Gentle Boorganna

If you’ve never been up to the Comboyne Plateau, you have a treat in store. It’s high and green and often wet; I have never forgotten being told as a child that it got six feet of rain a year. At the time I lived on the Central Coast and I knew we got four feet of rain a year, so that was a vivid comparison for me.

I have now been there many times, noting the sign to Boorganna Nature Reserve, but never stopping to investigate it.

Now I have.

Boorganna is a gentle, special place, long ago put aside for us to wander down through its rainforest, along its leafy, rock-edged paths. There are plenty of informative signs on the way, about the forest, its buttressed and giant trees, and its inhabitants.

Most life goes on above us, green and lush and multi-storied, with twisting vines and clinging creepers and giant bird’s nest ferns all competing for the light.

When this forest giant fell, the path was sensibly cut into its girth. reinforcing its size in the minds of us small humans.

Not all the giants have fallen; this Brush Box is estimated to be as much as a thousand years old.

From the foot-stand slits in some of the big stumps, other giants were not so lucky to survive.

I reach the Rawson Falls Lookout, but decide not to continue to the base of the Falls, mindful that while it has all been a gentle wander downhill, the way back uphill will not feel so gentle on my knees.

As always, my eye is taken by details: I love that the fence at the Lookout is as spotted and bearded with lichen as the nearby trees.

I can look down more safely going uphill, and see delights I missed, like this absolute cornucopia of pale fungi.

Or these few strange papery cup fungi … and is that tiny stem in front a baby one?

There are many logs bedecked with fungi imitating fallen leaves … or potato crisps? I love that Nature does not restrict their artistic licence in design.

But of course, being a rainforest, green and ground matters dominate.

Boorganna offers the lot.

Where rocks rule

Cathedral Rocks National Park is of course a mecca for rock lovers.

But rocks ain’t just rocks, impressive though they be; they are also habitat, as here, for mosses and lichen and orchids.

Individual rocks – or should I call such big ones ‘boulders’? — exhibit very particular features, like this one, which sports a kind of centurion helmet.

The majority of them sit calmly in credible piles, moss-capped and comfortably non-threatening.

Other clumps are incredible in their composition; now how or why does that rock balance as it does?

My hesitancy in climbing higher towards the summit of Cathedral Rocks is not helped by having to pass so close to huge boulders so precariously perched above me. The balance has to give at some point… erosion may be slow, but it’d be just my luck to be there when it reaches that tipping point.

I can see the Woolpack Rocks in the distance, and I know I managed to get to the top of those on another trip, from a different campground.

But here I give up at this point, while my more intrepid friend continues. I am not a rock-climber — a crevasse bridger, a knee scraper, a leg stretcher — and this is enough of a view for me.

It is more the closeup subtleties of the rocks and their accompanying plants that I am most interested in. I just wish I could read the distinct hieroglyphs that the moss and lichen form. Can’t be random…

Occasionally, I can; I mean this is clearly a heart, right?

And even if the plants don’t speak to me, the boulders give me an ephemeral treat in providing a canvas for shadow play — which would not have been evident amongst the undergrowth otherwise.

Thanks, for so many reasons, for rocks!

Spring colour

On the rising slopes above the campground, many surprising spring shows were tucked amongst the rocks. Some, like these White Everlastings or Paper Daisies (Coronidium elatum), only appeared in a few places.

Overall, white, yellow and purple seemed to be the chosen colour palette.

The swamp below the rocks was dotted with hundreds of these shrubs, their delicate creamy blossoms looking like garden escapees, too pretty to be growing wild. But they are Small-fruited Hakea (Hakea microcarpa), which like sub-alpine swamps.

Much less common, to the extent that this was the only one I saw, was another white flowering plant, Coral Heath (Epacris microphylla), with its unusual stems, clasped by dozens of tiny leaves.

I had noticed these shy lilac buds the day before, but next day they were blooming and blue; Thelymitra ixioides, a single-stalked ground orchid that likes to open on warm sunny days.

I saw very few other orchids, such as these Donkeys’ Ears ones, but they had no chance in the major claims to yellow.

