Sunday 11 August 2013

Wonderful Weekends {Part Two}

Again with the amazing weather! We decided to make the most of it and do some exploring.

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Ever since we’ve moved here, we’ve heard of this place called ‘Utopia’. Young people like to visit it after church, and it’s apparently one of the nicest places in the area. So after nearly three years of living here, we decided it was about time we found it.

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My two sisters and brother-in-law joined us for the adventure, and we set off. ‘Utopia’ is actually officially part of the Mount Walsh National Park, and it’s nickname comes from the road you travel down to find it. It’s about an hour’s drive from here, on nice, quiet country roads.

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It was certainly worth the drive, and we had a fabulous day in the perfect weather.

Utopia is home to a number of rock-pools and small waterfalls (they may usually be bigger, I don’t know – we haven’t had a lot of rain lately!). It’s about a 1.5km bushwalk up to the rock. The walk is reasonably mild, though steep and rocky in some places. Mayana was was able to walk the majority of the track herself. At the end of the walk you are rewarded with this gorgeousness:

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We chose a nice flat section of rock in the sun to have our picnic, then spent some time exploring around the area, and enjoying the beautiful surroundings.

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The water was crystal clear, and when you looked into it you could see right to the bottom. It was quite freezing though, and my brother-in-law was the only one brave enough (and appropriately attired) to actually go for a swim. We are all looking forward to heading back when the weather warms up and having a dip!

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There was one other group of young people up there, and they were giving us heart-palpitations with their crazy behaviour! Poor Alexie (nurse-in-training) was trying to work out how on earth we would be able to safely get them out of there if someone broke their neck!

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Both the kids really loved it, though I was probably quite over-bearing of them. It made me nervous letting them walk around the rocks with such tall drops down into the water, and I wouldn’t let them within at least 5m of the edge! I reminded myself of my mother when we were stopped at the Great Australian Bight on our trek across the Nullarbor!

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My brother-in-law carried Reuben in a baby carrier for both legs of the bushwalk, and he was so zonked on the way back that he fell asleep after about 200m of walking!

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Mayana walked the whole way back by herself, and was pooped by the time we got back to the car!

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We had such a lovely day, and definitely will be back to Utopia sooner rather than later! It’s made me want to do some more exploring and see what other hidden wonders we can find in little corner of the world!

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