PNG is arguably the most exotic birding destination on Earth with bird families like Birds of Paradise, Paradise-kingfishers and Crowned Pigeons. On the other hand country has quite a reputation as a dangerous, expensive and difficult to travel destination. By experiences of this trip there seems to be some truth in it too.

We experienced one minor hassle with a drunken local, fortunately the vast majority of people are very friendly and there are no such nuisance with bumsters and beggars as is the situation in some other countries I have been visiting. But I would recommend to be extra careful in cities like Port Moresby and Hagen, even in broad daylight. We were moving with group and had experienced local quides to take care of us most of the time, so obviously the possible problems were quite subsided.

Special flavor of PNG is the remoteness and lack of infrastructure, even for the most visited sites. We were moving by bus, boat and 4WD, while any of the longer distances were done by plane.

Possibilites for accomodation in PNG are sparse and expensive, booking well beforehand is recommended. By looking some of the lodge room prices there, I would consider them the most expensive in World, if you consider in the standard of rooms and services.

Fortunately there were two exceptions for rule in our route: PAU university park ponds near Port Moresby and Kumul Lodge feeding table near Mount Hagen. At least there any photographing member of the group could fill memory cards for a couple of hours.

One could rightly ask what is then a sense for a bird photographer like me to go with group into PNG? The answer is two-fold: first I'm also a birder and like to see and learn more about birds, not only photograph them. Secondly, doing a private photography expedition there would easily cost more than I could afford. Even the PNG group trip price equals easily ten charter holiday trips cost inside Europe!

One of the most remarkable incident was when we quickly spotted from bus window a group of women doing 'line dance' with bright large red face paintings and equal color wooden poles in their hands. Local guide commented with low and bold tone 'funeral', thus strongly hinting we were not going to return there and spoil the ceremony with reckless shooting. There are some events you should only store in your memory and let you camera stay down, I think I agree with our guide here.