.

We’ve been there a few times now, and this tiny area packs a punch in terms of landscape. The lake is surrounded by tea trees and mangroves, which quickly give way to paperbark gum trees, which in turn fade out for the grassy plateau that lies between the lake and the sea. As you wander from the heathlands down towards the ocean, the extraordinary ochre colours of the cliffs appear – deep reds and browns and yellow.

Camped with our friends at the edge of a quiet beach, after a dinner by the fire and the sounds of the surf lulling us to sleep, I really had no intention of getting up to see the sunrise, but when I woke up in the pre-dawn chill, and heard the first sound of a kookaburra, I decided to brave the cold to see the sunrise.

It seemed as if the kangaroos and wallabies had the same idea – they were dotted over the cliffs, looking out to sea, or grazing quietly in the bush around me.

They took no notice of me and I was careful not to disturb them. So many of them were on the cliffs looking eastwards that it seemed as if watching the sunrise as a morning ritual. I was standing behind a pair of ‘boomers’ – large male kangaroos, who were gazing out to sea when they suddenly stood up, balanced back on their massive tails and started to spar with one another. It wasn’t a surprise when the bigger one knocked the smaller one off balance, and then, fighting all done, they went off about their business, as if whatever had offended them had passed.

It was a magic moment in the still morning air, the kookaburras, magpies, seagulls and egrets creating a dawn chorus of such magnitude they almost drowned out the sound of the crashing waves below. When I’d started my walk I was the only person out and about in the almost-dark, but by the time I walked back the campsite world was waking up, just as the kangaroos were heading to the their favourite hiding spots for the day.

As we headed back home, I thought about how so often you get those moments of synchronicity when you’ve pushed yourself out of your comfort zone. I felt extremely privileged to have witnessed this quarrel between friends. I couldn’t help wondering what had started it – why were they so happily absorbed, as was I, at watching the sun rise, when they decided to have a spat? And, deeper than that, why were so many of them watching the sunrise? Did it mean something to them, or were they just waiting for the first warming rays?

I’ll never know, of course, but I’m glad I got out of bed.