Winter on the South West Coast of Victoria

Winter on the Great Ocean Road and in the Otway National Park is a time of quietness and subtle light.

The summer crowds have gone and it’s easy to quietly enjoy the place’s beauty.

The wind had been up for a couple of days. It was still, though, as I road down the ocean road, allowing a perfect curl on the waves at Apollo Bay.

Further west at Port Campbell, the wild sea gave an alternative view of the famous Twelve Apostles.

White water surrounding the sand stone monoloiths, crashing against then.

In winter, in the continuous mountain mist on the Otway Ranges, the rain forest has its winter beauty on display.

One of my favourite places in the Otway Ranges is Lake Elizabeth and its surrounding rainforest.

Though winter is cold and wet, in Australian way, the riding through the rainforest on empty roads is especially rewarding.

The cool climate rainforests of Victoria have a very special charm.

But in winter on the south coast of Australia, in the Southern Ocean, there is often a storm brewing out at sea.

A visit to Gariwerd ( The Grampians)

Gariwerd, in Victoria, is the southwestern tip of the Great Dividing Range that runs 3,500 km up the east coast of Australia.

Its a beautiful place for riding the back roads, walking in beautiful bushland, and taking in the views from mountain top lookouts.

Geriward is also a place of significance for Australian Aboriginals. There are over 200 sites of Aboriginal Rock art in Gariwerd. It has the largest number of rock art sites in southern Australia.

Gariwerd can be translated as meaning Mountains created by Bunjil. Bunjil is part of the Aboriginal creation story.

I visited a couple of sites on this trip.

‘Bunjil shelter’ is the only known representation of Bunjil with two dingo helpers.

Ngamadjidj is another site that is accessible.

The art is generally found in rocky outcops in Gariwerd.

There are beautiful walks through the forests…

To waterfalls…

And mountain top views…

For the motorcyclist, the riding both on and off road is excillerating.

Back on the edge of the Outback -2

"See here, young man," said Mulga Bill, "from Walgett to the sea,
From Conroy's Gap to Castlereagh, there's none can ride like me.

From “Mulga Bill’s Bicycle” by Banjo Patterson.

I like stopping at the towns and villages recounted in the early Australian balads.

The flood plains of the Namoi River were full of water.

In the “land of drought and flooding rain” therehe had been a flooding monsoon north in tropical Queensland a couple of months earlier. The flood waters were slowly moving south, bringing vital water to the edge of the Outback as it travels thousands of kilometres to the Murray River, which empties into the Southern Ocean.

Wallgett was just a photo stop as my destination was Lightning Ridge, famous for its Opals.

Lightning Ridge is very much more a tourist town rather than a prospecting these days. Especially if compared to the Opel prospecting South Australia, Coober Pedy, and Blinman.

There are some good aspects to a tourist town….

The street art…

The Opal shops…

Even fine coffee with delicious apple strudel and ice cream.

Lightning Ridge sits on the Great Artesian Drive, a series of thermal baths drawing water from Australia’s Great Artesian Basin.

It was hot 30c in Lightning Ridge so I enjoyed the cold water of the campground pool to the hot spa.

My next stop was Brewarrina and little detour to Goodooga for a hot bath in the cool of the morning.

I arrived at the Aboriginal Cultural Centre in Brewarrina for the last cultural tour of the day

Brewarrina sits where the northern rivers come together to form the Darling River, which funels the monsoon rains of the tropical north of Australia southward along the edge of the Outback, providing precious water to a dry land.

Brewarrina, which means Tall Trees, was/is a special meeting place for Aboriginal Australians. The rock fish traps pictured above were built over 10,000 years ago. And were an intrcately designed so that fish could be caught and stored in ponds.

This photograph (below) from 1870 shows aboriginal children collecting fish from the fish traps.

The banks of the Darling River also contain ochre, which is used for skin care and decoration by aboriginal people.

Unfortunately, the high state of the river had covered fish traps. But a river full of water is something beautiful in itself.

And on the river bank, I spied some some red tailed black cockatoos. A beautiful bird that lives along the rivers on the edge of the outback.

From Brewarrina, it was time to follow the river flow south toward home.

Back on the edge of the Outback -1

You really know you are back in the outback when you find emus running down the main street of the town.

I’d spent the night at the pub in Nymagee on my way to the Macquarie Marshes, a 198sqkm oasis in the dry plains of North West NSW.

The fact that you are in the Outback is reinforced when you confront a road train at a water crossing!

I set up camp in Coolabah Gum woodland opposite the woolshed at Willie Retreat about 5km from the southern end of the Macquarie Marshes.

The woodland was home to a beautiful selection of small woodland birds.

The oldest known Coolabah gum is 300+ years old. The Coolabahs in this woodland were old and gnarled with plenty of hollows to form homes for the little birds.

The next day, I woke to a beautiful outback dawn…

And headed down to marshes.

In the light of the day, the small birds were flittering around, catfish were jumping, waders were hunting, and the pelicans rode high on the thermal updrafts.

As the sun went down, the mood and colours changed.

Across the water, a crafty fox was keeping an eye on me.

The Birruma Boardwalk is 25km north od Willie Retreat and provides a way of walking through the, otherwise, impenetrable reeds and across the top of the boggy marshes.

A further 50km up.the road, at the northern end of the Marshes, is the town of Carinda famous for cotton growing and for having tge pub where David Bowie’s Lets Dance film clip was recorded.

Follow the link to see inside the pub.

https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=VbD_kBJc_gI&si=kveFHCryACAg-peb

Above is the outside! So lets dance!!!!!

Some special scenic places in Tasmania

The recent trip to Tasmania was more about socialising than touring. Catching up with friends of long standing.

But in a place like Tasmania, beauty is always close at hand. So what can you look out for if you are lucky enough to visit this small, beautiful island.

Light houses on spectacular headlands…