Wet again

This week I was reminded of the crisis we were having before the current one. On 2 January this year I visited the Hunter (not so) Wetlands in Shortland, when the water supply was pretty dire. I revisited the same spot today. What a difference in 5 months!

While walking around I took a photo of a water droplet nestling in the depression of a plant leaf, and was rather pleased at how the reflections made the droplet look like a miniature earth being cradled by nature.

Flickr’ing Hot

It was hot today. Too hot to do anything but stay inside. This however gave me a great opportunity to organise the photos in my Flickr account. Recent changes to Flickr mean that free accounts have a maximum of 1000 photos. So today I cleaned out my Flickr account leaving just a small collection of my favourite photos. Click on the image below to see more.

Royal Re-visit

Four years ago I visited Mt Royal National Park north of Singleton, and walked part of the the loop track that goes down to the creek in the valley. On Friday I returned and completed the full walk.

The Creek Walking Track, Mt Royal National Park.

The walk down and back was 6.2km, and it took 1 hour down, and 1 hour 20 minutes up. At the bottom of the track, just near the creek, there’s one lone picnic bench.

The creek itself is quite small, not much more than a trickle, even after some heavy rain the day before.

We walked back up the northern track, which in contrast to the southerm track has steps in some of the steeper sections.

Both tracks conveniently have a bench seat at about the halfway mark, for well earned rests.

On returning to the Youngville picnic area where we started the walk, the mountain was shrouded in cloud and mist, making a very picturesque scene.

After some lunch at the picnic area, we did the short walk up to Pieries Peak. This is only 2km return, and a much gentler grade than the creek walk.

Pieries Peak walk, Mt Royal National Park.

Leeches? Yes. On the way home I found one very bloated leech in my sock, and four leech bites on my ankle.