Sydney to Jervis Bay: with a right royal treat

Winnifred Falls

The plan for Tuesday's journey south was to go via the Royal National Park, and I had identified 3 walks I wanted to do - total of about 12km and I figured that might take me until just after lunch.

I did get away roughly around my planned departure time of 9pm, and had double checked that Maps was not going to throw me into a tunnel that might continue in uncertain directions for uncertain distances - after all, Maps fails to help me once GPS signal is lost underground. Heading towards the harbour bridge tunnel, traffic was down to a crawl in 3 lanes, but I managed to be in the correct lane until well past the city centre. A little further on I did find myself in a left lane, needing to cross 5 lanes to get to where I needed to be to veer right; fortunately the traffic had seriously thinned out by then and it was not terribly scary.

I do love a good carnivorous plant

It took about an hour and a quarter to get to Royal National Park, then I fiddled about a bit, sorting my day park pass at a pay station that wanted to be told everything twice, then find the visitor information centre to get advice about the best order in which to do the walks. I'd picked one that Yu Rong was keen to do, along with a couple of others that Google suggested were really good walks. I was advised

1. Winnifred Falls

2. Wedding Cake Rock

3. Providential Lookout

Epacris sp

By 11am I started out on the Winnifred Falls track - it was a firetrail, but quite flat...for the first half kilometer, then it became VERY steep, and with a small rock strewn surface required a little concentration and careful footing.

The birds varied from large and raucous overhead - possibly a gang of currawongs, through to the usually cryptic little brown birds, and some honeyeaters which were somewhat flirty but not enough for a photo. I recognised the New Holland Honeyeater but not the others.

one of the many stunning banksia

There were quite a few lovely flowers on the walk: again, some I knew, some I did not know and some that I could take a good guess at the genus but which were new to me. Some of the banksia are flowering and they really are magnificent.

The falls were quite pretty but I was not prepared to take my life into my hands to get a really good vantage point. I saw only 2 others on the walk, and a couple of people emerged from the track once I had got pack to my car - definitely not a busy day for that walk.

From The Balconies:
white water in centre is whales

From there I headed out to do a section of the coastal walk that included Wedding Cake Rock, via the Balconies. As I walked the section of track to the Balconies - some lovely sandstone formations where my approach to the coast track first hits the coast, I enjoyed the birds - even more honeyeaters than on my morning walk, and the even more prolific banksias.

Whales ahoy: white water to left of boat

As I saw my first glimpse of the sea - and some whitewater through the bushes - I thought that either a boat or a whale might be responsible for the white water. As I got a clearer view, there was not boat at that location. Not only was there a small pod there, but several others also. The blows were frequent and some pods were close enough to shore for a good view of their glistening backs as they proceeded north on their annual migration. Some, occasionally, were making much more of a splash but I did not see one actually breach.

Stunning coastal scenery

I loitered for some time, watching, before heading towards my intended destination, pausing frequently to watch the various pods on their journey. I guess I was lucky: I'd picked a good time - when I returned that way there might have been a single pod breaking the surface only occasionally. Even without the whales the views are wonderful: great seacliffs, eroded sandstone, some evidence of undercuts, honeycomb erosion, large tumbles of boulders and then, of course there is wedding cake rock: A large block of white sandstone, vaguely attached to the cliff, but which is identified, by those with serious geological expertise, as likely to fall any time. That, consequently, is fenced off in a most assertive way.

Thar she blows

On the way to Wedding Cake Rock, while descending steps towards the Waterrun, I was delighted by a large reptile sunning itself partly across the path. Some 3m of snake - the largest I have ever seen outside of captivity. I have no idea what it was, but dark with yellow patterns. I googled and found a suggestion of Yellow Python but the described habit doesn't really match what I saw. As the snake slithered its considerable length into the bushes, the birds vocalised their concern. Maybe it was an endangered Broad Headed snake, but the pattern does not seem quite right. Jane subsequently identified it as probably being a diamond python - not venomous to humans.

This is the imminent fate of wedding cake rock

I really was most delighted with this second walk, and as the distractions took so long, when I returned to my car there really was no time for the planned third walk, nor for the catch up planned with an acquaintance 1 hour south. A minor discrepancy between actual and maps description ended up with me heading back to Sydney on the main road, then a confusing diversion before the heart-in-mouth necessity to turn right across several lanes of fairly constant traffic. Back on track, progress was fine, but it became evident I was going to have more night driving than I really wanted. That was compounded by the onset of some rather filthy weather - strong gusts of wind and heavy rain. That slowed me considerably.

I stopped briefly for petrol and the young man behind the counter empathised with me regarding driving conditions and advised particular caution on some road sections because of the risk of encounters with wildlife.