For three very different people brought together by their love for birds, life on the Queensland coast in 1914 is the timeless and idyllic world of sandpipers, ibises and kingfishers. Inevitably, the two young men - sanctuary owner and employee - are drawn to the war, and into the mud and horror of the trenches of Armentieres.

It is the Gold Coast, Queensland, in 1914, and a man returns home from England to claim the land he has inherited. For Ashley Crowther, it is a landscape "that could accommodate a good deal". For Jim Saddler, the land is a sanctuary. For Imogen it is a place of study.