In search of the lost pêche

This is another little thing I originally put on Facebook, but that I think deserves to be preserved a bit more. Adventures in a world of fruit beyond Paris.

Way out in eastern Paris, beyond the numbered arrondissements, beyond the Boulevard Périphérique, in the départment Seine-Saint-Denis, in a place where tourists rarely go, we ventured to find the stone-walled peach orchards of Montreuil, les murs de pêches, famous in a minor, nerdy kind of way.

In the 17th Century, closely-spaced stone walls, covered in plaster, were built to house orchards. The walls, oriented north-south, absorbed solar energy and slowly released it, creating a microclimate that enabled peach horticulture, in an area that would otherwise be too cold.

Some of the walls, with a vegetable garden in the foreground

More of les murs de pêches

Montreuil peaches became famous and highly sought, first with the nobility, and then more widely via the big market at Les Halles. At one time they were worth more than their weight in gold. The statue of agriculture outside the Mairie de Montreuil includes a peach tree, recognising the importance of the industry.

L'esprit de l'agriculture, Mairie de Montreuil, with her peach tree

Owing to limited operational intelligence and suboptimal navigational tools (I will not comment further about on-peach activities), we reached the orchards, but not the small segment that has been restored to production. Instead we ventured beyond the freeway that cuts "Les murs des pêches" in half. We saw very old, degraded parts of the wall system, very overgrown and in poor condition, the home of itinerants and tramps.

Wall detail, with scale

We found the unofficial site for illegal dumping of old mattresses, asbestos, and noisome garbage. We may also have stumbled on the car rebirthing centre of Paris. Groups of men idling on street corners watched us, silently. 

The Mean Streets of  Montreuil

Bogan, mullet-haired subteens on high-rise bicycles boisterously rode down the streets. It was all fascinating, and a far cry from the Paris of the 1er arrondissement and the Eiffel Tower. On our way back home to the 4eme and Garret Central by bus, we could watch the sudden change from the outer suburbs to the elegant, restaurant-lined streets of inner Paris that we all know.

Toscana del sud

A little after dawn. Riding in a car with my father. I'm entranced by the topography — angular, fissured hills; sere grassland with stands of spindly eucalypts. Barbed wire five-strand fences, old, silver-greyed strainer posts, ragged split timber fenceposts. A two-lane bitumen road running along the flats, the hills a few hundred metres beyond the fence line. But it's the shape of the hills that holds me. The endlessly varying but eternally uniform shape of those hills. As a small boy, say five or six, I don't have the language to describe them with any precision. But the shapes reach out, beguile, capture my imagination. I can see myself walking across the concavity of the river flats, to foothills, then scrambling up a gully to the ridge line, the gully split by smaller and smaller gullies; the low ridges giving way to higher and higher summits. Not huge mountains, but gentle, human-sized hills — the size where you could climb to the top in an hour, or less.

Not huge mountain ranges, for this is the Central West of NSW. If there is a part of Australia that feels like my bit of country, it's here. I'm a city boy — Sydney, born and bred, but the Central West is something special in my interior landscape. It was a place I learnt about early. My father was born in Wellington, at the northwestern end of the Central West, schooled in its heartland at Orange, then lived in Canowindra. That's where I first came to know the region, on visits to my grandmother, my Nanny, Dorry. They were the only holidays we ever had as kids. 

My Nanny, Dorry, and my father, at his graduation

Canowindra was a long way away, a drive to a place that was a different world from my home in the Inner West of Sydney. A place of climatic extremes — dry heatwave summers, when I spent all day at the swimming pool with my cousins, and cold, cold winters, when Nanny would — wonder of wonders — light a fire in the living room. A land of curiosities — two stoves in the kitchen: a wood stove that also kept the room cosy in winter; and an electric stove, for summer, to avoid heating the house up any more than it already was. A chip heater in the bathroom, that, along with drought, meant lukewarm baths in a few inches of water. All the wood burning gave the house a distinctive, smoky smell — not strong, but rich and warm, a dark brown smell. Like tobacco, and the leather of my grandfather's collar box, that sat on Dad's bedroom dresser, as it now sits on mine.

