Travelling Pathetically - A Spit Bridge too Far Edition

 My Tasmanian correspondent contacted me the other day in a terrible state.  She moaned about her neck, her foot and her children and how collectively they had prevented her from doing what she really enjoyed doing which was abandoning her family and roaming the wilderness like some predator of old.

"I must live vicariously through you," she announced, "and make sure there are photos."

I glanced around at the nylon cord, handcuffs, ball gag and the shackle rings on the wall.  Turning to my puffin I asked.

"Do you think she means..."

"Absolutely not," replied the puffin.

"Bushwalk it is then."

The weather has not been particularly conducive to roaming the outdoors lately.  At least it hasn't been conducive if you've been looking for any excuse to not roam the outdoors.  There was a threat of rain so I put off (with an internal sigh of relief) my bold expeditionary plans to the wilds of suburban Sydney and looked for something a little closer to home.  What I came up with wasn't much closer to home but was probably closer to emergency services should something go wrong.

I decided to walk from the Spit Bridge in Mosman to the Sydney Harbour Bridge in Milson's Point.  This is actually an acknowledged walk that would take me around various headlands, reserves and parks near the edge of Sydney Harbour.  My puffin pointed out that the walk was twenty kilometres.  I indicated that I could handle such a distance.  My puffin pointed out that I get out of breath walking up the street to buy cigarettes.  I stuffed the ball gag back in his beak and terminated the conversation.

It was grey with a threat of rain when I mounted the bus to take me to the Spit Bridge.  Possibly for this reason I had actually remembered to pack the hat to protect my head from the Sun.  It is to this forethought that I attribute the fact that I am not completely dead.  The bus stopped at the Spit Bridge, unfortunately I wasn't on it.  I'm not very familiar with the area with the result that I got off the bus far too soon and the first stage of my journey consisted of trudging down an overused road to actually reach the bridge.  See what I do for you Clare?

A view while wearily trying to reach my start point

Sadly my puffin was right.  My triumphant march to Milson's Point would devolve into a desperate stagger around Mosman.  I literally would not leave that suburb the entire time despite walking for fourteen kilometres.  By the end I thought I was in a high rent Escher painting.

Once down at the Spit Bridge I promptly left it again plunging into the wild.  However this is Mosman so the "wild" turned out to be a road with trees on either side of it.  Slightly downhearted by this I nevertheless plunged on and took my first opportunity to leave the road when a path appeared that offered to take me to Pirrama lighthouse.  I could actually see the lighthouse from the road but I took the path anyway.

By careful use of the camera I can give the impression that I'm in the wilderness

Taking the path turned out to be a great idea.  It literally took thirty seconds to reach the lighthouse (there is a better lighthouse photo later) but the path went on and eventually wound up down at the shore.  A sign announced that there was a walking path to a nearby beach which could be used when the tide was low.  I don't know if the tide was low but there was a distinct amount of water where I would have expected a walking path to be.  Undaunted (because it was still early in my walk) I clambered and occasionally slithered over such rocks as seemed most likely to stay unsubmerged, negotiated somebodies boat ramp and eventually wound up on the beach.  I'm sure it has a name but I descended to and climbed away from so many beaches that they've all become a bit of blur.  Along the way I didn't take photos of lizards.  The area around Pirrama lighthouse positively heaves with lizards but the camera shy little beggars fled at my approach.  Some more relaxed lizards would happily pose for photos later.

I'm not sure if this is a tidal pool or an unambitious stream

It didn't actually start raining, apart from a few spots, rather the moisture in the atmosphere simply condensed onto my body with out going through the formality of rain.  The weather however was about to take a turn for the better.  Apparently simply sick of the entire concept of rain the clouds vanished and I found myself walking under a brilliant blue sky with an equally brilliant Sun.  Fortunately I had a hat.

