Most of us drive through it enroute to our favourite holiday haunts on the south coast, an occasional glance out the window our only interaction with the vast swathes of heavily forested national parks that stretch along the escarpment country from Nowra in the north to Bemboka in the south.
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A decision by the NSW government in 1999 to declare many parts of these national parks "wilderness", meant that unless you were prepared to strap on the walking boots and embark on multi-day hikes, much of the country was inaccessible.
An unintended consequence of this dramatic expansion of wilderness meant that many traditional, heritage and recreational bridle tracks, especially in the Monga and Deua national parks, were suddenly off limits to non-walkers, including horse riders.
Among these were the spectacular Shoebridge Track, a purpose-built route for pack horses dating back to the gold rush days connecting Nelligen to Araluen, and the WD Tarlinton Track, an ancient Aboriginal path pioneered by William Tarlinton in 1829 to move stock from the tablelands on the upper Shoalhaven River to the coast.
"At the time of the changes, the government didn't have any real knowledge that these bridle tracks even existed," says Peter Smith, a spokesperson for Access for All, a community group of 400 horse riders and other interested parties, who for the last two decades argued for authorities to reinstate responsible public access along these tracks.
A couple of months ago, their wish came true. Following a two-year trial that showed no environmental damage caused by horse riding on these specific tracks, management plans of some of these national parks were changed to reinstate access along the tracks.
Peter, who is known to readers of this column through his encyclopaedic account of the area's most notorious bushrangers in The Clarke Gang Outlawed, Outcast and Forgotten: The worst and most troublesome bushrangers of all time (Rosenberg, 2015) is "ecstatic" that these traditional tracks are open once again to future generations of horse riders.
"It's great to see history being kept alive," says Peter, explaining in the 1800s, these tracks were the lifeblood of a number of towns along the coastal escarpment strip between Canberra and the coast. "These bridle tracks were hand-cut into the bush in order to transport goods to communities in the 1800s."
Transporting goods into the Araluen Valley during the mid-1800s gold rush was especially challenging during wet weather when access from Moruya was flooded. In fact, when the Deua River was running high, due to the steep gradient of the alternate track into Araluen (from Braidwood) essential goods had to be precariously lowered down into the valley on wooden sledges. Really!
"The sledges carried about half a tonne and although dragged by horse, were steadied by hand-held ropes as they were lowered to the bottom of the mountain," explains Peter. "It was a one-way trip as no horse could draw the slide back up the mountain, so once down the bottom, the slide became firewood."
In an attempt to improve supply into Araluen, Thomas Shoebridge, an enterprising store owner in lower Araluen, funded an all-weather pack track to allow goods to be transported from Nelligen. The government later pitched in to improve the track, even building "passing bays" every 300 or 400 hundred metres.
Despite the considerable cost (Shoebridge ended up going broke and had to sell his store) and effort put into its construction, following an upgrade in the road from Braidwood and the construction in 1870 of a dray road from Moruya, the Shoebridge Track became virtually obsolete.
According to Peter, "While it continued to be used for people travelling into Araluen from Nelligen and for occasional stock improvements, it was no longer a critical supply route, and used occasionally by adventurous locals to keep them open."
To celebrate the recent decision of re-opening the tracks to horse riders, Michael O'Brien and his wife Melissa of Nelligen recently led a 10-day horse trek, 200km along a number of tracks including the Shoebridge and WD Tarlinton tracks.
"It was amazing to ride through the country again, although we were closed-in for much of the time, occasionally it would open up to amazing views of steep country in the remote Deua National Park," reports Michael. "Because we rode up and down the escarpment, the vegetation was changing all the time, simply stunning, the timber, the tall trees."
"Going around the side of the hill where the tracks were benched was easy, but in other parts, the tracks had become overgrown and we needed to follow the blazes on the trees," says Michael, who while he has "ridden a lot around the east coast of Australia", reveals "the country along the Shoebridge [Track] was up there with the best".
But it wasn't just the scenery that impressed Michael, who rates as a trek highlight camping at an area on the WD Tarlinton Track, which according to local folklore was a bush hideout of the Clarke brothers.