Other curios and oddities abounded. Nanny lived in a freestanding house — a wonder to a child who'd only ever lived in a small city flat. It had timber verandas on several sides, which meant you heard visitors long before they arrived at the door. There was an old garage, but no car — she didn't drive, and had been widowed for as long as I knew her. The garage was a magnet. Dark, dusty, with benches and cupboards full of potentially interesting things — tools, jars of nuts and bolts; it drew me, until Nanny saw a snake in there, and I was banned. Two big water tanks up on high stands; I learnt to knock the rings to see how deep the water was.

Further down the backyard was a corrugated iron dunny, which stunk, and resulted in a reluctance to go to the toilet. Next to it was a chopping block, where she split timber for the stove and chip heater. The washing line was up on clothes props — a Hill's Hoist was nowhere to be found in those days. Beyond the washing lines was a low fence, separating the grassed area from a rougher weed-strewn patch down the back, intended as a vegetable patch. I remember a photo of my father in his twenties, standing there, weedy rough ground then as well, holding up two chooks by their legs. I never learnt the fate of the chooks, but have always assumed they were dinner.

 It's not for decades after that early morning drive that I learn that the landscapes I see are fractal geometry — they exhibit repeating patterns that display at every scale. It's also later, as a geology student, that I gain the language to describe the topography that had held me. It's called a mature landscape, in the theoretical cycle of landscape evolution developed by geographers like William Morris Davis.

William Morris  Davis' model of landscape evolution

I realise that a trip from Sydney to the Central West is a trip through Davis' landscape model. The flattish Cumberland Plain of western Sydney could be the "Old" stage, as is the landscape beyond Parkes or around Hay, all big plains with minor residual ridges of harder rock. The Cumberland Plain is followed on the drive by the uplifted plateaux cut by box canyons of the Blue Mountains. They look like Davis' "Youthful" stage, but I quickly realise the impact of geological history here. They are actually a "Rejuvenated" stage, where uplift of the plateau at the Lapstone Monocline has kicked off the Davisian cycle again. But it's the Central West — part of the Western Slopes topographic division of NSW, that grabs me. And so perfectly exemplifies Davis' Mature stage of topography. 

That monotonically repeating landscape — all fractal slopes with nary a flat spot — is very appealing. On a world stage, the landscapes that capture popular imagination often resemble this. The lands of central Italy — Tuscany and Umbria, for instance; The Lakes District and the Cotswolds; or Appalachia (Davis was a Philadelphian, and Appalachian geology informed much of his thinking). Tuscany and Umbria are popular, I feel, not just because of their abundance of Mediaeval hill towns, good vineyards, and annoying renovating authors. The hills of central Italy are very similar in form to those of the Central West.

Tuscany

The Central West

The uplifted, eroded plateau — think of the Blue Mountains, or the Colorado Plateau cut by the Grand Canyon — is spectacular. But also intimidating. It overwhelms the individual; inducing awe, certainly, but not necessarily a sense of comfort or ease.

The Grand Canyon of the Colorado River, Thomas Moran, 1904.
A spectacular but intimidating landscape

 Mature landscapes like the Central West, or Tuscany, have a human scale and a more intimate feel. They are, I think, immediately appealing. I can immediately imagine myself in them, and fit them out with people and culture — roads, farms, villages, pasture, crop lands, railways and canals — that are unthinkable in a youthful and cliff-bound landscape. Whilst many people love the Blue Mountains, and, indeed, live there, for me they have always been the bit you have to drive through to get to the Central West.

My connections are not just childhood ones. As a geologist I've worked there a bit. For students in Sydney, it draws. Sydney has some fascinating geology, but it's all of a type, and lacks the diversity, the exposure to a wide variety of rocks in a small area. So, for me, the landscape and the memories make me want to say that the Central West is my patch.

