Took Phil to do this walk today. When he originally proposed it, I quite wrongly poo-poohed it as a fairly dull doddle. I was recalling my walks from 20 years ago, when we used to walk from Safety Cove, obviously across the badly degraded private property now owned by Dick Smith et al, and then wander up Mt Brown at the far end of Crescent Bay. The return involved a quite awful (and environmentally degrading) slog back up the endless sand dune at the north end of Crescent Bay. I have a feeling walks in those days were more about which girl you were walking with than where you were going and what there was to see (at least sometimes). Anyway, the walk isn't too hard for the moderately fit walker, and if you skip the climb up Mt Brown, it really is a doddle. Even that is only about a 140m (steep) climb from the track. The view today back along the coast to Remarkable Cave from the cliffs on Mount Brown was quite impressive, as the photo shows.
These days the walk properly starts from Remarkable Cave, and includes a lot of interesting features, as I noted a couple of months ago. I'll post a detailed walk description which will assist in pottering about the top of Mt Brown and the end of Standup Point. This photo is from the top of the sobering 170m cliff on the southern end of Mount Brown. Phil doesn't like heights, so instead of staying where I left him while I sat on the edge of the cliff to take photos, he wandered off. I finished taking photos, but there was no sign of Phil. You know, it was like in those movies where you can hear the wind blow, the sea break on the rocks far, far below, the gull calling mournfully. Of Phil there was no sign. You call, and your voice seems to be carried away on the wind. While I wondered how to explain Phil's presumably painless demise to Yvonne, he was off photographing the cliff somewhere else. Maybe he'll post that photo up for us to make my high blood pressure worthwhile.
The coastal heath is quite spectacular right now, and if you can get down there and have a look at the flowers out between Remarkable Cave and Mount Brown. There are purple, yellow and white flowers out all over the place. You could spend a whole day just wandering amongst the heath and around the foreshore. The first part of the walk is a little undulating over old dunes, so for the less mobile this might be a bit challenging. The rocks along the shore are very interesting, and I'll post up a set of photos to show the features. This photo of a Mountain Dragon, (Tympanocryptis diemensis) shows how cleverly he camouflages himself on the ground.
Highlights today were the views from the top of Mt Brown, a Fur Seal on the sloping rocks at Standup Point and the wildflowers. Phil startled two Tiger Snakes along the track, so it's worth being vigilant. They ran away from us, but later in the season they might be more aggressive. The cloud sat on Cape Pillar all day. Tasman Island became visible later on, but the higher parts of the Cape were still in cloud as we left.
This walk features some very impressive opportunities to fall off high places, or INTO DARK and NASTY things. It's great. Phil was suitably impressed by the Maingon Blowhole, which is something you do not want to come across unexpectedly in the dark. If someone knows how deep it is, please let me know. The map suggests to me that it might be around 35 metres, but it's hard to tell where the contours run, and it didn't look that deep to me when I was logical about it. Phil thought it was deeper, but careful assessment of the cliffs on the sea-end of the gulch suggested it wasn't that deep. If you can bring yourself to look down into the blowhole, you can see that it is very narrow and very deep, and we've decided that you'd probably not survive the fall to worry about how to swim out of it. Good place for a (fictional) murder?! Maybe Phil should write a poem.
Now, I have a few other sets of photos to put up, so bear with me as I bore you with the stuff I have gathered up.
OK, I admit this first one is a lichen, but it provides some bright colouration to the rocks of the foreshore. In places it looks like someone has painted the rocks bright yellow.
Although I've had trouble before identifying Allocasuarinas, I'm fairly sure this one is Allocasuarina monilifera, the Necklace Sheoak. This was on the heath between Remarkable Cave and Mount Brown.
The Native Pigface, Carpobrotus rossii, adds attractive bright pink and green to the landscape.
The Swamp Honeymyrtle, Melaleuca squamea, is part of the attractive heath between Remarkable Cave and Mount Brown which is flowering quite copiously at present.
This one stood out, and I suspect it's a weed. I can't identify it yet anyway.
The (apparent) flowers on this one were superficially similar to the previous weedy-looking plant. However the leaves were very different. Denis Wilson noted it looked like new leaf growth on Banksia, and he's right. There was another similar one with old bottlebrushes on it. We speculated on a Banksia when we were looking at it, but we were misled by this new growth. Thanks to Denis for helping. By a very rapid process of elimination then, these are simply Banksia marginata, although seeming quite different to the tree form I have seen on mountains. No mystery at all.
This is the Common Heath, Epacris impressa. The flower colours vary, as seen clearly.
Teatree, Leptospermum scoparium. The flowers on these vary in the colour of the nectar disc. Some are green, others a deep red, but they seem to be the same plant. I'll stand corrected if I'm wrong.
Common Everlasting, Chrysocephalum apiculatum.
