A chilly but fine morning meant we were in no hurry to leave
camp, but by 8:30am the road called and we headed off, first to look around the
dying town of Cassilis, which is even more run down than it was almost 2 years
ago when we dropped in.
Overnight we’d read about Hands on Rock and The Drip, two
interesting-sounding places that were in the wrong direction but not far off
track. We were glad we did.
As its name suggests, Hands on Rock is an aboriginal site
where hand stencils are still visible from pre-white settlement. Some of the
hands are so high up I think that perhaps the cave floor must have been higher
at some stage.
A few flowers were blooming, but not many.
Next stop, The Drip in Goulburn River National Park. This is a wonderful, easy two and a half
kilometre return walk that passes amazing sandstone rock formations and ends in
a formation where water consistently drips out of the sandstone when it hits
impervious rock. The feature known as "The Drip" is shown in the 4th photo.
After morning tea, we headed
north to our final destination for the Coolah Tops. It is meant to be freezing tonight here, down
to -2°C. We have a campground to ourselves and our
first fire and BBQ.
And of course, I couldn’t
resist a wander round and a bit of nature photography, first during the day and
then when it grew dark, I tried for moths.
On Sunday, we woke up to a freezing morning and utilised our
heater we have in the camper.
Luxury! However, the day warmed
up beautifully and we decided to ride our mountain e-bikes to about the one
place open in the park at the moment, Pinnacle Lookout. Many of the trails have been closed due to a
massive storm earlier in the year that has made many trees dangerous with
large, dislodged limbs high up in the trees.
The 19km ride there and back was fun and the Lookout wonderful. We were able to contact my mother and two of
our children for Mothers’ Day as we briefly had reception at the lookout. Fantastic views.
It was disappointing not to be able to see some of the
features of this park – in particular waterfalls and hundreds-of-years-old
Xanthorrhoea (grass trees), but we have had a good time anyway. One pretty amazing thing we did witness was Sulphur-crested Cockatoo acrobatics. About dusk each night, a flock of cockatoos would create a real ruckus. We were watching this on the second night when, out of the blue, one cockatoo separated from the flock, did a barrel roll, dived like an eagle, then righted itself and flew off into the flock again. I've seen many cockatoos, but nothing like this before. We expected it to end up in the trees.
Again, there were a few flowers that my camera couldn’t resist.
If you are interested in fungi, click on the attached
link. There was lots of fungi around.
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