This simple statement can be controversial amongst some circles in Australia. It's clear that Aboriginal Australians have a long connection to country. Over 40,000 years of it. It's a spiritual and custodial link. The Aboriginal people of what we now call the Central West are called the Wiradjuri. This is their country. They are the people of the goanna totem. They are the largest Aboriginal group in NSW, and Wiradjuri country is huge — ranging from the change from woodlands to open grassland in the east — approximately the alignment of the Great Dividing Range, to the more arid plains to the west. Wiradjuri country covers three major rivers in NSW — the Macquarie, Lachlan, and Murrumbidgee, and continues south to reach the Murray. They maintained a cycle of ceremonies that moved in a ring around the whole tribal area, that led to tribal coherence despite the large occupied area.

Wiradjuri country

I'm not denying the crucial, central role of Aboriginal custodianship in Australian culture. And I'm not comparing my connection to that of Aboriginal people. My ancestral links go back to England, mainly, with a bit of Scotland and Ireland as well. A multiple-times great grandfather arrived in Sydney town in the second fleet, courtesy of His Majesty, for helping himself to a few necessities. It's the typical Anglo-Celtic version of an Australian story. And anyone of my generation who grew up in Australia is steeped in British culture. But I didn't actually get to England until I was in my 40s. I enjoy going there. But it's not Home. That's Sydney, but with a strong touch of the Central West — Wiradjuri country. The Tuscany of the South.

On the how, and the where

I talked a bit about “why walking”. But now, what about How? And Where? They go together, and are, of course, intimately connected with Why?

Regarding how: a fundamental consideration is that I don’t want to turn my recreational walking into bushwalking. I don’t want to carry all the camping paraphernalia — tent, sleeping bag, cooking gear, several days worth of food. I’m lazy. I want someone else to look after those things, so I can focus on the walking bit, rather than spend time putting up tents.

Now, all this doesn’t happen without some effort and preparation. The decision to free myself of carrying kit means walking from place to place where I can find accommodation. It doesn’t have to be particularly high standard. I’m not a 5-star princess, but it does mean making landfall by night somewhere where I can find a roof, a wash, and a meal.

Walking the Camino — the mediaeval pilgrimage route from Paris to Santiago de Compostella in northwestern Spain, has become a popular pastime. I’ve not done it, but I know a few people who have done bits. The model seems to be one of moving on each day, walking for some hours, and gaining relatively simple and cheap lodging in a village each night. Somewhat like in mediaeval times, when the pilgrimage was the thing to do, establishments have again appeared along the route, providing modern-day pilgrims with accommodation.

Now, one day I might do some of the Camino. But that takes some funds, and I’m skint right now. Certainly, a few weeks walking in France and Spain, appealing as that sounds, is not in my budget. I started to cast my eye around local possibilities. The requirements seem simple on paper: a region where pubs or other cheap accommodation are available in settlements a day’s walk apart. Preferably somewhere scenic and appealing, with a good road network, so I’m not stuck on highways all day.

So — the thing about Australia is that its big. BIG! About as big as Europe, or the contiguous United States. But much less densely settled, so towns are a greater distance apart. It doesn’t take much map-gazing to realise that the southeastern crescent, roughly from a bit north of Brisbane to a bit west of Melbourne, is the area of operations. Anywhere else is too sparsely settled, with towns more than a reasonable day’s walk apart. As a rule of thumb, I am using 20 km as a distance for scoping walks. An option is to stay in one place that I like and make daily loop walks. I mean, it’s not like a I have some actual religious imperative to get to a particular spot.

Another problem is access. In the UK and Europe, there appears to be a long-standing, if not always legally codified, right to walk along public footpaths that traverse private property, as long as the walker obeys certain provisions such as not bothering stock, not lighting fires, and sticking to paths. Such a network of paths across private properly is lacking in Australia. I suspect this comes from the development, early in the European settlement, of the practices of free selection, where certain individuals were given total rights to hold property. And they often wanted to set up a “Bunyip aristocracy”, negating the concepts of public access to their land. Whatever the cause, it is difficult to just walk along a fence line or creek, without incurring the wrath of a landowner. The end result for a walker is that minor public roads become the most-accessible way to move around.

