Mulligan Falls to George Point
We respectfully acknowledge the Bandjin People as the traditional custodians of the land on which we walk. We pay our respects to Elders past and present and to the Aboriginal people present today.
Crossing the last estuary at an excellent time!
Today’s hike is short at just 6.3 km and cruisy, being all downhill. We have elected to get a late pickup in the boat from George Point, so we have plenty of time in the morning for another swim, and the estuary will be at its lowest.
Geoff cooks breakfast beside the waterfall.
Preparing poha with flattened rice, nuts, peas, and Indian spices: one of our favourite breakfasts.
One of the water polo lads takes a snap - thanks, guys!
Our view downsteam across the pool at breakfast. More pools for swimming are hidden below those boulders. You can just make out the jungle perch in the foreground.
Back in camp, we meet Nikki Coombs, who has cleverly sewn her own backpack! Her video has footage of Sunken Reef Bay.
As we pack up later in the morning, this brilliantly coloured Noisy Pitta (Pitta versicolor) flits about the campsite.
You’ll see elkhorn ferns (Platycerium bifurcatum) scattered throughout the forest during the hike.
Beautiful bracket fungus (probably Turkey Tail, Trametes versicolor) on a mossy log.
And here is a baby green ant nest with just two leaves woven together. Elsewhere high up, we’ve seen ones the size of basketballs, or bigger!
We pass magnificent gnarled paperbarks with tangled roots.
And into rainforest that’s different to what we’ve seen elsewhere, with bare straight trunks and less understorey.
Just look at that beautiful canopy!
Textured red trunks of Red Beech (Dillenia alata)
So this is why there is so little understorey here. This part of the island is sandy inland, rather than rocky, and don’t the pigs know it.
The pigs are doing an enormous amount of damage but are fortunately restricted by the nature of the terrain. You’ll pass a small exclusion corral, which is used to assess the effect of various animals on regeneration, but it’s pretty obvious with the ground a bare pugged wasteland compared to the rest of the island.
Slender dwarf Morning Glory (Evolvulus alsinoides)
And onto the beach. The weather is great, but I decide to test out my new sun/rain umbrella even though it’s neither sunny nor raining. I’ve carried it all this way and I’ll be damned if I don’t use it! The umbrella handle attaches to the shoulder strap with a few shock cord loops. It works!
Notice also those rough spots scattered across the sand.
Many of the beaches have these intriguing holes with surrounding detritus distributed in fascinating patterns.
Here is the culprit, a tiny semi-translucent blue soldier crab (Mictyris sp.) who casts almost no shadow and is speckled to perfectly match the sand. These crabs feed on tiny detritus and the little balls are what is left after they’ve fed.
Lugworm casts on the beach. Lugworms look like something you’d see in a scary alien movie.
Our little group of five has the entire beach to ourselves. Everyone else has already been picked up.
Lush green Scaevola taccata on the foredune.
Yellow flowering shrub I’ve not yet been able to identify - help welcomed!
The estuary is very low and easy to cross. This looks straightforward but when you realise that this morning’s high tide reached the bushes at the edge of the beach, it’s clear that the crossing can be challenging at other times!
And here we are at our pickup location, George Point. Again, you can see that the high tide reached the very edge. There is a small campground, picnic table and toilet, but no water.
We divvy up our last remaining goodies - there aren’t many of them! - between the five of us while we wait for Brad to arrive.
Martin, Diana, Doug and us: five happy campers!
A huge thank you to Diana, Martin and Doug for their wonderful company and generosity in asking us along, a rare gift of banner memories we’ll treasure for a lifetime.
