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| Freedom! |
So, as with some of my previous long walks, I thought that after taking a bit of time to recover I would post some musings on how the thing went. Well, it was all pretty awesome! Fair play to the people who came up with the idea for this, it really was nice to do a long trip that did not involve long, long stretches of unimproved forest, or indeed dangerous and absurdly arduous walking through mile after mile of snow. Perhaps I did sometimes miss mountains, and the succession of beaches did eventually get a little boring, but really this was very cool. I guess, the fact that Australia was always able to produce some kind of interesting bird or animal to enliven my day meant it was never dull.
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| They are so cool. |
Given this isn't an official trail at all, it really was amazing how little road walking or bushwacking was involved, there was a lot of beach, and other than that a lot of good paths. None of those paths, individually, were very long - I really do get the impression that this is not a country of hikers - but there were plenty of them. Obviously there was one serious obstacle - or obstacles - to overcome during this walk, namely the many water crossings. Getting back from it, I notice that most other people who have done this seem to have mainly crossed the various creeks and inlets on boats, well, I guess I am a bit too mad for that. But really it was fine, I never felt in any danger, and swimming for fifteen minutes, or even half an hour, isn't too hard - I was happily walking for hours on end after all. I reckon I swam eight times in all, over the following rivers / etc. :
Wonboyn River
Towamba River
Pambula River
Nelson Creek / Wapengo Lake
Bithry Inlet
Tuross River
Currambene Creek / Huskisson
Crookhaven River / Greenwell Point
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| So much exciting wildlife. |
Many other inlets were closed off by sandbanks so I could simply walk past them, and in one or two cases I detoured around - notably the Tomaga River. And of course I did take a boat a couple of times, firstly over Sussex Inlet, and then the Comerong Island Ferry.
There was beautiful scenery, mostly coastal of course, but there were beaches, rocky shores, cliffs - all good. Did I mention the amazing wildlife? Logistically it was all good too, I had no problem getting the buses to the start, good, cheap food was available every couple of days or so, and Australia's campsites seem to be largely excellent and reasonably priced. So really, I would totally recommend this walk - just as long as you are happy getting wet from time to time!
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| Enjoying the view from Sublime Point. |
Photos to go with this post can be found here and here.