As well, changes in the patterns of settlement have an effect. The bush has had the economic shit kicked out of it over the last 50 years, with steady depopulation of rural towns, and a loss of services. Small towns that once had a pub have disappeared, or lost services. The options for somewhere to stay have reduced. Along with this has been the gentrification of the “bed and breakfast” market. Once, bed and breakfast accommodation establishments were just that — a place for cheap and simple accommodation in someone’s spare room. Now, they mainly seem to cater to the “dirty weekend” demographic. This has been accompanied by substantially increased prices, minimum stay periods, and death by twee. I don’t really need a crocheted dolly toilet roll cover, thanks very much.

Anyway, all this reflection – largely achieved over a few longer walks, has led to a fantasy conception of the ideal accommodation. It was envisaged by Almost John Buchan:

“Two hours before sunset I crested the ridge, and looked down into the long glen before me. The dusty road behind had been a long and lonely walk from breakfast at Muirtown markets. When I had alighted from the train in the dawn light, I’d looked carefully through the market crowd and my few fellow travelers. I saw no one I recognised, and no one seemed interested in me. I appeared to have outrun my followers of the last two days. It was hard to believe that only three nights before, I had returned from my club to the Mayfair flat and found Sofia dead — pinned to the parquetry floor, a long knife skewered through her heart, a look of terror frozen on her face — and the Karamanlis letter gone from my desk drawer.

The road ran down into the glen through some slow bends. About two miles ahead a stone bridge crossed the burn, and beyond lay a single croft, a thin drift of blue-grey smoke rising from the chimney. Beyond the croft, the burn emptied into a loch. A few rowboats were pulled up on the beach.

Far to my left, sun glinted off the sea, silvering it. The landward sides of the islands were already purple with shade. I sat on the heather with my back against a boulder and carefully scanned the glen with my field glasses. There was nothing moving below me. The glen had no cover — not a copse or a stand of pine in the whole place. I was relieved. Nothing could move in the glen without me knowing about it.

Carefully I crept the few yards back to the crest, and with my glasses surveyed the way I had come. There was very little traffic on the coast road, and none on my side road. There seemed to be no pursuit.

Not long after, I was crossing the burn on the bridge. I walked up to the croft. An elderly woman with grey hair and a worn face was tending a vegetable garden, a basket of beans and potatoes beside her. She bid me good evening. When I asked about lodging for the night, she gave a drawn smile. “I’ll show you what we have.” In a lean-to on the side of the croft was a small bedroom — spare, but neat and clean. “ You’re welcome to this” she said. “It was our son’s room. He ne’er came back fra’ France”. She pointed me to a well and stone tubs behind the croft, and offered to make tea whilst I washed.

Before the tea she gave me a bowl of creamy milk and fresh-baked bread. I sat in the gloaming watching the glen. There was neither man nor beast abroad, as far as I could see. For a few hours, it seemed I had escaped detection.

After dark, her man came home, carrying a creel with a salmon from the loch nestled in bracken. He was a tall, whip-thin, wind-burned man, a little grey starting to appear in his brick-red hair. We ate slabs of the salmon that she cooked in butter in a skillet, with beans and potatoes.

After the meal, he and I sat in front of the fire with our pipes and drams from my hip flask The conversation was halting, with long periods of silence as we stared into the coals. The talk was of stalking in the district. It was poor, as so many keepers and ghillies had left for the front. I ventured a few comments on the fishing and the game, and circumspectly asked about neighbours. All were old, established families, who had lived here since Noah. I was relieve to hear that no one new had come to the valley for years. When I cautiously expressed support for the new Labour government’s plan to use demobbed men in land and game restoration projects, he came to life.

“I ken fine the idea, and it’s a braw one. But our local member is a Tory and a high laird, and he’ll no be supporting it. I hold no time for either side, syne the war that took the best of us away, and left no benefit to ordinary wee folk. I’ll thank ye not to be a’ talking of the politics in this house. It upsets her too much, syne our lad died”. At this he fell into a brooding silence until our drams were finished and it was time for bed.

Between crisp sheets, the visions of Sofia and her terror mask, and of my escape from the Red Door gang, slipped away quickly. For the first time in days I slept a deep and dreamless sleep.

