It's a Beautiful Day; Don't Let It Get Away

I woke up at 7am to catch a bus into Sydney where I met friends and got on the train to a town called Cronulla.  Here we took a ferry to Bundeena, the home of Royal National Park (also called Bundeena National Park) and started our day.

Mangrove trees: The tips of the roots (under water in this picture)
stick straight up above the sand so that when the tide goes down,
they are exposed to oxygen.  The roots regulate the water
and oxygen intake so that there is never too much or not enough.      

We rented a few ocean kayaks and spent some time in "The Basin" which is a wide saltwater river edged by tall cliffs and jungle, and filled with mangroves and other exotic trees and plants.  Apparently we came at the perfect time because the area is only accessible at very high tides.  The water was perfectly clear and, unlike rivers in the US, the bottom was white sand and no more than two feet deep at any point.  We found a cliff that had a rope swing out to pretty deep water, but we couldn't figure out to get to it and it seemed like the place where you would most likely land was right on top of a rock...so we skipped that idea, but took some pictures instead.  The landscape was more like what I would have expected from New Zealand, not Australia, but I'm definitely not complaining.  On our way out of the river we spent some time kayak surfing out in the bay and then did some swimming before heading back to town for the rest of our adventure.

Our first view of the sandstone cliffs at the start of the Coast Track.
Without a cloud in the sky, we hiked from this point to the beach
which is just past the furthest visible outcropping.

After grabbing a quick lunch and a map, we walked to the trail head of the Coast Track, the "must-do" of Royal National Park.  This bushwalk is typically done in two days and is 27.3km.  Since we only had the day and had to be back to catch a 7pm ferry back to the train station, we only did the first 6km out and back.  Along the way were the most spectacular sandstone cliffs, including one section that was a pure white stone that was so smooth from the wind it looked like sand on a beach.  The Coast Track, as the name would imply, follows the coast along these cliffs and sometimes cuts inland for some much needed shade.  Every view of the unbelievable water colors and rocks was breathtaking.  We didn't know much about the hike when we started it, except it's length, so when the trail first opened up to the cliffs along the coast and all of us saw it at the same time, I can honestly say that it took our breath away.

Huge waves!!

At the end of 6km was Big Marley beach, which turned out to be our private beach for the hour we got to be there.  From the beach there is nothing to be seen but open water, cliffs, and the forest of the National Park behind you...  The waves there were the biggest waves I have ever seen in my life...some of them were easily 7 or 8 feet.  Since the surf was so rough and the current was so strong, the waves would hit the shore and then get pulled back out and make another wave breaking backwards.  Getting caught in between two waves coming from opposite directions is not fun, by the way...


The return trip, which was just a backtrack of where we had come from earlier, was just as beautiful.  I know the word is definitely overused, but this scenery was awesome, in the most powerful sense of the word.

This was one of the most exciting days I have had here so far, but two hours of kayaking and about 15km in total of hiking/walking has completely wiped me out.