Peter Murrell Reserve from Patriarch Drive 2015

Today we're walking from Patriarch Drive in Kingston and are being led -up and down, back and forth, side to side- by Tas.

Another good weather day for us. So much so, I had the thought: "Gee. I wish I'd worn my shorts today!". Inside of 5 minutes it changed to: "Gee. I wish I'd brought a machete today!".

Tas was determined to find a track Bob hadn't run on before, and I think he definitely found one.

Leaving the cars and heading for the start of the track.

Clearly marked

Looks good so far

Little did we know how many of these we would walk

This doesn't look right. Shouldn't we be walking the wide, comfortable track?

No

Still near civilization, but this is a taster

The only track here was created by animals. No offense to everyone in front of me

Tas missed this side track

John ponders the wisdom of joining our group

Soon, however we are out in the clear and and on nice wide track. I think this is the Sandflats Fire Trail and then we turn off onto the Scarborough Fire Trail.

Sounds familiar

Now we continue on established tracks, at least for a while. Soon we're off across country again, but not until a map is consulted.

This look serious. Unless you're Bob who laughs at maps!

Decision made and off we go

At least there's something to eat if worst comes to worst

What little track there is has disappeared...

...but found again. So we head for Morning Tea

Tas leads us to a road side spot with plenty of large rocks to sit on. After everyone is revived, we continue on.

These two tracks appear to be named after convict ships. Lady Penrhyn docked in Sydney in 1788 and she also sailed in the Atlantic transporting slaves. The Scarborough was another convict transport

Leaving that happy note, we continue on, using more established tracks.

I think we've been here before

We do cover tracks with the same name as before, but on a different section.

Looking south over Kingston Golf Course

Wouldn't like to meet this gum tree on a dark night

I think I heard Tas say this tunnel into a bank is the nesting arrangement of a Spotted Pardalote

Unlike the Forty-Spotted Pardalote, it apparently has too many spots to count.

Now we take a very short walk along Howden Rd. and pickup the next track leading back into the reserve.

The next track

Howden Track was too good to walk on, so we wait to turnoff when everyone catches up

Tas says there are some native orchids along this trail

True to his word, we find one. I managed to get a photo when my unsteady hands matched the waving of the orchid in a slight breeze. It only took about six goes. Thank goodness for digital cameras.

Native orchid

Back on another track

On the Middle Fire Trail heading towards Coffee Creek

We're now making our way towards our lunch spot, which is off Coffee Creek.

Coffee Creek

Penrhyn Pond

The lunch spot

We'd just settled down when a couple of gentlemen turned up and told us there was a race through the area that involved some teenagers and flour. They would try not to bother us. We'd noticed some tents on the grounds of Terremah School, so it must be them. In the end we really didn't see much of them and what we did see didn't involve much running. And no flour.

We have to keep some of our members caged when near the public

The man in the white shorts is one of the race officials

Selfie taken with the original organic selfie stick. A stretched out arm.

This is the second photo. I charged $10 not to publish the original embarrassing one. Only $20 will secure a copy of the original to be emailed to you

As requested, a Monet like reflection photo

Purple Swamphen or Porphyrio porphyrio just to show off

I think we had 15 walkers and covered 11.89km in 3:58hours. A very interesting walk with little overlap thanks to Tas.

Click here to download GPX file

 For the Daring

If you want to see how we walked the track, download the GPX file, start Google Earth, go to File then click on Open and navigate to, then open the GPX file you downloaded.

You should then see the track on Google Earth. Click on Edit then Show Elevation Profile.  This will open a window at the bottom. Put your cursor over the left hand side of the graph and just move it to the right and you should see the cursor move on the track showing where we went and when.