In the morning she served me ham and eggs with more strong tea. As I was taking my leave, I held out one of my sovereigns. They looked affronted. He said “There’ll be no need for that”, and she walked to the kitchen dresser, took out two baps, wrapped then in paper and held them out. “A wee bite to help you on your way” she said. I made my way down the road beside the loch, towards the sea. No one followed me.

An hour later, I heard the sound of an aeroplane. It came high over the far ridge then dropped, following my road. I stepped under an old pine and watched as a twin-seater biplane worked its way along the coast. I could see the pilot and observer both leaning out to scan the ground. My sense of security of the last few hours fell away. The gentlemen of the Red Door gang had taken their search to the skies. I was still hunted.

That fantasy accommodation isn’t about to happen in a hurry. But a country pub, with a simple room, and a bathroom down the hall, is enough. Especially if it has a decent wine list, a veranda, and a log fire in winter.

A decent network of minor roads; a few country pubs; some pleasant countryside to walk through. That’s what I’m looking. Within striking distance of Sydney, it announces itself. The Central West — stretching from Mudgee to Cowra. High country, rolling hills, big sky. It’s as close as I get to a bush home. Family connections, and a lot of work as a geologist has taken place in the Central West of NSW. That’s where I will start looking for walks.

It is snowing in Helsinki

With Wintergeddon again spreading its frozen grip across southeastern Australia — it’s been snowing in Orange again — I’m reminded of this short story I put on Face book a while ago. It, and the video, are worth another life, I think.

It is snowing in Helsinki, according to my weather app. Memories come flooding back.

Snow. I'm from Sydney. We don't do snow. So, one January day early this year, I found myself walking through a Helsinki street, when this snow started falling. It was impressive, as the snowflakes were SO large. I had to film it. It was a quiet backstreet behind the national museum, well away from downtown bustle. And the snow tumbled down so silently, completely fascinating.

Until I spent last Christmas holidaying in Finland, I had no idea how delightful snow could be. How it muffles sounds, how it drifts and eddies slowly up the street. The silence is striking. I'm used to a good, torrential downpour, with drumming of rain on a corrugated iron roof being part of the perennial soundtrack to life in Australia. But snow falls so quietly. And then builds up in drifts and banks of white icing sugar along the street, instead of swirling along gutters and disappearing down the nearest drain.

On Christmas Day, everything in Helsinki shut, I went for a long walk — four or five hours, thought Kaivopuisto Park, along the frozen Baltic seafront, past the docks, into Kamppi and downtown, past the Johanneksenkirkko (St John's church), past the Soviet-era grey stone pile of the Russian embassy — hammer and sickle still over the door, and slowly back to Eira and home. It snowed lightly all the way. I had no idea how delightful — how utterly beguiling — walking in the snow could be.

Not a soul to be seen for most of the way, I had the still, soundless white world to accompany me. Warm as toast in my heavy duty parka, my beanie (a delightful gift from my friend Helen in Canberra), and my Himalayan woollen socks, bought at a Christmas stall on the railway platform at Mälmo. Savouring every moment. Delighting in the candle-lit windows in every household, I ploughed on.

I'd never awoken to the results of a good overnight snowfall, with banks lining the kerb. Watching commuters digging the car out. Or a man silently langlaufing along the street. A crocodile of preschoolers reaching the tram stop, each with skates around their neck, heading off to a skating lesson.

For the record: in the meteorological history of Sydney, there has been one recorded snowfall. The Sydney Morning Herald reported it thus: "June 27, 1836. Raining at 3, 6, 9 p.m.; very heavy rain in the night; 7 a.m. of June 28, snowing heavily, snow lying one inch thick". This is disputed by the killjoys at the Bureau of Meteorology, who say it was most likely to be "soft hail", not snow. So — we don't do snow. But one day, I would like to, again.

Walking in a Winter Wonderland

The BOM site was going crazy late last week about the impending winter storm conditions that were going to sweep, Assyrian – wolf like, down on the southeast. Snow! Wind! Cold! Rain! End of CAWKI*! A big system pushing north from Antarctica. Snow down to 700 m, at any rate. Beauty, I think, a chance to get out and do some walking in the cold, possibly see some snow, feel buzzing finger tips and ears, eat something great in front of a roaring fire, with a glass of red.

