I've been staying in Carlton North for over 7 years now and last week I discovered a new parklands just a hop, skip and a jump away from me. Darebin Parklands is a hidden gem. Melbourne never ceases to amaze me with its abundance of parks and nature reserves. You can easily forget you are living in a major capital city and imagine you're out in the bush in the middle of nowhere.

So this morning, before the 42degree temps hit, a mate and I grabbed our dirty great big lenses (70-200mm) and hit the track to try our hand at a bit of bird photography. Neither of us are particularly keen on bird photography, but we figured it would be good practice. And we were right. It's bloody hard!

You need a lot of patience, some pretty good camera skills, a bloody long lens (I had a x2 converter on the 70-200), some good light and a nice background. And did I mention lots of patience? Oh, and a good bit of luck too.

My mate got some cracker shots. But she's one of those uncannily gifted people that can easily make the rest of us think we should hang up our camera's right now.

I kept getting distracted by bugs and berries and the light on the grasses and things other than birds. It's a great place to go for a walk. Straight down Separation St and you're there. Check it out.