Gandy's Gully

Introduction

This is walk number 15 in George Driscoll's book "50 real bushwalks around Adelaide" which he calls "Neville's favourite". It is also a favourite of Sue (a friend from my work). George's Neville is Neville Southgate who was instrumental in getting the Heysen trail started.

This walk is through Gandy's Gully, which is within the Horsnell Gully Conservation Park. You need boots with good grips for this walk as there is a steep down hill section with loose rocks on the path. We have been here when Dan was 6 or 7 - but I wouldn't probably bring kids any younger than this age along.

To get there from the city, head South and turn left on Greenhill Road. Drive up until you get near to Mt Lofty summit. At the Summit road intersection continue left and a short while down there is a turn off left to the gravel Ridge Road. About a km down and past a few driveways there is a small road on the left called Coach Road. This is a narrow road but you can turn at the end. George recommends parking at the start of Coach Road and walking into the park for a km as this road forms part of the Heysen trail.

Now we are in December (officially summer in Adelaide) the weather is warming up - 26 degrees and a bit windy. We hope to get an early start so that we miss the heat of the day. It turned out to be quite hazy - so the views were not as good as usual.

What happened ...

We arrived about 10 am, driving all the way down Coach Road to the entrance of the park and parking in the turning area.

We carried our picnic lunch on our backs (but brought it all back again as we were out before 12). The trail is all down for the first 30 minutes (and we all know what that means..) with views of the city and the nearby quarry. High tension power lines indicate it's time to descend into the Gully and the 19A pylon (see photograph) is where the 'secret' path down can be found. This is the rocky path I mentioned above - take it very slowly and sit if you feel like slipping - it is better than falling forward! It is lovely however as the bird song escalates and the bush builds and surrounds you. Surprisingly there was no water flowing in the gully. We took George's advice and took a fruit break on the old log at the floor of the gully. This would have been nice for lunch (which would have also lightened my back pack load for the walk up hill that followed!).

Then it is the uphill section as you head back along the gully and up to the top again - but a nicer uphill is hard to find. It is a small winding path through an interesting bush within the protected gully with lots of birds. I personally did not see many birds - the bush was quite dense - but you could hear cockatoos, kookaburras, wattle birds and rosellas. We saw skinks and geckos here - but I am sure if we had stopped and looked there would have been much more - but Peter was determined to go at pace to build fitness: "you might as well be home watching TV at the pace you guys walk".

At the top there was a large pile of rocks (a cairn) which indicates that the strenuous part is almost over and in less than 10 minutes we were back at the car.

Dan says ...

Gandy's gully smelt wonderful as it was just after the wet season. All the plants were bright and strong and the natural creatures were coming out to live even though the creek was dry.

I saw the quarry but there were no people operating in it (sometimes quarries are filled with quartz).

We tried to walk at a slow steady pace but Dad made me rush through, telling me that I was a slow snail.

We had lunch out of the gully. I was eating my sandwich and as I had my third bite I saw a large caterpillar walking along with its lots of legs. Mum thought it was trying to find something green to eat but I thought it was looking for a place to make a chrysalis (it was very big and fat). When we touched it it crunched up into a ball and then a few seconds later it peeked out and started walking again.

This week’s joke

Knock Knock
Who is there?
Impatient cow
Impatient cow

Turn off
Tricky part. Go under the large high tension power lines and then at the next pole (marked as 19A) turn left and head down the small rocky path into the gully.

who?
MOOOOOO!!!!

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