In the Footsteps of Charles Darwin

In 1836 Charles Darwin, then 27, and sailing around the world on HMS Beagle, docked in Sydney. From there he made a side trip to the Blue Mountains and over the ranges to Bathurst. On the way he and his guide stopped on what is now the Great Western Highway and walked along a track to look out over the Jamison Valley. As he wrote in his diary:

About a mile & a half from this place there is a view, exceedingly well worth visiting. Following down a little valley & its tiny rill of water, suddenly ... an immense gulf is seen at the depth of perhaps 1500 ft beneath one's feet. Walking a few yards farther, one stands on the brink of a great precipice. Below is the grand bay or gulf, for I know not what other name to give it, thickly covered with forest. The point of view is situated as it were at the head of the Bay, for the line of cliff diverges away on each side, showing headland, behind headland, as on a bold Sea coast. ... The class of view was to me quite novel & certainly magnificent.

The route Darwin took is now named the Charles Darwin Walk and it leads to the top of Wentworth Falls, which even at the time of Darwin's visit, was already a popular tourist attraction. Back then you could only stand and look out over the Jamison Valley but now, thanks to the staff of the Blue Mountains National Park, and all the work they've done constructing walking paths, you can descend the "line of cliff" and walk along it. One thing hasn't changed from Darwin's time: the view over the Jamison Valley is still pristine.


Last week my old friend and fellow author, Richard Tulloch, and I did one of our favourite walks at Wentworth Falls, The National Pass. Starting at the Conservation Hut Cafe at the other end of the escarpment from where Darwin was and, after fortifying ourselves with coffee and scones (with jam & cream) we started off down the track. Ignoring  the Yowie warning sign.

The Conservation Hut Cafe

Yowies are  Australia's answer to the Yeti and Bigfoot. Sadly, we didn't see one. It would have made for an interesting blog entry. Unfortunately Darwin didn't see one either as it would have given his book The Descent of Man that little magic something to keep it in the charts a bit longer.

Beware of the yowie

In any event these men descended to Lodore Falls, Sylvia Falls and Empress Falls on the Valley of the Waters Creek. A group of canyoners were busy canyoning down the creek. We stopped to watch just long enough to be happy to be warm, dry and on foot.

The National Pass Track

The National Pass track traverses the middle of the cliff from the western (Conservation Hut) end to the eastern, Wentworth Falls end. Or the other way around depending on where you've parked. I've drawn a red line on the photo above to show were it goes. If this looks scary, it's really not. The track is well-maintained and the National Park people have made every effort to keep people from unnecessarily plummeting to their deaths. I guess it's in their interests, too.

A paved path---not to every bushwalker's taste

It was a warm day but, considering it's summer here, we were just pleased that we weren't walking in blistering heat. But it is a well-shaded walk and it's been so rainy recently that there was always a bit of cooling spray from above.

Low overhead

A few stretches are better for kids---short ones---than adults.

Richard in welcome shade

Okay so now you wish you were bushwalking instead of staring at a computer screen. You can get to the Blue Mountains from Sydney by car, bus or train and there's all the information you need at the various Park information centres---such as the one in Springwood on the Great Western Highway on the way to Wentworth Falls. There are also excellent guide books. My favourite so far is Blue Mountains Best Bushwalks by Veechi Stuart. For those of you from away, Sydney is just a short plane ride. Just hop on the plane, go to sleep for a day or so and you're here.

The railing does take away some of the fun

A metal lizard climbing a new, very classy, National Pass trail marker

A real lizard, an Eastern Water Dragon, standing in our path

The track has wonderful views out over the valley but, equally interesting, is the variety of plant life on the cliff face. There are a number of plants that grow only the wet rock faces in the Blue Mountains and nowhere else in the world. If I knew anything about plants I'd have included a photo of one.

Wentworth Falls from below

At the other end of the track we arrived at Wentworth Falls. It's a good climb up but there are stretches of metal stairs that make it easy. This is part is a popular walk so it can be a bit of a conga line on weekends.

The upper part of Wentworth Falls

Once on top of the Falls the trip was only half over. From here we again traversed the cliff line on the Overcliff Track back to the Conservation Hut Cafe and rewarded ourselves for our efforts with a filling lunch. 