Not a bad little beach really

Rocks with water running off them.  It's fair to say I'm not going to be asked to do a nature documentary anytime soon

With my first beach behind me I walked through my first reserve and wound up on what sadly was not my first suburban street.  Before I could find someone to complain to though I was back on a path hugging the harbour and barrelling directly towards my next beach which I remember was Balmoral.

I've actually been to Balmoral beach before (although without the tedious walking) and it is a positively charming place.  Or at least it would be if you could get rid of all the people who tend to congregate at positively charming places.  Along the way I amused myself by taking photos of spiders.

Spider #1

Spider #2

I actually took a lot of spider photos but these were the only two that came out half way decently.  The rest of the spiders blended irritatingly into the background.  By now I had been walking for an hour and a half (I know the blog seems to have gone on much longer) and I stopped at Balmoral for lunch.  This wasn't so much because I was hungry as because I took a look inside my pack and realised the sandwich I had made had come off worse in a confrontation with my water bottle and I had better eat it while it still vaguely resembled food.  I dined on what was halfway to becoming cheese and apple soup and drank water from a bottle that managed to exude a definite air of triumphant smugness.  While doing this I also tossed a crumb to a bird that approached me so boldly that I was worried it might steal my shoes if I took my eyes off it.

Aforementioned bird.  Don't mock, it was scarier than it looks

With lunch completed (and the bird eyeing me speculatively) I decided to push on.  Somewhere over this collection of headlands was Sydney Harbour Bridge; my goal.  At this point I was still at the ludicrously optimistic stage of my journey.

Now I was walking through unspoiled bushland or, to be more accurate, I was walking beside unspoiled bushland.  Said bushland was walled off from me with a barbed wire fence and warnings that trespassers would suffer hideous consequences (such as getting caught up on barbed wire).  The reason for the fence and the warnings (and the bushland) was that I had encountered HMAS Penguin, a naval base that sprawls over half of Middle Head.  If you want your bushland preserved, give it to the military.  The occasional unexploded round and totally deniable drum of nerve gas notwithstanding its a great way to preserve some of the natural environment.  One of the ways they preserve it is by erecting barbed wire fences and not letting anybody in.

Trying to take a photo of bushland without barbed wire

Having made my way down to Balmoral Beach and then back up the other side I wound up on Middle Head where I took a detour to wander down a path that eventually took me further along Middle Head (at this point I was basically just looking for walking paths that didn't run along the side of the road).  Eventually the path connected up with the road again at a rather handsome restaurant.  This restaurant used to be the clubhouse for Mosman golf course until the military took it over during the Second World War.  The fact that the military were right next door anyway probably helped.  The military eventually released their grip on it and its now a restaurant.  A nearby sign boasts that the building has been preserved by which I think they mean they didn't knock it down.

Quite a handsome building really

Being deeply uninterested in former golf clubhouses I instead wandered along and took a look at a former gun battery that had been built on Middle Head to help defend Sydney Harbour.  I have noted before in my blog (look it up) that the British tended to defend their possessions from seaborne attack despite the fact that they were the only ones capable of launching said attack.  To be fair it makes more sense in Australia since an invasion is hardly going to come from somewhere else.  Anyway convict work crews hacked away at what was then virgin stone surrounded by bush and when they were done hauled cannon up to the platform thus provided so that Sydney could be defended, for about six years.  At the time (1800) Middle Head was a long way from the centre of the colony through trackless bushland and it actually proved very difficult to maintain the guns or the soldiers based there.  A few years after the thing was built it was effectively abandoned although other battery positions would be build later.

A gun battery, you just have to imagine the guns, as indeed did the Colonial authorities for much of it's existence

There were other batteries further on but I was uneasily aware that time was passing and I was getting no closer to my destination so I retraced my steps, for about a hundred metres before plunging down a side track that seemed to lead towards the harbour.  It did indeed lead towards the harbour and I took some great photos from a  convenient vantage point.  After taking said photos I looked around and noticed there was a man near me.  I noticed three things about him.  He was a powerfully built man, he was completely naked and there was a younger, highly decorative man, equally naked with his arm around the first man's shoulders.  I looked at them, down at my camera and decided that discretion was the better part of getting my head kicked in.  So I retraced my steps back to the point where I was retracing my steps and then retraced those steps as well until I was back on the path that led me down Middle Head at which point I turned and walked in the other direction.

