We are generally pretty slow to pack up camp and get going in the morning. Today we almost excelled ourselves. Within 30 minutes of getting up we had packed up our mattresses etc, broken down the tent and made breakie. From there it took us another hour fifteen to have our showers, do a load of washing and get going. Still some room for improvement…Kings Canyon is stunning – big thanks to Katrin for the recommendation. Totally different from anything I’ve seen and one side of the walk was completely different to the other. It started with a very steep climb up to the rim up beautifully laid stone steps. From there it was a mostly flat walk right around the rim. Stunning rocks, amazing colours, huge views. It’s hard to capture the exact colours or the scale of the place. It’s also hard to wrap my head around walking across rocks that were formed 400 million years ago, including some that were once rippling sand under water.
On one side of the canyon we looked across to the other and saw the walls where the softer rock had eroded away and undercut the harder rock which in turn sheered off, sometimes the size of a house, and tumbled down to the canyon floor. Apparently the last known such event was in the 1930s.
We visited a waterhole which was a sacred aboriginal men’s site. The original custodians’ request is only that no-one swims in the water to ensure it’s not polluted and that it remains a sanctuary for all the creatures. We’re lucky to be allowed to visit that place at all.
In certain areas of the canyon there are plants that were around at the time of the dinosaurs. This plant is apparently 400 years old!
In little pockets there are soft, beautiful flowers that seem too delicate to survive in this harsh place.
After lunch we drove back to Redbank Gorge. As we were leaving the carpark we saw crows hopping across the various car roofs, checking out everything strapped on top to see if they could find any snacks or treasures! And along the way we found my favourite road conditions warning sign placed just before a sharp bend on a gravelly road:
We’ve realised we always seem to be arriving at places in a rush to get to the next thing – racing to leave on a hike to get to the destination in time or racing to cook dinner and get to bed in the dark. Today was luxurious. We arrived at 3:30, hung out our washing in the sun, pitched our tent (first time for me as the solo tent pitcher!), had a couple of beers and relaxed while taking our time cooking dinner and getting ready for tomorrow’s hike. Such a lovely way to spend the afternoon.
Kerry's Hikes 