Back to Charles Darwin's brief trip to Oz: he wasn't as excited by the fauna here as he had been in the Galapagos because so much of it had already been described. He didn't see a yowie but on his trip to the Blue Mountains he came across other animals that puzzled him. He saw a rat-kangaroo that seemed to fulfil the same function a rabbit does in England. And he saw a platypus that was much like an English water vole. But both were very different in anatomy. In his diary he wondered who one creator would have designed different animals to fill similar ecological niches in different parts of the world. It wasn't an original thought but Darwin eventually pursued it in a way that on one else did. Using this and other evidence he collected on his voyage he wrote a book with the catchy title, On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. We know it simply as On the Origin of Species. 


So there you have it: if it hadn't been for a tourist visiting the Blue Mountains years ago we would never have had the Theory of Evolution. QED.

Accidental Animals

I could never be a nature photographer. I'm just not patient enough to wait in a hide at night for a mother Eurasian Eagle Owl to return to the nest with a freshly-killed mouse, or to crawl around a malarial swamp photographing the mating habits of a False Gharial, or to spend my life searching for last living Night Parrot or Tasmanian Tiger. But I do walk a bit both here in Australia or wherever I might be and I often have Canny the 3rd, my trusty pocket camera, with me. While I could never work for David Attenborough I've had my share of the gadget-bag essential---good luck.

I was with some birdwatcher friends in their backyard in Massachusetts and, while their binoculars were trained on their bird-feeder, I looked down on the ground and saw this baby Striped Skunk. It let me get very close before raising its tail and running away. Fortunately it was too young to spray me. It was incredibly cute, as I hope you'll agree, but not old enough to make scents.

These Rainbow Lorikeets were in a park near where I live in Sydney. They let me get very close before flying away. They are very common but so strikingly colourful that I can never resist photographing them when they give me a chance.

This New Zealand Fur Seal was warming up on the rocks at Kaikoura on the South Island of New Zealand. Its mother, behind me, wasn't as happy about my informal photo-shoot. She made a quick movement towards my legs and I legged it very quickly out of bite-range.

While I was walking on a country road in Maine some young relatives of mine called me over to their backyard. They showed me these baby North American Raccoons in a hollowed out apple tree. Once again, I had a camera in hand---rather, in pocket.

Royal Spoonbills are not uncommon here in eastern Australia. This one was in a park near me rummaging through the water plants in a pond and allowed me to get close to it before it flew over to the other side of the pond. It was clearly annoyed that I'd interrupted its dinner.

I can't claim this photo as my own. Near Boothbay Harbor, Maine, this whale suddenly surfaced. I was at the helm of the boat and quickly cut the engine. I couldn't get to my camera in time but my cousin, Johnny, obligingly took this photo. We thought it was a Minke Whale but this is all we saw of it. It dived and we didn't see it again.

On another boat, this time on a trip up the Ord River near Kununurra, in northmost Western Australia, this lizard was sunning itself. I don't know what kind it was but it was big, fast and loved the water. If you know what it is, please leave a comment.

I was walking around Iron Cove on Sydney Harbour when I spotted this Australian Spotted Jellyfish. They're common here but I'd never seen one before. Jellyfish don't race away when you try to photograph them which is fortunate as it took a while to get a photo that didn't show the clouds above better than the jellyfish itself.

Closer to home, this sausage-size caterpillar (species unknown) appeared in our tiny back garden. I watched it for a while carving great chunks out of some of our favourite plants. I'd have loved to see whether it eventually turned into a butterfly or a moth but by then we wouldn't have any garden left. So I took it for a walk to the park where it would have more to eat. I can't identify it so if anyone can, please leave a comment.

Huntsman Spiders make guest appearances in our houses here in Sydney. They don't actually come in to the house but just magically appear inside on a wall or ceiling. Their bite isn't deadly but they can bite and they are memorable to look at. This one is the span of a child's hand. Okay, a smallish child's hand. They have two speeds: deathly still and frighteningly fast. 

I'm the designated spider-catcher-in-chief because I'm not quite as terrified of huge spiders as my wife is. I use the bowl and magazine method and then release them in the park across the street closer to the neighbours' houses. Huntsmen (Huntsmans?) aren't always easy to catch. Just when I'm about to clap the bowl over them they often shoot off. Perhaps the screams of, "Catch it, Duncan! Catch it! Get it out of here! Oh, yuck! Horrible. Horrible." disturbs them.

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