Wilderness

We left Nature’s Valley and headed for Wilderness, giving Tim (who we’d met the day before) a lift. He had to be at work at a hostel there that afternoon.

We dropped him off, headed to the launderette to put our clothes on for a wash, and then went to Fairy Knowle Backpackers where we were camping for the night. 

We’d planned to do the Kingfisher trail that afternoon, chatting with the person on reception we discovered there was the option to kayak up the river for about an hour, then walk for 30 minutes. This sounded much more interesting, so we opted for that.

The padding was fairly easy going, despite the sea kayak being less streamlined than the other river kayaks around. At the point the river got too shallow we pulled up onto the beach and continued on foot.

The wooden boardwalk ran, most of the way, to the top waterfalls. We stopped briefly here, before heading back. We had to make sure we made it back to the launderette on time to collect our clothes. 

The next day we went to the beach in the morning. Stopping at a café for some breakfast before setting off along the abandoned railway tracks to find Kaaikans Grotto.

As best we understood this cave had been converted into a hostel for the homeless. It was a little eccentric, to say the least, with a maze of rooms and corridors all decorated with bits and pieces of reclaimed odds & ends. A bit of an odd place, hard to do it justice with words.