GSCW Day 23 Pinnacles Beach to Eden to Boyds Tower

Thursday 17 October 2019

Walked today: Over 25km

This is a long day. It starts slowly as I dry out my gear in the morning, watched by a curious wallaby, then a walk up dirt roads towards Eden. I meet two surfers coming down to the beach and they say its their favourite spot. Its apparently called Terrace Beach, not Pinnacles Beach, and they say it’s because the offshore rock shelfs “tear the arse” out of surfboards. The track enters residential development on the outskirts of Eden and I have to divert to get around new houses and construction fences to get onto the boardwalk around the lake near Eden. I shop in Coles, eat at a friendly cafe called Ollie Masons where the proprietor lets me charge up my phone and battery, and at the chemists I get a tick treatment called “Tick Tox” that I saw advertised at Pambula Beach. Its a spray that you direct onto the tick, using a mask with a small hole in it to stop it going too far on your skin. Its apparently a similar product to wart remover. I’ve had two ticks so far on this walk. One was dug out of my head by a real estate agent (!) at Bendalong, and I dug the other one out of my leg at Tuross. I’ll probably get more. This product is the latest treatment method because it kills the tick instantly before it can regurgitate blood into your bloodstream when you disturb it. It will kill leaches as well. I can hardly wait to try it.

I strike trouble leaving Eden because Cattle Bay is enclosed by construction fencing. I finally find a way through, but the coast walk around to Quarantine Bay is very difficult because of a large rock fall. There are some heavy showers going through. At Quarantine Bay I decide to walk the road instead of the coast to make up time. I’ve got another water crossing coming up at the Kiah Inlet and I want to get there at low tide, which is 5:30pm this evening. There are several suggested ways to get across Kiah Inlet, and I decide to follow a track that is marked as a dotted line on my map about 600m inland, rather than swim at the outlet. This track turns out to cross farmland but there are no stock or people around. I pack my gear into the dry bag at the edge of the inlet and start the crossing. Its difficult because I can’t see too far ahead and the depth of water is hard to see, but it turns out to be thigh deep. Its still running out strongly, even though its low tide time. I’m glad to get across after walking a minor channel and then the main channel, which is about 100m wide. I then cross a long mangrove flat that has car tracks on it. It’s a place that seems unable to decide whether it wants to be land or sea. Now the track gets difficult and its getting late. There is a property called Edrom Lodge that I decide to cross to get to the main road but there are “no trespassing” signs. I try to cross as discretely as I can. Its a choice between camping on their land or getting off it as quickly as I can, so I take the risk. I get to Boyd Tower Road which goes 1km down to the start of the “Light to Light” walk. I can’t see anywhere to camp along the road so keep going in the dark and start the L2L walk. After about another 1km I see a flat spot in the casuarinas, well off the track, and set up in the dark after 8pm.