Up early, so with the car mostly packed we were away a bit after 8.00 and came to a stand still not far up the road as the night works on the main road was still happening so it took us 1/2hr to get past the roadworks, it was then the trudge with the peak hour traffic into Geelong where we topped up the fuel tanks at the usual APCO in South Geelong and headed out along the Bacchus Marsh Rd in cold windy showery conditions, not ideal for birding. So when we stopped at Gorman Rd Bullengarook I wasn’t surprised to hear silence, but I found a small feeding group that had both Yellow and Striated Thornbills in it which brightened up my morning. We did a lot of mapping for Hema today, finding dirt roads to get from one survey point to another. Our run with locked gates surfaced a few times though. The next stop was Waterloo Flat Rd Bullengarook where I added White-throated Treecreeper, still haven’t managed a photo of one yet. We had lunch at Birranes Rd Ashburne where I got Spotted Pardalote. Potts Rd Hecket was the second best survey with 10sp including Golden Whistler. Bolgeds Rd Newsham had Yellow-faced Honeyeater, which is the common one in these forests. Cobaw SF Alconds Tk was the best site on the edge of the forest with farmland along the western side, birds seem to love this kind of habitat, so I got 12sp including White-winged Choughs. At the north end of the forest at Cobaw SF Ridge Rd I only got White-throated Treecreeper, this site is higher than the last one and with no edge habitat, but good forest all around, it can be poor birding in the late afternoon. Darlington Rd Baynton had a country garden in one quarter of the site where most of the birds were, adding Silvereye here. At Emu Flat church the wind was howling over the ridge here and it was looking like a no birder until a pair of Wedge-tailed Eagles soared right over my head chased by 5 Magpies. We then went to Dargyle Picnic Mt Ida NP to camp and hed 8sp by dark.