South of Sydney

The botanists were off on a full day field trip to some natural areas south of Sydney, and the boys and I went with them.  We stopped throughout the day, and the main areas we saw were rainforest.  Above are two photos from my walk on "The Fly," a spectacular walkway in the canopy in Illawarra natural area.  When I got out onto the catilevered terminal end, JR was bouncing up and down.  He swears he was encouraged to do this by one of the graduate students from Russia.  I am not sure who to believe...

From the rainforest part of the trip, my absolute favorite was seeing tree ferns.  We don't have them in the "new world," and Australia is my first old world rainforest, so I was quietly excited. They are ferns, so they look like ferns, except that they stand as tall as small trees.  The are old, as a group--- older than any seed plants.  There are lots of ways to define success, but the photo above shows one way.

We went to Minnamurra rainforest next, which has both subtropical and temperate rainforest.  The area has been saved from too many human footsteps with an extensive boardwalk.  We had an excellent botanist/ecologist show the group around.  This area was carved out by a rivulet which added to the diversity.

In the latter part of the afternoon we drove to Royal National Park, stopping at a scenic overlook for a photo along the way.  Here are a pair of photos from what looked to me like the edge of the world.

 Boys on the Brink

Botanists on the Brink

We arrived at our last stop in Royal National Park very close to sundown.  Royal National Park is the oldest national park in the world, ahead of Yellowstone in the USA.  We were out of the rainforest and into a desert-like habitat, with sand underfoot, not because of the current coast, but because of an ancient coast that became sandstone under pressure, has now had uplift and erosion turning it back into sand particles.  We saw the biggest diversity of plants in flower.  Before I had even set foot from the van, though, John Roy, who had alighted first, was on his way back to me with a Banksia pod in his hand.  In our family we know this plant and its pod because my father, who is a wood turner, makes vases from them.  Banksia is highly dependent on fire, at a high temperature, to reproduce, and the seeds also seem to require a drenching rain after the fire.

Banksia under a sliver of the moon at sunset

We have been accepted into the clan now, and have another trip tomorrow, to the Blue Mountains. We leave at dawn....

Alan has read four books so far on this trip Down Under, and I am hoping that the fifth book lasts until we are home!