Orroral Valley Heritage Trail

Another beautiful autumn day, even better than Thursday as there was no cold wind. I even took my jumper off before we'd gone very far. We started at Orroral Homestead, which we'd noticed in the distance on previous visits to the old tracking station site.

The restored homestead dates from about the 1860's.

The kitchen was separate, only the fireplace remains.

Nearby are remnants of the 1950's homestead.

There were lots of kangaroos around.

The tracking station site didn't look very far so I suggested Hubby go move the car while I walk across. It was a pleasant flat walk, mostly short grass with just a few short raised sections over swampier areas. The views of the mountains all around are lovely.

In a blue-grey native landscape the exotic plantings around the old site stand out. They have been preserved as part of the history. Unfortunately vandalism to the buildings led to them being demolished and only foundations and explanatory plaques remain.

There was a camellia flowering.

It looked like this birch tree had been damaged, by wind perhaps, and re-grown around the breakage.

The colours of the maple were amazing, vibrant shades of red and orange, my photos don't do it justice.

As well as the beautiful deciduous trees there are conifers and cordylines.

Some parts of the building remnants are recognisable. 

A shower!

Some are intriguingly obscure.

We explored up to the end of an old maintenance road we hadn't gone up before.

The late afternoon sun lit up the eucalypt trunks beautifully.

It gets dark very quickly once the sun goes behind the mountains to the west and the wildlife make driving at dusk worrying, so we walked fairly briskly back up the old road to the car park and set off for home. We did indeed have to stop for wallabies three times on the road out (last time we had to stop for a snake on the way in, there's plenty of wildlife!) and it was almost dark by the time we reached the outskirts of the suburbs.

There's no car park as such at the homestead, just space for a couple of cars to pull off the road, and then you have to go through a locked gate and walk some distance to the homestead. The walk between the homestead and the tracking station site is flat and easy so I think next time we'll simply park at the tracking station and do a return walk.

I posted about the history of the tracking station  here.