Well we did it again, up at 5am, on the track walking by 6.15am. The crossings were much better this time so made the whole walk a lot quicker, out of 9 crossings I only took my shoes off once. Actually more than 9 as there were some other crossing into the Amphitheatre.
This time we had our camera out from the start and had a much smaller kit, we managed with Chris’s bag, left the heavy lenses back at camp and I carried the food back pack. It really is the best time to see the sandstone cliffs. They only light up like that in the early morning sun and only lasts for short time. We got lots of pics of the sandstone cliffs with nice deep blue sky, no polarizer needed. On some creek crossings we got the sandstone cliffs with a nice golden glow, deep blue sky and a reflection on the water, really is breath taking.
We were at the Moss Garden toilets at 7am which is about 3km up the track. We went to the Amphitheatre first which is further up the track. Hidden inside the gorge is a 60m deep chamber, gouged from the rock by running water. Access into the chamber is via a four-tiered ladder. It was huge in there, really amazing; the 10-22 lens was no where near wide enough. After a while it got very cold in there.
Next we went up to Wards Canyon, so named as the Ward brothers would store there, fur pelts in the canyon as it acts as a nature cool room being 10 degrees cooler in there, and it sure was, again an amazing place, very steep to get in and lots of stairs. Rare King ferns can be found in the Gorge. The ferns pump water up their fronds to give them strength, the canyon is the only place the king ferns are found off the coast.
Since we had started early and before everyone else we were able to photograph the Amphitheatre and Wards Canyon without people in the way.
Next we headed back down the track to Moss Gardens, steep track in with even more stairs. The Sandstone acts like a big sponge and soaks in all the water when in rains, the water then filters through. At the Moss Gardens it’s like a big filter with water constantly dripping from the sandstone walls, supporting a lush carpet of mosses, ferns and liverworts. There is also a small waterfall. The moss is so green and lush, also very cold in there.
Even with our lighter load our backs and feet were still hurting by the time we got back from the 11.7km walk, as they had hardly had time to recover from the previous big walk.
On the way back to camp we saw another Echidna crossing the road, Chris stopped the car quick and I flew out camera in hand. I got some real beaut shots, some with his head out, cool. We got back to camp put the feet up had a couple of cuppa’s to recover, then got our good lenses on and went down to the creek to scout for birds. Yesterday Chris had followed an Egret all the way down the creek taking shots, it seemed to come back to same area every day around the same time looking for food.
Yep he was there, we were both in the water following it down the creek as it just walked along looking for food, got some nice shots with reflections on him. Also got some shots of a roo with it’s reflection as it crossed the creek. We both managed to fill up 4gb cards today.
We were both worn out after another fun filled day.