Gorringes Beach Circuit - 23 April 2024

Today Michael is leading the walk which will commence at Mortimer Bay car park and then use various Tangara Trails in the area (The Tangara Trail is an 80km network of tracks in the Clarence City Council area. Tangara is an Aboriginal word for 'lets get away together'. The trail takes in varied landscapes, weaving between property boundaries, roads, beaches and bushland. The trail continues to grow and evolve with sections added each year).

Getting ready in the car park

And off we go in bright sunshine along a track which runs parallel to the beach

 This series of "witches hats" sitting on top of poles was puzzling us - what were they there for?  Morris suggested that they are markers for slasher operators warning them of dangerous  objects to avoid when mowing - eg. rocks, stumps etc.

 

We head onto the beach

And its morning tea

Morning tea over we move away from the beach and shortly after leave the Mortimer Bay Coastal Reserve

The large horse saw us coming so it trotted over and made friends with Lorna.  His 2 companions initially hang back but eventually also came over for a pat. Before we left them behind each horse got half an apple!

On we go crossing Gellibrand Drive

Not to be left out Chris finds his own horse, but it doesn't have the same presence as the three we saw earlier

Continuing along the Tangara Trail - it's mostly very dry

 Chris doing his "Spiderman" impersonation

Is this a Qantas or a Virgin plane high in the treetops?

A pile of sandstone in the drive and interesting gate

Sculpture in the field beside the track

We reach our lunch spot - it has a marvelous view of Cremorne

 

Lunch over the walk continues on the Tangara Trail

Onto the beach at Mortimer Bay and almost back to the cars

Today Michael lead 16 walkers into areas of the Tangara Trail that we haven't been to before. We covered just over 13 kms

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Mount Field East & Seagers Lookout 16 April 2024

 Today we will be walking in an area we have been in before - weather and time permitting it is hoped to walk to Mount Field East and Seagers Lookout before returning to Lake Fenton. If possible we will also spend time looking at the Fagus around the Lake.

One of our members has had his 80th birthday recently and so Marilyn brought along a cake.  We forgot that he wasn't going to attend today's walk as he was away scoping out a possible future walk.  Never one's to waste food, our group decided to stop at the visitor center at National Park where the cake was eaten - verdict -- delicious.

We then drove to the car park near Lake Fenton where today's walk will begin.

Getting ready to start.

Off we go

It didn't take long till we spotted the Fagus - unfortunately the timing wasn't right and we only saw a few bushes that had 'turned'. Fagus is Australia's only cold-climate deciduous tree who's leaves become flush with brilliant autumnal yellows and oranges. The rare Tasmanian Nothofagus gunnii is a small tree mostly less than 2m tall and is entirely unique to the mountains of Tasmania.

Some boardwalk makes the walking easier

We reach the turn off to the Mount Field East Track. From here the climbing gets more difficult

As we get higher the track becomes steeper and rockier

In some parts there is lots of water on the trail

An unusual rock with a flat top

In this section snow gums are prominent with their twisted, gnarled branches. Very spectacular

We finish this part of the climb and make our way along the ridge

Even though it is a harsh environment there is quite a variety of plant life - the orange in the photo below is sphagnum moss.

Down from the ridge onto the boardwalk which winds its way across Windy Moor.

Our destination (Mount Field East) is the mountain directly ahead of us - it seems to still be a long way away

Some moss growing amongst the waterways 

After crossing Windy Moor we soon reach the intersection of Mt Field East and the Lake Nichols Tracks. Half the group decide that they don't want to do the climb to the top of Mt Field East (they will have lunch) - the rest of us leave our packs and commence the climb 

Michael looks at home amongst the rocks

A little further along we pass a woman and her 3 children. It turns out that she is French .. Michael's first language is also French .. so the two have a conversation in French!

We reach the cairn at the top

Looking east

Looking west

A view of the duckboard snaking across Windy Moor

Back down for lunch at the track intersection

Lunch completed we retrace our steps 

Lake Fenton in the background

Chris looking over his domain

This tree looks like someones behind

Close to Lake Fenton almost back to the cars

Today 16 walkers covered 7.5kms in 4.5 hrs. We ran out of time and didn't get to go to Seagers Lookout.  The walk had 4 distinct sections - near Lake Fenton there was dense bush, as we started to climb it became very rocky with striking snow gums, next we crossed the marshlands of Windy Moor on duckboards and finally the bare rocks on the slopes of Mt Field East

Click on this link to download GPX file