Advertisement
Published: September 14th 2006
Edit Blog Post
Chamber's Gully
The quarried rock faces are beginning to regenerate. To view as a slide show, select Full image and then use Next> to scroll through. Introduction
This walk had been recommended to the hikers by Ania, so when we got our new
Push the Bush walking book by the Friends of the Heysen trail, we were finally able to locate a map of the area (Map 8) and make our own shorter walk.
This walk takes in some of the Cleland Conservation park - you can find out more about this park at the
Cleland's web site or on
Wikipedia.
Chamber's gully was originally the home of the Kaurna people. European settlement occurred in the 19th century where it was mostly used for market gardens. To fuel the growing building market it became ‘Dunstan’s quarry’ and provided bluestone for the houses of Adelaide. It then fell into the ownership of the city of Burnside and was used as a waste depot and composting site for many years, resulting in a lot of weeds being established with subsequent loss of the native bushlands. Remediation and regeneration of the site occurred and the gully was opened in 1997 for recreational purposes.
How to get there …
From the GPO, take Greenhill Rd into the hills, turn right at the Glynburn Road round-about and follow the signs to Waterfall Gully (a left hand turn on to Waterfall Gully Road).
Entrance
Located just off of Waterfall Gully road approximately 1.6 km on the right. After driving 1.6 km along Waterfall Gully Road, start looking for the Chamber's Gully turnoff on the right. Park your car near the no through road sign. I have included a route map - the Travelblog people are to be congratuated - the improvements in the route mapper software make the job of creating these maps so much easier.
What happened ...
We had a lovely sunny Sunday for this walk. The trail was wide and easy to follow and would suit families. Although there were several off shoots, we just stayed following those tracks adjacent to the creek, ending up on the Bartril Spur. It was a steady, but not tiring, climb along a gentle incline, making for very pleasant walking. When we had done about 2 hours, we turned around and came back, returning to the car in about an hour.
There were interesting rock formations in the gully with evidence of building and quarrying. There were many tall orange and lemon flowers in the grassland, but none of the native trees and bushes that we are used to seeing. Apparently they have been choked out of the gully by ther feral species that predominate
Fields of flowers
Tall orange, and some yellow, flowers coming through the grass. as a result of the gully being used as a compost site.
The bush was rather noisy - frogs in the creek, koalas bellowing,
sulphur-crested cockatoos screeching and
kookaburras laughing. We saw 5
koalas of various sizes high in the trees.
There was a real danger on this walk that I must warn you about - cyclists. The mountain bike riders use this track (even though it as signed as bikes not allowed) and they go so fast and quietly along the trails - I am amazed there are not more accidents. We took great care to walk on the edge of the path and in single file so if one did approach rapidly they might have a chance of avoiding us.
Dan says ...
Hello readers
Well it didn't take us long to get to this walk it was only a short way from the city. The walk was easy and had many pretty flowers - are they orchids? There were lots of nasturtiums with yellow and orange flowers. Mum said that you can eat the leaves and the petals of these in salads.
The gully edges had strange rock formations as some had been dug out for building.
We saw heaps of bikes that flew like lightening down the hill but went up very very slowly. The riders had good manouvering devices and manged to dodge us really well.
Every now and then there was a loud bellow on this walk - male koalas calling out from the tree tops - I was so glad that they were not drop bears as we really could have got hurt.
A joke for this week ...
Q: Why did the cat sit on the computer?
A: It wanted to keep an eye on the mouse.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.104s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 13; qc: 34; dbt: 0.0564s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Regan
non-member comment
Hi guys
Hi Dan, Diana and Peter, How are you? Just thought I'd write and say thanks for the Blog update! I'm always interested to see what adventures you've had on the weekend. You are like the Leyland brothers: you could end up anywhere! Hey Dan, do you know where Melbourne is on the map? That's where I am. YOu can come and visit anytime :-) Dan - I can't believe how big you are getting! Are you sure you're not a Pokemon? You've transformed from a little guy into a big man rather too quickly to be a human! Have you found out what your special powers are yet? My guess is that you have the power to turn a full fridge into an empty fridge at the speed of light! I'll be back from the 22nd to the 30th of September, so I'll buy some wine (diet coke for you, Dan) and we will have a steak-and-ceasar-fest OK?! Cheers, Regan.