"It's not a cave like many would imagine, rather a good little flat area where apparently they were holed-up with their stolen stock," says Michael.
Michael is confident that the re-opening of the tracks to occasional horse treks won't lead to any environmental damage.
"There are, of course, provisions in place to protect the surrounding environment including that horses can't deviate off the tracks into the bush and that treks are subject to limitations like maximum numbers of horses and riders," he explains.
"Further, it's unlikely the tracks are going to be over-run with riders as you need local knowledge, and lots of it", says Michael. "In the ten days of our ride we never saw another rider."
Have the archives' ghosts taken flight?
For several decades, librarians at the National Film and Sound Archive in Acton have complained of hearing ''scratching bird noises'' in the walls of the landmark building's ground-floor library.
Despite regular checks by maintenance staff, the source of the unexplained noises was never found, leaving some to speculate it could have been one of the archive's friendly ghosts.
However, current restoration work to the exterior of the building has uncovered the likely culprit(s) and unfortunately for paranormal aficionados, it's not Casper, nor any of his mates.
While pulling a mesh screen off a long-closed vent, stonemason Ted Higgins uncovered a secret cavity extending about half-a-metre along part of the library wall.
"The wire screen had rotted away, allowing the birds in and the only void was filled with nesting material," reports Ted.
"When I pulled the vent out I wasn't expecting such a large nest," says Ted, who estimated he removed 0.2 cubic metres of nesting material.
"There was even a couple of eggs," reveals Ted, who has worked on stone buildings all over the world, including Westminster Abbey and in doing so has uncovered more than his fair share of bird nests, "but never anything on this scale".
Still at the NFSA, don't forget to catch their knockout The Dressmaker Costume Exhibition which features a selection of haute couture costumes worn by Kate Winslet, Hugo Weaving and the rest of the cast of the 2015 Australian revenge comedy-drama film of the same name. It closes August 18.
Did You Know? The building currently home to the NFSA was originally built in the late 1920s to house the Institute of Anatomy. In the building's stately foyer behind a plaque in honour of the Institute's founder, Sir Colin Mackenzie (died in 1938, seven years after the Institute officially opened), are his ashes. Following questions about the exact whereabouts of Sir Colin's ashes, in 1974 authorities took a peek behind the plaque and confirmed they were still there.
CONTACT TIM: Email: timtheyowieman@bigpond.com or Twitter: @TimYowie or write c/- The Canberra Times, 9 Pirie St, Fyshwick.
Where in Canberra?
Clue: Think logo
Degree of difficulty: Medium
Last week:
Congratulations to Veronica O'Brien of Gowrie who was the first reader to correctly identify last week's photo as a sign on the wall at Whisk and Cocoa Café & Cake Parlour in Berridale, a popular stop for a morning coffee on the drive to the snow.
Apparently the sign comes from Perisher, and no, it wasn't pilfered, rather purchased several years ago at a clearing auction.
How to enter: Email your guess along with your name and address to timtheyowieman@bigpond.com. The first email sent after 10am, Saturday July 27, 2019 will win a double pass to Dendy - The Home of Quality Cinema.
Spotted
"I'm not sure if you are aware that Easter Islanders once visited Australia," muses Tony Brown, who, while recently exploring the NSW Snowy Mountains backcountry, spotted this rock "while returning from Seaman's Hut on the northern side of Etheridge heading towards North Ramshead lookout." What a ripper.
Mailbag
This column's recent exposé on the Canberra (Captains Flat) radar promoted a flood of weather-related correspondence, including an email from Craig Collins of Coombs, who, about 30 years ago was friends with a Bureau of Meteorology forecaster.
A keen cyclist, on stormy days Craig would occasionally call his forecasting friend, asking for advice on when to time his ride home.
"One day, at knock-off time the weather looked quite threatening so I rang my mate who checked the official forecast, the satellite image and the radar but still couldn't give me a straight answer," recalls Craig.
Eventually Craig's BOM insider gasped, "I'm not quite sure, I'll have to look outside," laughs Craig.
"I heard him scurry back to the phone and he told me I'd better leave straight away," reveals, Craig, adding, "and you guessed it, I got drenched."