The slopes were carpeted with shrubs of the sort we always called ‘Eggs-and-bacon’ as kids, pea flower families, of which there are hundreds of types. There were three discernible sorts here, some prickly, some not and some with more red in their centres (more tomato sauce, as we’d say).

Some were threaded through with purple Hardenbergia.

With all these flowers to see, it was hard to watch my feet on the rocky tracks, let alone look up to the stunning rocks. But I did stop to look up, so rocks and giant boulders will be my next post. So, so much to see!

Cool camp flora

In Cathedral Rocks National Park, the Barokee campground alone would be enough to keep me returning. Fascinating flora, and fabulously abundant birdsong.

This charming little alpine creek runs through the nearby swamp, its cushioned grassy edges soft and inviting, the fresh water cold, but still inviting.

Being a swamp, it has varieties of rushes, but this stripey one especially caught my eye. I am told it is a species of Baloskion. Maybe tetraphyllum?

My wayward eye was also taken by this quirky baby bracken frond, questioning life before it commits to unfurling.

Unmissable was this small group of plants that the boffins at NSW Plants I.D. say is Tasmannia stipitata, or Tasmanian Pepper Berry. I later saw many such plants higher up, but not in flower, and without the red colourations.

Brilliant red new growths always take my attention, and here at camp these were spectacular, ranging from orange-red to burgundy, some even as part of a quite large shrub/tree.  

Throughout the walks and climbs I was later to see many examples, mostly small and isolated – Trochocarpa montana, or Mountain Tree Heath, native to this high country, from the Barringtons to the Dorrigo region.

One more unknown species flashing red by the campground turned out to be Polyscias sambucifolia, or Elderberry panax. A native, its purple berries are edible, but not related to the European Elderberry.

All new to me, and thanks to the NSW Native Plants I.D. Facebook group, now given names and background information.

But I did eventually leave the campground and climb up amongst the rocks, finding more plants to share with you next post.

High country Nature

I greatly enjoyed the recent Dorrigo Bluegrass and Folk Festival, but afterwards I needed a quiet bush break.

As it was so close, I headed for Cathedral Rocks National Park, but stopped in at the refurbished Ebor Falls Lookout, just off the main road.

Fitted out with new cliff-skirting concrete paths and metal railings, it would gladden the heart of any OHS observer. And yes, I know the paths were aimed to be wheelchair- and walker-friendly.

In a way, the tourist-oriented features detracted from the wildness whose viewing they facilitated.

But not much, once I looked over those railings. In fact, they emphasised that wildness by that very contrast.

For me the best part of any falls is always the point where a calm stream becomes the dramatic drop that we all goggle at. Here a fisherman is trying his luck just upstream from that point.

And dramatic they are!

The organ pipe rock formations of the cliffs are equally stunning. Formed around 19 million years ago, when the cooling lava from the Ebor Volcano created these vertical contraction cracks, they are part of the ancient Demon Fault Line.

At the base of those cliffs was a very noticeable localised group of bright green, which has been identified as Tree Ferns, likely Dicksonia antarctica. Great to see them recovering after the fires here.

The imposing Upper Falls are followed downstream by the narrower Lower Falls.

Beyond them the creek heads into the wonderful rugged wilderness of this high country.

I think its wild expanse is why I love it so much. 

After Lighthouse

I have decided to investigate each of the fire trails that penetrate the bush and heath after the civilisation of Lighthouse Beach has been left behind.

The first is Immediately after the last ‘estate’.

So close to houses and yet still wild enough to house some surprises for me, like this fallen forked branch fully decked in what might be orchids? Healthy greenery at any rate…

There are enough older trees with hollows for other plants… and hopefully creatures…to use as homes.

Some trees are very large, like this impressive one, which I think is an Angophora. It is so grand that I am grateful it has survived; too twisty for saw logs?

There is a variety of palms to be seen from the fire trail, adding to the patterns of foliage as if by design.

There are lots of paperbarks, including those surrounding a very full and rather scummy swamp.

A few wildflowers are out but what surprised me was above my eye level: a red-flowering mistletoe in a tree. Its slender bells were more noticeable when fallen onto the now sandy ground below.

Also eye-catching was a small sawn-off stump (ti-tree?) emulating a flower.