A big system coming up from Antarctica. BOM image

Sunday sees me on a Blue Mountains bound train before dawn. It IS cold, on the walk from home to Central, but lovely in the carriage, as we head through dark suburbs to the inaptly-named Emu Plains. Well — have YOU ever seen an emu thereabouts?

About Warrimoo, the very first sun cuts the dark, a pale pink, nacreous glow; a huge ball of orange soon follows. It is exquisitely, heart-stoppingly beautiful, as I see it through darkened trees, and suggests that, at least to the east, the sky is unclouded. If we are going to see some snow, that system coming in from the west needs to make good time. 

Warrimoo sunrise

It is just after eight when I leave the train at Blackheath, elevation 1070 m. Crisp, but no snow. Rime and frost on the grass near the railway station, and I am off searching for a hot cup of tea and some breakfast.

Civic information, Blackheath

Area of Operations, west of the railway and town ridge

I get walking, and head southwest out of town along empty streets, to the Centennial Glen car park. The sign gnomes near there have a dim view of walking speed. 1.5 km in 40 minutes? Along a sealed road? Even I can walk faster than that. 

1.5 km in 40 minutes?

From the car park, the track winds west though low heath, which really is being blasted today, buffeted by a roaring gale from the west. The track runs along the spectacular cliff top, then takes a dive like an Italian soccer player; all ladders and cut steps, down the cliff line through a deep gully. In places spray from the creek flies up in drifts onto the ladder ways. I walk quickly through those, not wanting to start the day wet. In summer, this would be a lot of fun! Today, it will just be annoying, at best.

The track levels off and follows the base of the cliff line along Colliers Causeway. It is reasonably wide and even in some places, rough and narrow elsewhere.

The wide path ...

 ... and the narrow

 It is generally fairly easy walking. In places, there is some track improvement going on, with masonry works in progress, building retaining walls and easy paths.

Track upgrades

The path is usually right at the very base of the cliff — I can touch sandstone faces with my right hand all along here. The cliffed landscape is the defining, iconic feature of Blue Mountains.

Typical cliffed landscape of the Blue Mountains. Banks Wall Sandstone forms the cliffs in the western Blue Mountains, as here on the Blackheath ridge.

The western edge of the Blue Mountains is transitional land. Cliff-bound hills covered with nearly continuous eucalypt forest, give way westward to a more rolling terrain of open grassland, with patches of forest, usually forming the higher ground. And so it is, as well, with the original inhabitants. The western Blue Mountains, the Megalong and Burragorang valleys, is the home of the Gundungurra people, which continues south into the Southern Highlands. To the west is Wiradjuri land, home of the goanna people, dwellers of the grasslands of the Central West.

As always, geology is at the bottom of it. The cliffs in the western Blue Mountains are formed from my old acquaintance — Triassic-aged Banks Walls Sandstone, part of the Narrabeen Group in the Permo-Triassic (300 – 200 million years ago) Sydney Basin. Further east, down the mountains, beginning about Woodford, the cliffs are built of younger Hawkesbury Sandstone, which crops out so well around Sydney itself. Cliffs form when a resistant layer is underlain by a more easily-eroded rock layer. The soft rock erodes back more quickly, making an overhang; the overlying rock collapses, forming cliffs.

Overhang cave and cliff

Over time, the process continues and the cliff line retreats. In the Blue Mountains the rock layers are nearly flat-lying, so the cliffs can continue, essentially unbroken, along ridge lines for many kilometres. If you stand at vantage points like Govetts Leap in Blackheath, you see the cliffs extending, in spectacular fashion, all the way down the Grose Valley. The rock overhangs must have been magnets for Aboriginal occupation over millennia. They offer shelter, and water from seeps, dripping roofs and cascading streams. Further east, near Wentworth Falls, an occupation site has been dated at 20,000 years old, or possibly older. The tribes have walked these hills for a long, long time.

