Still wandering along the coast!

We wound our way into Walkerville, a quiet and seemingly almost deserted place and took a short troll along the edge of the water but then pointed the beast towards Inverloch. We had spent an enforced week there maybe 30 years ago and thoroughly enjoyed it (car breakdown). It was rather sleepy and tranquil back then - that was before it became trendy. However ..... this day we decided to explore Screw Creek. 

Once we cleared the caravan park, which seemed to go on and on and on, we found the inlet, creek and boardwalk. Peaceful and lovely late in the afternoon but we passed quite a number of people - after-work exercisers no doubt. 

We ended with a long walk back along the beach as the sun was setting - like a movie setting with music fading into the background!

McLoughlins Beach and Nooramunga

From Port Albert we headed further east along the coast to McLoughlins Beach and the Nooramunga marine & coastal park. It’s an area of some significance: the wetlands there are a Ramsar site (a protected environment), half of the Eastern Curlews (the world’s largest migrating wading birds) that come to Victoria come here, and the area has the highest number of breeding pairs of one of my faves, the Pied Oyster catcher. It’s a special place and being protected. 

Love these ruby jewels. They taste as you would expect quite salty.

Under threatening clouds, we braved the boardwalk with not a soul in sight - surprise surprise! It was eerie but quite lovely as the world closed in around us with just the rippling of the tide flow beneath us over the mud flats, the occasional bird calling a warning of approaching rain and the rustle of the saltbush and mangroves. 

At the end of the boardwalk we crossed the bridge over McLoughlins channel/Nooramunga Inlet - in mounting wind! We followed a track over dunes and through the scrub to a remote, wild stretch of 90 Mile Beach.  It was simply magnificent. 

This guy stood well over 6ft. Magnificent creature. He was still there feeding beside the track when we came back - we startled the daylights out of each other. Poor thing. He went bouncing off into the bush - to resume feeding.

The expanse of sea is just over that little rise. It had been teasing us for quite a while promising to be just over the next rise. Under all this is sand and vegetation sits a lens of freshwater floating on top of salt water.And there it was! Sooo beautiful in the watery sunlight with the sun catching a trembling wave. The rainbow almost touched that spot of gold  

We turned back as the sky turned a stunning deep slate colour. Rain was on the way and we copped some of it but it had been a wonder-filled day, one in which we walked around 10 km through places we just may have missed if not for our enforced stay here. Always look on the bright side of life ..... tra la la!

Tarra Warackel and the Old Port trail

A wooded walk which hugs McMillan Bay, Corner Inlet and is ringed with Mangrove swamps and salt marsh - and silence



Through quiet coastal scrub we wandered the Old Port Trail with not a soul in sight. This is the place first settled in the region after it was ‘discovered’ and opened up in 1841 by white settlers. Discovered? But this of course is the cradle of the Gunaikurnai, the people of this land. Borun, the pelican, discovered it. He was the first of the Gunaikurnai who came down from the mountains in the north to the deep inlets near Tarra Warackel (Port Albert). 

We followed the flight of a white bellied sea eagle this morning. Magnificent creature. She was taking a break from eating this octopus - yum. 

It must have been mermaids washing day. 
She took to the air but left me a gift.

It’s a gentle place, quiet and that day overcast and a bit damp but that enhanced a vague feeling of other-worldliness.

Gorgeous greenhood orchid - a Nodding greenhood I think.

There was a veritable forest of these little beauties. Look at that face. 

This is a different species which we returned the next day to photograph. I believe it’s a Tall greenhood (Pterostylis longifolia)

Dear little pixie cup lichen



Various wattles leaned out over the track 

I call these Christmas bells but they’re not, I believe they’re native fuchsia (Correa reflexa)

Love these seed pods

Grasses draw me closer but it’s hard photographing them (I’ve trashed so many pix)

Watching these moving in the breeze is mesmerising (I videoed it but I’ll save you that)

The bush was punctuated with tall grass trees in flower. Stately.

This I love - reindeer or snow lichen. We saw this in Iceland and Canada as well as in Tassie.



We made a bit of a dash for the car under lowering but rather spectacular skies.

Mount Worth State Park

Along tranquil deserted trails a couple of days ago in Mount Worth State Park, we tramped through boot sucking mud being careful not to slip but also careful not to tread on the chimneys and burrows of Gippsland’s freshwater crayfish - some big species and some tiny.  Mt Worth is part of the Strzelecki Ranges and is host to a cool very wet mountain rainforest. Beautiful! 