Almost at the beach, I was halted by this shell-studded plastic rope, its bright tresses cascading down the side of a Ned Kelly sculpture, a post. Someone must have picked it up as beach flotsam and grown weary of carrying it, but I appreciated the artistic sense of the arrangement.

I did reach the sea, only to find the beach scored by 4WD tracks, even up on the higher levels where they should not be, where shorebirds might nest.

Worse than Dunbogan Beach.

But here is just south of the very popular Lighthouse Beach, and it is not long after the October weekend when thousands of extra people visited.

Still, the sea, collaborating with the sky and sun, make such a picture that I can ignore what has been done to the sand.

And the walk itself has been worth doing.

Botanica tropica

Lake Eacham on the Atherton Tablelands is a beautiful crater lake, filled only by rainwater. Mostly blue, in parts it is this amazing green. Seen from the walk around the lake, the fact that it is likely from algae does not detract from the surprise or the beauty.

There are so many unknown plants in these forests that I can only marvel. They are always hard to photograph, as so brightly skyward dominated above, with darkly buttressed forest below.

The ‘birds’ nest’ ferns are huge, and different from what I am used to.

This is a fallen one, dead and stiff, like a woven work of art, partly finished.

This one was atypically low-growing. The Queensland I.D. group suggests it’s Basket Fern (Drynaria rigidula) which makes absolute sense.

Amidst all the greenish trunks, I kept seeing occasional ones that were eye-catchingly bright orange-red, and flaky. The boffins suggest Paperbark Satinash (Syzygium papyraceum).

Tree ferns were common near the small clear-running creeks.

The most notable plants for me were the vines, some so old and gnarled (left) as to look older than the trees they used to help them climb to the light. Others (right) had unusually papery bark, pale green and deceptively soft.

For any vine to climb so high, they cannot be too soft, as this one (left) shows, where it has forced the host tree to accommodate its growth. But mostly they seemed more flexible, with a simple hugging help-up needed now and then, (right) twisting around themselves for added strength.

Some had not yet found a host tree and had twisted every which way in the search.

At whatever stage they are, vines, like fungi, fascinate me. 

These rainforests offered me far more than blog posts will accommodate, but after this one I will leave them to their tropical wonders and return to Nature in my more southerly climes.

Fantasy forest

Life is a struggle in the rainforest, and elaborate means are used to reach the light and to survive.

This huge Curtain Fig on the Atherton Tableland is famous, but not unique.

Once the fig had strangled the host tree, it fell over on to another tree, and the vertical roots descended to feed it, forming a curtain.

On another walk, this one showed the process of development of those curtains.

But figs are not orderly in their strangling.

Or gentle. This could look like an embrace but it has a relentlessness about it that seems cruel. Anthropomorphic, I know.

Where do root and trunk differentiate?  Incredible colours and shapes kept catching my eye in this fantasy world.

I have no idea what is going on in this miniature strangling scenario, but it seems not of this world. And is it plant or creature or something in between?

Lake Tinaroo surprise

The Barron River on Queensland’s Atherton Tableland was dammed in 1958 for agriculture. It flows on after the towering dam wall that contains the large Lake Tinaroo.

Lake Tinaroo is edged by rainforest and mountains in some parts, as in Danbulla National Park, giving it many moods, and by domesticated areas in others.

I am staying at my friend Inge’s Tinaroo Haven BnB, a precious few acres of bushland full of wildlife and birdsong.

The Lake is hugely popular for fishing and boating, but its shallow areas’ dead trees marking it as man-made reduce its appeal for me.

As I have just read the evocative ‘Cool Water’ by Myfanwy Jones, set during the construction of this dam, I am especially attuned to the drowned land that lies beneath the surface.

But the dam spillway is another matter. The day I was there it was spilling over from the Lake in an amazing perpetual pattern, roaring with beauty.

The constantly changing chevrons of white lace were mesmerising.

Once they reached the base they created new patterns.

My friend had never seen the spillway like this, but rather a more even overflow curtain. This day I was just lucky.