To the west Sydney Basin gives way to the underlying, older rocks of the Lachlan Fold Belt. These can be highly variable over short distances, compared to the regular, continuous geology of the Sydney Basin. Their variability give rise to the diverse range of landscapes, soil, and vegetation of the Central Tablelands and the Central West regions. Granites are often deeply eroded to soft, rolling landscapes with deep, relatively fertile soils that can sustain grasslands — such as the area around Bathurst. Stronger, more resistant rocks — often metamorphosed sandstone and mudstone, give rise to hilly county with shallow, stony soils that support forest, such as the prominent chains of hills — Mount Lambie, Dark Corner, the Catombal Range, the Hervey and Coccaparra Ranges.

And so, as I walk at the base of the cliff, I can look west across this geological, topographic, ecological, anthropological divide. I am looking through the forest, from Gundungurra land, to the more open grasslands of Wiradjuri country.

Looking through the trees, from Gundungurra, towards Wiradjuri country

Nestled in the valley, right at the bottom of the hill, is a white farm house and outbuildings, in an opening between the trees I can see a house which is the closest to the cliff line. I think of this as The First Farm.

The First Farm

The bush is mainly the olive drab, grey green of eucalyptus forest, but in the deep gullies, where the sun doesn’t penetrate easily, the vegetation changes to dense, multi-green temperate rainforest, fed by the constant spray from waterfalls.

By channels of coolness the echoes are calling,
And down the dim gorges I hear the creek falling.

Temperate rain forest in the tight gullies

Scattered through the bush at this time of year, are splotches of beautiful lemon-yellow wattle — always the first to flower.

Even in the middle of winter, the wattles have got their hurry on, when other plants won’t start to flower until spring starts to warm them up. As well, there is a pretty, but tiny, pink trumpet-shaped flower. It’s pretty. It’s pink. It’s shaped like a trumpet.

That exhausts my knowledge on this plant. I’m better with rocks.

And, in the way of Blue Mountains bushwalks, at the end of the day you repeat the climbing, in reverse. Back up through the cliff line on ladder pitches, to win to the plateau again. At the top of the climb up Porters Pass, there is a lookout, with views again out to the west, over the mix of bush and pasture. This time, the wind is howling, fiercer than before, and a lot of cloud is inbound. I take a short time to enjoy the view, and celebrate my return to the top by supping a wee dram.

Cheers!

In this cold and wind, the whiskey is most welcome. It burns and warms on the way down. I think of the characters in Tim Winton’s “The Riders” — the father and the neighbour — who spent a lot of time standing in an Irish bog, taking a spot of drink against the cold. I don’t think I’ve ever drunk whiskey like this before — outdoors, in the whistling wind and with my fingers freezing. It’s a wonderful moment. The drinking and looking and general huzzah is cut short by the wind, which is screaming always more loud. As I take a picture, light flurries of snow arrive, and this makes my day. Snow, at last. It’s not settling, but, by God! I came to see snow, and here it is!

But the wind doesn't die, and I can feel my legs stiffening. I walk on, staying warm by keeping moving. It’s a short walk through the streets of 1930s holiday cottages, back to the railway station. Where a transformation has been wrought in my absence. The early morning Blackheath was empty of people, bar a few hardy (mad?) souls like me. Now, it is teeming with rubberneckers. It seems that tout Sydney and the mountains has ascended on Blackheath to witness the impending meteorological onslaught. Wintergeddon. The streets seem crowded but the indoors are even worse. The cafes are full to bursting; both pubs have queues as long as a mother-in-law’s memory, waiting to order counter lunches. My dream of a delicious and hearty feed in a quiet café is disappearing, fast. Eventually, I eat an indifferent steak sandwich in a crowded café. But it DOES have a roaring fire, and I am seated right next to it. I am looking out at more snow flurries, although they melt on hitting the ground.

On the way down the hill, there is a serendipitous moment. Near Warrimoo, where I saw the sunrise, the train runs through a short section, where a gap in the trees aligns with a gap in the hills. Far, far out to the east, on the coastal plain, I can see the skyscrapers of Sydney, 60 km away. A shaft of sun drops on the city, through a hole in the clouds, and it is beautiful, glowing, crystalline, in the way it is  lit up. It looks like Dick Whittington's London, Dorothy's Oz, beckoning me on.

