bushwalk addicts

The title of this post is ironic, although we have been doing some bush walking lately.

The reason we have been walking is because I have been commissioned to write for G magazine. I can not tell you how stoked I am about that commission. It's a great magazine, a 'green lifestyle' magazine no less. Pretty much what I want homegreenhome.com.au to be when I have the time to devote to it.

Anyway, I pitched them an idea and they asked me to write it. About tiny National Parks in Sydney, pocket parks if you will. So after being stoked about getting the commission, I then had to go out and find these so-called parks, walk in them, photograph them and then write the story.

That's on top of all my other work.

So I decided it would be a good exercise for me to do with the kids (thereby working on my 'days off') so they can be introduced to the wonders of nature.

The first walk, in the very local Wolli Creek valley, was quite successful with Zac happily loading himself up with a backpack (containing water and appropriate hiking snacks). He was enthused with imagining we were far from the city, indeed I came around one corner of the track to find him using a stick to draw dinosaur tracks on the path before shouting "Look OUT! T Rex about!"

Unfortunately Nell did not enjoy herself so much and we had to turn back after about 45 minutes.

Our second walk was more elaborate in that we traveled further afield and invited friends to join us. That was good and bad. Good because I had someone to commiserate with when Zac decided he really wasn't interested in walking that day, bad because Zac decided he really didn't want to bush walk that day.

Nevertheless we saw beautiful things: flannel flowers, banksias, scribbly gums. Nell decided she could leave no stone unturned which made for slow going but perhaps achieved the aim of introducing her to the natural world.

At one point, when we were looking at a camouflaged grasshopper, we talked about animals and their natural habitat. Zac scratched his head and said:

"The natural habitat of the ant is in the school playground near where the lunch boxes are kept."

Comments

[Helen]

Sadly, my kids hate bushwalking and camping.

HATE it.

I also have severe buyer's remorse about my new Aku Lhasa's ($256, excuse me.) My previous Akus lasted 12 years but they were just half a cm too small and were torture at the end of a walk. Now I'm thinking the new ones might be a bit big (the heel moves, which is Not Good) but it's too late to take them back.

For Victoria: Try Organ Pipes national park, smallest NP in Victoria and only a short drive from the city. Weird rock formations and a creek for little kids to throw rocks in.

[sally]

Hi Elissa

I love the idea of your article - I'm often trying to to find semi bushy places to take the kids for a walk.

it may not count as National park but the Coopers Creek park in Woolahra seems like it when you're there and its got a very manageable walk up the creek and then up the sides of the creek/almost gorge if you're more adenturous. It doesn't seem like you're in sydney at all except of course for having the very Sydney benefit of a cafe at the tennis courts at one end of the walk.

I occasionally decide we're going to go on short bushwalks and pick a spot on the map and we head over there. the last one was to a spot in Garigal national park. It started out with a lovely picnic spot on the river and then a dirt road (flat) along the river but after about 50m Odette refused to go any further. So Odette and I headed back to the car and Richard, Rohan and Stella continued on.

The walk looked quite benign on the refidex (UBD) but of course that's not a map designed to tell you if there are steep hills. Richard had his mobile and there followed increasingly anxious phone calls over the next hour and a half (from me)as I drove to the other end of the track but they didn't show up when I expected. Of course the river turned into a creek/gorge with very steep sides that they had to climb out of - at one point I called Richard and he just yelled "stop - get away from the edge - I gotta go.....". The fact that he's had a very bad back in the past that can just 'go' if he has to bend down at strange angles (in my imagination, to pull children away from precipices) just added to my anxiety.

in fact they did very well and Stella and Rohan walked all of the 3km - and they emerged at the other end unscathed.

But I will definitely read your article for ideas of flatter walks more suited to preschoolers - as that would save me that experience next time we go. We'll try out the Wolli creek one as well.

sally

[Annette]

Hi Lis

Love that!