Royal National Park - The Coast Track
Cara, Claire, and Whit hitched a ride to Canberra this weekend to play in a Hat Tournament. At the last second I decided to stay back in Sydney because the weather just turned nice after 4 rainy days and I wanted to go to the beach.
Instead of the beach, I called Aussie Dave, Adrian's college buddy from Rice, and asked him for the details on the Coast Track, a 26 km trail south of Sydney. The trail begins in a coastal rain forest and ends along arid cliff-tops along the coast. It was amazing! I was on the trail by 8 am and was boarding my train back to Sydney by 6 pm. Along the way I saw a quaint beach town, wonderful beaches (North Era, Garie, Wattamolla, and Little and Big Marlie), amazing cliff-sides being bashed by the Pacific Ocean, and a lizard and echidna.
My first swimming break was at Garie Beach. The southern side of the beach had nasty looking waves and the middle of the cove was filled with fisherman fishing from the beach. The northern part of the cove was gentle so after a reading a bit of my book, fittingly a Dirk Pitt novel, I jumped in the water to cool off. It was much colder than the water we swam in at Manly Beach.
I put my shoes on and began to hike again. Just over the hill from Garie Beach the land turns into desert that resembles what you see in the Southwest. There was however a glimmering stream I hiked over on my way to my next swim break at CurraCurra, a very small private cove. After eating lunch and watching some skittish crabs I headed towards Wattamolla.
Wattamolla was paradise. There was a white sand beach, a gently ocean to swim in, and a separate shallow cove to swim and play in with a rope swim and an 8 meter cliff perfect for a jumping platform. It was packed because it is accessible by car, but the hordes of people did not take away from beauty. After exploring the beach and the cove I climbed the cliff for my jump. I watched severely people complete their jumps successfully so I assumed it was safe enough. I didn't check how deep it was under the cliff nor did I ask anyone...mistake. As my pencil-like body entered the water both my feet slammed straight into the bottom. Luckily the sandy bottom cushioned the blow so I came away injury free and ready to continue the hike.
It was about 2 pm when I began the last section of the hike. From Watamolla it was 12 km to Bundeena, the end of the trail. On the way I walked along 100 meter cliffs and Little and Big Marley Beach. There was one point along the cliffs where an edge was pure white. It looked like stacks of tofu. The last part of the hike was tough as I was getting tired and thirsty. I passed a lot of people along the way so I was never in trouble if I really needed water.
After I got to Bundeena it was a short ferry ride to Coronvilla where I picked up the train back to the city. After a dinner, beer, and shower I started to upload the 40 plus photos I took today. Here is the only down-part of my whole day. Somewhere in the process of saving them to Whit's computer I messed up and they didn't stick. Before I checked to see if they were there, I erased them from my camera. And just like that, the memories of the amazing day I had are going to be more difficult to remember. I'm a little heart-broken. I wish I had something to show you from my coastal adventure, but this post will have to do.
Tomorrow, I think I'm going to take it easy and start on a new book at the beach.
love,
Mike
2 comments:
Mike,
Sounds like you had an real adventure on your trek. You described it so well I almost felt I was with you and I didn't feel tired at all. What a loss when the pictures got erased. Maybe Cara will be so envious that she missed your adventure that she will want to do it and you can go together and retake all the great pictures. Did she tell you that if you take and keep great pictures, that I have a Kodak site that will bind them into a coffee table type book that we were thinking of having done for you two. It is really professional looking with the text that you create. Speaking of text, I love the Dirk Pitt series also. If you haven't read Shock Wave, you should read it there. It is about that section of the world. Very tense with a political message about greed.
I love that you two are enjoying every minute, but like your mom I don't want you to love it enough to stay. Have fun on your tour. It is the the rainy season there isn't it. What kind of places do you stay at night and how will you be traveling? We checked out a video from the library and watched the section of the area where you are headed. It seems there are areas there that are more disimilar from anywhere in the US than most other areas except for the fauna, which is all different. Love you two, We miss you Cassey
in sydney it has been raining a little. light rain that doesn't keep you indoors like good-old texas thunderstorms. we are expecting more texas like rains we get up to darwin in a few weeks. that will be interesting. we'll see how the tent holds up, but hopefully we'll find a reasonable hostel.
-mike
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