Exploring the East
David had said the Naracoopa Jetty is good snorkelling but with the conditions today it's not going to happen.
I did walk out on the jetty and read a little of the history of it and was pleased to see that the King Island community has yet again stepped in and said 'we don't want part of our history demolished' (as they also did when the Currie lighthouse was decommissioned) and the jetty was preserved and restored.
I locate the public amenities which does include public toilets, which are far and few between on the island.
The intertidal zone offers lots of delights, but it's going to be difficult to explore with the ruggedness of the rocks. The plethora of life reflects what was found by Peron in 1802, and fortunately seems to have survived that way. Unlike the sea elephants, which the Sealers had managed to completely eradicate by 1805.
Sea Elephant Bay is named for these massive gentle creatures.
A beachwashed pebble attracts my attention as it looks awfully like the egg of a shorebird.
I leave Naracoopa and as I turn on to Sea Elephant Road, I'm distracted by some tiny pink flowers. It turns out they are just the flowers of the tall sundew, but pretty nevertheless.
Further down the road an area seems a likely candidate for the presence of orchids, and flashes of purple suggest to me the dwarf flag iris, about which I am correct.
Exploring just a little further, I do find a single Blue Sun Orchid. Possibly a forest sun orchid. Whoo hoo!!
At the end of the road, an access track takes me down to the beach and to the blowhole creek, which is obviously a fabulously productive breeding ground for fish, as the presence of an enormous school of tiny fingerlings demonstrates.
Some very fragile sandstone formations do not invite me to sit upon them to consume my lunch. So taking a guess as to the location of the blowhole. I follow a track.
Making my way around the small sandstone headland, I spot a few areas that promise action when the tide is high. Right now the tide is low so I can only speculate.
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| Possible part of the blowhole action |
I found a spot to perch and eat some of my lunch, and then walked a short distance along the beach. There's not a lot of variety in the shells washed up, but I do find a couple of slipper limpets, possibly Sigapatella calyptraeformis.
I can smell bushfire smoke and check the Tassie alert app. I'm speculating that I can smell what is drifting on a southerly breeze from the north west coast of Tassie. I hope it's no closer.
I continue on to Sea Elephant River and another stop on the roadside has me quietly searching for orchids. I'm rewarded with a single tiny bud of a Sun Orchid, but across the other side of the road, more buds, more advanced buds, and one in full flower tells me they are probably all the Twisted Sun Orchid. Very nice.
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| Thelymitra flexuosa, twisted sun orchid |
There's also leaves of something else, but I hesitate to speculate what they may be. The leaves are nearly finished and there is no sign of flowers.
I spot a raptor while I'm driving, and while I know it's not an eagle, I'm not sure what it might be. Maybe one of the kestrels.
A nice picnic platform at Elephant River has interpretive signs. This area is part of the extensive Ramsar wetland site and there are of course signs warning about risks of human activity to shorebirds, endangered plants and assorted others. One hopes some take notice, but I've seen evidence that not all do!
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| Sea Elephant River |
I take the short walk along to the lookout and enjoy the warmth of the sun for a while. I look vaguely at the birds, but my ability to distinguish one from another stops at swans and pelicans.
Another quick stop and orchid search on the way back yielded only some rather sad red beak leaves
I thought I might try to explore somewhere labelled Sea Elephant Park on the map, despite the fact that a Google search revealed no information about such a place. The shortcut road to it was a mere 3 km of what look like very straight, fairly firm road, but it suddenly presented me with a small lake and I decided discretion was probably the better part of valour and the longer way home might be a better option.
I have a better look at that area later in the day, using satellite view on my laptop, and it does show the little lake on the road.
I contemplate diverting to snorkel at Quarantine Bay, but the tide will be rising and it will take an extra half hour driving to get there, so I opt for returning to my accommodation.
Pre-sunset is once again pretty, but the sun does not set on the horizon but yet again dips into a cloud bank
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