In the morning we reexamined our surroundings, and found that we were very close to the seashore, with a large Banksia-covered sand dune in between. We watched the Bee-Eaters, Fairy-Wrens and Honeyeaters feeding on and among the Banksias, and heard from a nice woman from Sydney whose family has been there all week that the only snake they had seen was a Diamond Python (the name of the southern variety of the Carpet Python). Since our Koala sighting of the previous night remained unconfirmed, we wanted to try and look for Koalas in the northern area of the park, where our beloved “Watching Wildlife in Australia” handbook indicated there should be a healthy colony. However, trying to get to that northern colony we just got to the same bomb range we encountered the day before. We therefore decided to leave the park early.
Around midday we stopped at the little town of MacLean (which maintains a proud Scottish theme) for dump point, water and lunch. We had lunch at a small restaurant by the river, with a large family of water dragons for company just down the balcony. We stopped again at Grafton for resupply, and bought 30 liters of water, as we figured that our plan for the next few days includes mainly parks where potable water wasn’t necessarily available, and we didn’t want this to be a limiting factor. Given the hour when we finished our shopping, we decided not to drive to Washpool National Park, as we had originally planned, but return to the beach for another day, then go to Warrumbungle through Dorrigo National Park, somewhat further south.
We made a reservation at a caravan park in Woolgoolga, and arrived just in time to enjoy a spectacular sunset at the beach, with views of Oystercatchers, gulls and strange jellyfish that were washed ashore. At the BBQ facility that night I had a chat with an Italian guy from Tuscany, who turned out to be a photographer specializing in documenting artists. I was amused to discover that he too, like the Frenchman we met a couple of weeks earlier, didn’t like the local wines, preferring those of his home country.
Family Trips 