Ranger Dan came calling quite early to collect our fees so we had quite a good chat to him about some of the roads and national parks in the area – in particular Kangaroo Pass and Morton NP as that is our planned route to Sydney. With not wanting to travel too far we set our sights on a reserve area at Nowra about 100km away. The weather was forecast to change to rain with cooler temperatures which is a bit of a shame as since we crossed over and onto the NSW coast it has been a lot warmer.
On reaching the small town of Lake Tabourie we got cell reception back so stopped to sort out somewhere to stay in Sydney and look at the lake. The seawater lake (like many we have seen along this route) although quite pretty was smothered with grasses along the shallows and up to the shoreline and actually stinks. Information provided about its condition advised that unfortunately we good old humans have buggered it up through excessive nutrients from farm run off and the like. The end result being toxic algae and prolific weed growth – something we are all too familiar with back home with some of our own waterways and lakes.
Next stop was Ulladulla. A very nice town with a man made port. Man made in as much as huge breakwaters have been built right out into the bay to accommodate the fishing industry that survives there. Of particular interest was the salt water swimming pool that had also been constructed on a rocky part of the foreshore. Designed to fill with salt water when the tide is in and then retain it as the tide goes out. On arrival the weather was quite sunny but without much warning dark grey clouds moved in, the wind came up and down came the rain – before we made it back to the shelter of the Beast of course…
After our damp little recon of Ulladulla it was back on the road and over more densly forested hills in quite heavy traffic all the way to Nowra. A significant town/city built around the Shoalhaven River. With a short day in mind we tracked down the Wildlife Reserve on the banks of the river. We had no trouble finding the reserve but the access was down an extremely narrow and steep one lane road. It would be really ugly if two cars with caravans in tow were to meet. Given this very real fear our plan on leaving will be to get Carol to do a runner up the hill to ensure no vehicles come down while we are going up.
All the drama of getting in and out aside it is a very nice spot right next to the river and the gold colour of the trees at dusk was lovely. The weather held for the remainder of the day and after some light rain overnight was fine again in the morning. With our close proximity to the wildlife park we were entertained by the cacophony of animal calls – dingos being the most notable.
