Bournda National Park

We decided to 'rough it' for a bit on the weekend, and head to a campsite about 20kms north of Merimbula. This was a very pretty, peaceful spot - with a couple of lakes and not far from Bournda beach. We did a bit of walking and exploring, which was fine until Jed, ('leading the pack', as usual), came face to face with a HUGE goanna!! (komodo dragon size - it was amazing!). It ambled off, doing it's own thing, but it did curb Lily's sense of adventure for a bit! Unfortunately I didn't have the camera with me, so can't show you any photo evidence. Wildlife was abundant though, with lots of birds (bellbirds particularly), kangaroos and 'peeing' possums around the campsite, and some wallabies.

We tackled an afternoon bike ride, after I'd managed a 'nanna nap'. The ride in question was described, in the NP literature, as being a  3.5km easy ride into a fresh water lagoon, and adjacent to Bournda Island! Huh!! After 2.5kms of gravelly hills, as we faced yet another low gear climb we decided to get off, leave the bikes and walk the rest (except Jed, who isn't one to let something beat him - he kept riding!). We made it! However, we thought we had a difficult return journey ahead of us, as it felt like we had done much more going down, than up and it would be worse to get back to camp! Oh well... grit your teeth, one pedal after the other... and we had a GREAT ride home. Seemed to be easier and not the hard sharp climbs, and ... lots of 'free wheeling'.

We made it to Bournda Lagoon (fresh water), sea just over sand bar

We were all very proud of ourselves when we got back to camp.
So proud in fact, that we had a nice "pancake" fry up and 'gutsed' ourselves! (so much for the exercise!??). This NP enabled us to have a fire in the fire pit provided for each site, and there had been a bit of wood dumped in heaps that we could burn, so this was great! Who cares that we stunk the van out with smoke but the emotional atmosphere was one of peace and ambience! Lovely! We sat around the fire to have a glass of the red stuff and eat our grilled chicken and vegies. Jon is becoming an expert BBQ-er. Mind you, he was pretty good previously.



I know some of you reading this were avid Famous Five readers, as I was! When we made it to the lagoon on our bikes, and we glimpsed Bournda Island down the beach a bit, it greatly appealed to me to go exploring and it looked like, in actual fact this "island" joined the mainland at low tide.

And just like the Famous Five solving the mystery of the smugglers on George's private island (or was it Uncle Quentin's, or...am I barking up the wrong tree!??), i thought it would be great to investigate this island further! But, we were too exhausted at that point. So 'Mum' came up with a plan...??? (as Lily said to Jed, "you know we won't like this idea!") Anyway, we DID get up at 6.30am -7.00pm and drove to the parking area we had ridden to the day before, to take the time to walk along the beach and out to the island.
What a magnificent morning it was! Although it was a 'teensy' bit late for sunrise!There were rays of light shining through the clouds, huge waves rolling in one after the other and it was a crisp, but not cold temparature!

7.00am Bournda Beach - Magnificent!

We strolled along the beach, marvelling at God's amazing creation and climbed the headland, went along the narrow strip of  '2 way' beach between main land and "island", which was still exposed, as the tide was reasonably low, and expected to then climb over some rocks and up onto the so-called 'Island'. But it WAS an island!

Far too rough and deep to cross to the island on the LHS!

As you can see by photo, we were not able to cross it! So my desire for Famous Five adventuring remains unsated. PS. We didn't see any smugglers either.
Then it was back to the campsite for bacon, eggs and French toast before we packed up to head through the Bega Valley and head up into the Snowy Mountains - destination Jindabyne.



Having fun at campsite



"Squatters" - they didn't make it themselves!

Surf's up