History and Nature

The charming Roto House is a gem in Port Macquarie’s armoury of attractions. John Flynn had it built in 1891 of local Red Mahogany (Eucalyptus resinifera). It was restored in the 1980s, with much work needed, especially on the foundations, but also the roof and verandahs.

You can wander through its timber panelled rooms for free; most have historic exhibitions on display. The light fittings are beautiful. ornate yet simple. The whole house gives one a vivid sense of the craftsmanship and solid materials used then.

With its many chimneys, of course most rooms have a fireplace. I am reminded of our 1895 house/police station at Minmi near Newcastle, which had five chimneys, each serving two fireplaces back-to-back. but they had marble fireplace surrounds and mantelpieces and were closed in with a metal face and a small grate.

Roto House has been hugely enlivened by the establishment of a café, Home at Roto. You can eat on the verandahs, at the picnic tables in the peaceful tree-studded grounds, or under the covered café addition. They also run special events, be it poetry or music, often with open microphone, adding culture to the charm of being in a building from a bygone era.

At the risk of sounding like a tourism spruiker, this has become my favourite coffee place; so un-modern and un-citified, where history meets nature.

Roaming ‘round Roto

I have been told there is a track through the bushland below historic Roto House. This being a grey and bleak day, the beach does not appeal for a walk, so I aim to find that track.

I don’t, but through a deliberate gap in a netting fence I do stumble on to a patch of soggy forest.

It seems to have become a repository for the drains of the surrounding houses and for rubbish from trespassers.

It is still interesting bush, with features like this Bird’s Nest fern, the epiphytic Asplenium nidus, very low to the ground.

But it is hard to negotiate the muddy bits. And I know I’m not supposed to be here.

I retrace my steps, try the next ‘No through road’ street and find I am at the edge of the Roto House grounds.

A path skirts the lawn and scattered trees that border the wilder part, which today is alive with birdsong.

The tree trunks and tops are beautiful. The koala hospital is nearby, so I keep hoping to see a wild one in these trees, but no luck.

There are patches of colour along the way, from these fungi and from wattle that is starting to bedeck many roadsides.

There is even a strangler fig, familiar to me from my many walks though Wingham Brush. This one also houses another Bird’s Nest fern.

I am going to poke more closely around Roto House…

Remembering Harry

‘Harry’s Lookout’ was a simple clearing,  a place for hang gliders to launch from and gawkers like me and my family to embrace the view of ‘our’ little beach, Shelly Beach.

But that was decades ago. Harry is long gone and I know his work on the Lookout and his rough steps down to the beach have been ‘updated’.

Now I am so close I revisit that Lookout and vow to walk down Harry’s steps to the beach once more.

The first surprise is the Lookout area itself. Very arty, sort of Polynesian, no cobbled-together scraps as it was in Harry’s day.

The spot is still magnificent.

There is a small but quite superb birthday celebration happening  here.

I ask if there is any info up here about Harry and one young woman says, ‘I didn’t even know Harry was a real person’.

I assure them he was, still alive when my parents used to live not far away.

I head down the steps that Harry originally made. Back then they were in many colours, of whatever scraps of pipe or timber Harry could find. I recall lots of blue and yellow, and hand rails. No doubt they were kitschy and probably unsafe.

Now they are all uniform treated timber… and no handrails.

They are still best taken downhill rather than up.

Harry’s path takes you through some great rainforest and magically twisted tree trunks.

When I reach the beach, it is smaller than I recall, and of course Harry’s caravan is long gone. But I am so pleased to see that down here at least he is remembered.

I do recall Harry and his wife as likely the most sun-damaged people I have ever seen. I know Council later tried to evict them but public support for one of our last true eccentrics saved them.

Now there are several memorials to him. One is a timber statue, complete with mayoral medallion.

Harry’s van was beyond the most visited part, where the cars park and the brush turkeys pushily patrol the picnic tables.

It’s busy even today, a windy winter Sunday.

There is a wonderfully varied and detailed testimony to Harry’s life set in a helix in the sand. 

I am happy he is immortalised here, but regret that there is no such information up the top. Or did I miss it?

That lookout and those steps were a huge labour of love: rough and ready and free, un-OHS, un-arty, unauthorised, but so personal and indicative of a time now past.

Vale Harry.