Rainforest

On the Skyway

We woke up to some clouds today - but not to worry, there were only a few and they were dispersing nicely. Today's plan was to go to Dorrigo National Park which is World Heritage Listed as one of the Gondwana Rainforests: pockets of pristine rainforests dotted around NSW and Queensland.

This we did- we took warmer clothes and raincoats expecting the worse (we needn't have). It was a 60km drive inland, passing through the town of Bellingen which I had in my mind as an Alpine town with lots of alpine style wooden chalets. Once again my mind played tricks on me as we didn't see any but it was full of fair-trade type goods and craft shops which I also remembered,so maybe I've got mixed up somewhere.

View from the top

Buttress Roots

Small boy amongst the trees

After a slow drive up into the mountains (I got stuck behind a horse box) we finally arrived at the centre. We went to the information desk and asked what we should do with Tom seeing as he will happily walk around 6km. The lady sent us off on the Wonga Walk which incorporates two elevated sky walks where you walk amongst the canopy and two waterfalls. This sounded perfect so we headed on our way.

Crystal Falls

A rainforest really is an amazing place to explore - especially if you come from Europe where there aren't any. There immediately in front of us were thousands of trees - most of them very very tall and very skinny - all competing to get the most sunlight possible. We saw cedars, Tallow trees, rosewood, Yellow Carabeans, Walking Stick Palms and of course most spectacular of all Strangling Figs - trees that sprout half way up an existing tree and then sent roots up and down that tree slowly strangling it and taking over its intake of nutrients etc until the original tree dies and leaves the fig with pipe in the middle where the original tree was. Naughty Strangler Figs. We also saw the Stinging Tree - touch any part of it and you will know about it for days, plenty of ferns and palms, some fine examples of buttress roots and lots of mushrooms (much to Matt's disgust).

Lots of trees

It really was truly splendid, photographs really don't do it justice. We also were confronted by a barrage of sound: exotic birds calling out to each other. We didn't see many, but a Brush Turkey ran out in front of Matt startling him and slightly scaring Tom.

We stopped off at the first waterfall: Tristania Falls for a picnic lunch and what a lovely place for lunch watching water cascade and fall over what looked like a very tall version of The Giant's Causeway - the rocks seemed to be perfectly geometrical. We then headed to Crystal Shower Falls which is absolutely spectacular a fine flow of water showers over rocks. There is a cave behind meaning you can walk behind the waterfall and view it inside out - it was so beautiful and good fun because we all got wet doing it - Tom thought it was very funny.

Glowing (slightly blurred) fern

We then completed the circuit back to the Rainforest Centre. We had been warned that this was very steep, but it wasn't bad at all: Tom didn't stop to draw breath the whole way back - yacking about goodness knows what all the way and we did ok too. Once again he didn't whinge at all during the walk and he was rewarded with 'tea and a bun' at the cafe - what's big slab of cake it was too! We were both very proud of him.

Big cheesecake, small boy

After a suitable rest we headed back to our cabin. Surprisingly it was a good 40 mins before Tom nodded off, he wasn't that impressed with us when we arrived back at the cabin and woke up.

Oh big milestone: today was the first day that he sat still whilst eating dinner - he was under severe threat (his constant fidgeting at the dinner table has been driving us nuts for months now) and he did it - proving he can do it - no excuses now.






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Location:Dorrigo National Park