This is pretty damn good, after a stiff walk. Warming up, enjoying a sit. Nodding off on the train home, whilst savouring chocolate and a surreptitious nip of whiskey. I drowse off. Simple delights on an afternoon after a stiff walk in the cold. Snow. Just a bit, but good enough.

            * CAWKI: Civilisation As We Know It

On the why ...

Walking.

Isn't that a wonderful word - so full of promise, and delight, and fulfilment? Walking is one of my favourite things. Along with eating, and fucking, and reading. Each has its own delights, but walking is special. Unlike most of the others, it's often best when done alone. It is good day or night, in any weather. And all you need is a pair of shoes. 

I'm not talking about walking around the house, or down to the shops. Nor am I talking about walking with an agenda - like "getting fit", or "training for the City to Surf". Those LOOK a bit like the walking I'm talking about. And are important. I should be doing more of both. I'm talking here about walking to a wider horizon. Walking with no purpose, beyond just getting out into the world, walking across it, and seeing what's there to be seen.

It can be a short walk. But really, I'm thinking here of a walk of AT LEAST a few hours' duration. Preferably all day. And, most preferably, one of a few days together, dedicated to podial locomotion. For when you walk long distance, with no great agenda, or schedule, things start to happen. Your mind opens up. You start to relax. You get time to think, in an unstructured way - noticing the body's steady rhythm, the wind at your back or the sun on your arms. Seeing the various sights along the way - trees, and rocks, and soil; animals, vegetables, and minerals. Watching the landscape unfold before you, at walking pace, from ground level, is one of the most luxurious and relaxing things I can imagine.

Given that we can hold several thoughts in our minds at once, and that, at walking pace, there is time for these thoughts to ferment, mature, evolve - it's a fine opportunity to mull over the problematic items of life. When the going isn't too difficult. Moss forest, tropical karst, button grass swamp, horizontal scrub - all take their toll on progress - and need your full attention to traverse. But when there's open forest or - joy of joys - a track, a fire trail, a back-country road, the walking doesn't interfere too much with the mental journey.

And so, we plod along, in the moment, thinking deep and shallow thoughts. Building to those rewards granted the walker: the view from the top of a hill; a thirst-slaking beer at the end; the joy of a hot shower (or even, if you're lucky, a bath); and that delicious, slow descent into deep sleep that is the reward for today's effort, and the preparation for tomorrow's journey.

For a field geo, walking is part of our stock in trade. We are on our feet from the start of day one. But it's different in ways, that I'll talk about later. But, for now, just know that we walk a lot. And so, we have plenty of time to think about stuff. 

After a long career as a field-based mapping geologist, my work started to spiral inwards, to become more constrained. I've walked a lot as a geo, in eastern and southern Australia, northwest Queensland, Papua New Guinea, Fiji, Burma, Bangladesh. But over the last few years, with inevitable career changes, the focus has changed. I've moved from doing regional mapping, where the canvas, the area of interest, may be 100 km wide, to looking at dams. The focus is usually a hectare or two immediately around a dam wall, which may only be a hundred metres long

So, all this has led to a growing sense of claustrophobia. The need to break out, and put some kilometres under my feet.

What I'm going to do - well, that's the subject for another story. I'll tell you another day. Now - I just want to be somewhere, walking towards an open sky.

I'm back ...

Walking the Great Wen was a blogging project I started when I went to London and Paris in 2014 with my charming and delightful girlfriend Annie. I had hoped to make a travel diary.

The software wasn't up to the challenge. As we were on the go, I had an iPad and a phone. No laptop. And I found it impossible to do what I wanted - write stuff, interspersed with photos I had taken, to record our travels. It's a long, dull story, that you don't need to know. But it quickly became obvious that, away from the technological sophistication of a full (heavy!) laptop, the travel blog as I envisioned it  was a dud. Writing stories on Facebook became an easier option. And that's what I did.

Anyway, now I'm planning to resurrect WtGW as a continuing travel diary, with some imminent software/platform changes. In the interim, I'll struggle along here.

I'm excited to be working on a new travel writing project. I hope you follow me.