Tuesday, March 20, 2012
Making lemonade out of lemons….

Here it is….Tuesday already. Obviously we recovered from our thwarted plans to visit the Great Barrier Reef and the Daintree Rain Forest—even though the disappointment took some of the wind out of our sails. Still, this is an amazing place with much to experience; so we decided to put the cancellation behind us and strike out on a new plan. We rented a car and mapped out some adventures for Sunday and Monday.

Sunday, 18 March; 2012 Northward on the Grand Pacific Drive:

The Grand Pacific Drive extends from Sydney southward along the coastline to Bateman’s Bay (pronounced byte-mens baie) and maybe beyond. We decided to explore the section northward
and see what we could see. That turned out to be small seaside communities of Corrimal,
Bellambi, Woonoma, Bulli, Thiroul and the like, each one with beautiful public beaches reaching out into the Pacific waves. An additional few miles north we reached the Sea Cliff Bridge-a roughly 1km section of highway built right into the side of the cliff overlooking the shore.

Apparently, the original cliff road crashed into the surf after a landslide on the cliffs and had to be replaced in 2005 at a cost of about $50 million. The bridge juts out from the cliffs and
overlooks the ledge rocks and surf below. In addition to the two auto lanes, if offers a bike lane and pedestrian walkway with spectacular views. We walked all the way across and back on a sunny, autumn day and had a wonderful time. Quite a view…!

One interesting feature of the bridge is the display of padlocks attached by visitors to the vertical sections of the railings across the span. Couples and families etch their names and significant dates onto the sides of the locks and fasten them to the railings as a memento of true love, marriage, birth of children or other sentimental occasions. It’s an interesting practice worth copying elsewhere—maybe even back home.

We parked the car in the village of Coalcliff to get access to the bridge. Apparently this community was the site of one of the original veins of coal that gave birth to the local economy. The railroad, with long strings of coal cars, still runs along the face of the “escarpment” as the west facing cliffs are known locally.

Next, we continued northward along the Pacific Highway to Stanwell Park and up a long incline
to Bald Hill, home of the regional center for hang gliding. Here, glider pilots leap off the face of the cliff and soar above the surf and beaches many feet below. As we approached the area several gliders hung nearly-stationary in the air, faced into the easterly (prevalent) breeze. A brief visit to the staging area revealed several commercial operations offering tandem-soaring lessons for
tourists and students. About a half-dozen gliders were in various stages of preparation for flight in the observation lot. We stopped a little further along in the village of Otford at a roadside shop featuring “homemade apple pie.” It tasted quite good, especially with vanilla ice cream, and quite unlike any other apple pie. Instead of traditional crust, it contained a breaded or cake-like top with apple filling underneath—just the thing to give weary travelers a pick-up.

From Otford we explored various roads up the coastal mountains and arrived at the small
town of Helensburgh. We drove through and remarked about the town’s “quaintness”… and drove on. Just before the last intersection joining a major road, I looked up and saw the most exquisite building with two large towers covered with intricate carvings and figures. We stumbled on the Hindu Temple, Sri Venkateswara built in 1978 to provide a place for meeting and worship to the surrounding Hindu community. According to some information, the location for building such temples were required to fulfill five criteria: (1) virgin land (2) on an island (3) surrounded by forest (4) near a source of water (5) nearby ocean. The temple was very busy
with worshippers, weddings, families, tourists and other visitors—so we walked around the exterior, took lots of pictures and moved along to other sights. It provided a beautiful exit to
our visit to the Helensburgh area.

To close out the day, we drove onto the Prince’s Highway and proceeded southward towards Mt.
Keira. This is the highpoint of the local escarpment overlooking Wollongong and the surrounding areas, both north and south along the Pacific shore. The lookout area appears close to the city from below, but from above the area spreads out in intricate detail—extending from the steel and coal mills on the southern side to the beaches, lighthouses and coastal highway to the north. We could even see our apartment building near the town center and soon started on our way back for a relaxing evening with a glass of wine and a home-cooked dinner.

Monday, 19 March, 2012
Point Jervis:

We decided to go south on Monday, down the Prince’s Highway for about an hour’s drive to Jervis Bay. The scenery completely blew us away! Unlike the winding seacoast or soaring
mountains, this area presented us with green, rolling hills and fields extending out into the mountains, on one side, and the bluest of the bluest of oceans on the other. When we crested the rise of the highway, we saw one lovely scene after another spread out before us. The road also goes directly through several towns and cities on its way southward—places like Nowra, Kiama and Berry, to name a few. Some of these were quiet little villages; others like bustling cities.

Arriving at Jervis Bay, we entered the Booderee National Park (don’t you just love the names!), an anvil-shaped peninsula sticking out into the Pacific. Lunch became the first item of business; so we stopped at the “park store” and had a “take-away” sandwich.

Next we visited a place called “Green Patch”; a visitor’s area including camping, hiking trails, fishing and assorted other tourist activities. We took a short hike down to the beach—another gorgeous stretch of white sand stretching out along the distant coastline—and up to an point called “Bristol Point” with a skillet-like plate of rock and water on three sides.

Oh, yes….and we saw our first wild kangaroos! One hopped across the road as we drove in; then we saw three others “lounging” in the grass near the walking trail. I approached them and took several pictures; they seemed less impressed with me than I was with them. It looked like an
adult couple and one young animal, but what do I know about Kangaroos? They were still there when we returned from our short hikes! Nice life…..!

Next we waked through a couple of forest trails for a couple of hours, observing the wonderful foliage—especially the huge eucalyptus trees shedding their bark and the green ferns spreading across the forest floor. By that time, we had pretty much used up the day (and our energy reserve) and decided to head home.

Linda took the wheel (with a minimum of whining and protesting from me) and we headed north up the Prince’s Highway through all the beautiful scenery to Wollongong.