Parts of the tracks were wet and muddy - we were thankful for our sticks although one time mine went down into a burrow and I nearly went after it. In some places the ground dropped away right beside the track so we walked very cautiously.

These look like worm castings, I saw a number of deposits, but I don’t know what species - native or introduced. Certainly we are in the territory of the Gippsland giant earthworm but I suspect these were from smaller native species

Gorgeous moss. The mountain is densely forested but is home also to ferns, mosses, liverworts and lichen of many different varieties.

We took the Giant’s circuit walk starting from Moonlight Creek and followed the route of a timber tramway through Mountain Ash both towering and regenerating; one almost 300 years old. The forest, lush, wet and cold, is home to a range of trees - dogwood, blackwood, mountain grey gum as well as the towering mountain ash that once covered much of this region The track wound through and by fern-filled gullies, epiphytes often stretching out soft fingers to touch us as we brushed by. In the background we could hear the constant tweet of small birds, the occasional squawk of black cockatoos and crimson rosellas as well as the piping song of shy Bassian thrushes and the taunting calls of lyrebirds hidden in the dense scrub.  Occasionally the fragrant waft of blossoms high in the canopy floated our way. Quite delightful!

Fungi like these added brilliant flashes of colour in the green shadows.

We came across large chunks of moss, we think torn off by birds looking for grubs. This chunk was a forest of stalks and spore capsules - the fruiting bodies. Stuck in amongst these was a leaf (circled) with creamy dots. Next pix shows those spots ....
Yes! the tiniest wee fungi I have found so far. (I was right at the limits of my iPhone camera zoom so this is NOT as sharp as I would have liked. I should carry my other camera but I try to keep my load to a minimum)

Most of the soft trunk tree ferns are host to a stunning array of epiphytes - Kangaroo fern, Strap water fern, Fieldia australis which bears small fruit. It’s a veritable paradise shaded in green.

We took branching tracks off the circuit to investigate the relics of a couple of timber mills that operated on the slopes of Mt Worth in the early 1900s.

We were pooped and mud spattered when we got back to the car as dusk was descending.  Then it was home via Gippys, the excellent Fish and Chip shop in Drouin. 

Mt Worth, a great place to visit - hope you’re making a list for when ..... !

And then there’s the fruit and trees and ....

Where was I? In Civic Park Warragul. An expansive and lovely parkland.  

The empty space of this sculpture created in 2016, is based on the circumference of the world’s tallest tree (they say) found in Thorpdale near Warragul. It was cut down to measure it. Can you believe it!!? It measured 114.3m. A Mountain Ash, the tallest flowering plant in the world. The sculpture was reproduced from a 3D scan of the 300 year old Ada tree near Powelltown in the Yarra Ranges. 

The plants are a mix of natives and exotics. The brilliance of these fruits caught my eye.

These are not the softest fruits you would find but they are rather special.

An almost spent pomegranate. Wonderful winter colour and visual texture.

A eucalypt of some description I believe but the name?? The pattern of the bark is so beautiful.

Taking time to smell the 'roses'

You know me and flowers and plants well put your feet up because I’ve got a veritable florist shop for you to browse - and imagine the perfume  

Yellow daisies a personal fave but add a hover fly and - what can I say?!

Ah japonica! It is one of the first flowers that captivated me (that and cineraria under Aunty’s orange tree). Walking to school in Glen Iris a loooong time ago, we always walked passed a house with japonicas growing. Maybe it was the colour or maybe ..... I simply don’t know but the first flower garden I planted I included a japonica (flowering quince).

Look into the heart of a camellia and it draws you deeper. The petals are so fragile, almost translucent.

The Queen of Sheba in royal purple

Now if you were an insect wouldn’t you want to crawl inside to see what those dotty things were all about?

The dance of the fire ants!

As dainty as a bunch of tiny rose buds. Fascinating structure

Dainty pink ballerina grevillia

From the simply beautiful ....

..... to the beautifully complex.

Ah not to forget catkins. Lovely ropes of tiny flowers like strings of beads.

and the strings of wattle so heavy they are weighing these branches low (so I can snap them!)



I know, I can’t leaf it alone but here we have more. Amazing pattern rather like seersucker of old.

But look at the other side. Wow!

Baby wattle, cute.