Random bush and water shot #1

Random bush and water shot #2

 

I was rewarded for my return to the actual path I was supposed to be on when a lizard stopped and posed for a photograph.  Unlike his earlier flighty cousins this one was far more relaxed.  Either that or he was stupefied by the Sun.  I had sympathy and clutched my hat a little closer to my head.

He's either dozy or an attention whore

 

Although I was leaving Middle Head reminders of its military purpose kept popping up such as when I looked up and found myself staring at a cannon mounted over my head apparently still guarding the harbour approaches.  I had no idea why at the time but according to a little map checking after my return this was probably Georges Head Lookout.  It's nice to see someone takes the tourist trade seriously.

 

Just try getting in without a ticket

Since I had been going up for a while it was only appropriate that I should start going down again.  This time I plunged towards the harbour only to stop a few scant feet from the water at a collection of buildings clinging to not terribly much semi flat ground backed against the sandstone cliffs which appear to be a feature of this part of Sydney.  I had encountered Clifton Gardens.  Or rather I had encountered Chowder Bay, Clifton Gardens was just on the other side of this rather quaint collection of buildings that I didn't take a photo of because despite the fact that they were largely cafes and restaurants they still managed to give off a bit of a military vibe.  A vibe that wasn't helped by the sign warning me that having my bag searched was a condition of entry to the whole area.  Since I almost got arrested in Mombasa for photographing an inconveniently placed bird I've been a little nervous about taking pictures of things that might belong to authority.  At least if the authority is close enough to bother me.

I trudged along Clifton Gardens' inevitable beach and struggled (and by now it was becoming a struggle) up the rise on the other side.  Now I was on the way to Bradley's Head and an excited sign informed me that soon I would be walking through one of the last unspoilt remnants of the original bushland that had once fringed Sydney Harbour in its entirety.  As if that wasn't enough the sign gushed that there would be other signs, informative ones, along the way to help identify all of the plants and wildlife that you almost certainly won't see.

Somewhat perked up by this (it turns out I am disturbingly easy to please) I strode forward under a cool canopy of trees which was very welcome.  The bushland may have been pristine but I bet the walkway I was traversing had been around the block a time or two.  Then I encountered my first informative sign complete with a picture of the animal it was describing.  These have got to be the worst animal pictures of all times.  I was familiar with some of the animals, familiar enough to know that they looked nothing like the pictures.  One of the signs told us to watch out for humpbacked whales.  I didn't exactly expect to see one on the path but if I had I certainly wouldn't have recognised it from the picture which resembled an obese penguin with downs syndrome. 

No need for artful photography now, I was in genuine bush

And for no reason at all a photo of another lizard

The dreadful pictures did provide me with a certain amount of innocent amusement which was necessary because the truth was I was flagging badly.  Only the "I told you so" look on my puffin's face was keeping me going.  Fortunately Bradley's Head was genuinely worth the effort and at the end of the walk I managed to take a decent photo of a lighthouse which I know you've all been waiting for since I mentioned such a thing many paragraphs ago.

Now that's what I call a lighthouse

And that's what I call a brush turkey.  It's my blog, I don't have to have reasons

After Bradley's Head it was just a little further to Taronga Zoo the sort of place I might like to visit on a day out if I hadn't just exhausted myself wandering around the shoreline adjacent parts of Mosman.  I reached the zoo and thought "surely I can go a little further".  I was right, I could go a little further.  Specifically I got as far as Mosman South ferry wharf at which point my legs threatened to seek asylum in another body if I continued.  I took the hint and, stinging with defeat slunk home.  My puffin was very gracious about the whole thing for which I was grateful.  I have certainly built up a large appetite for dinner but it remains to be seen if I am physically capable of producing it.