Covid countdown - Dog Pound Creek

There's a nice quick short-cut track between Hornsby and Westleigh, along Dog Pound Creek. I'd hardly ever seen anyone else there before. But today there were plenty of other walkers and cyclists. Such is the stay-at-home lockdown we're living under!

You start at the end of Valley Road, Hornsby, and you re-emerge in Warrigal Drive, near the Westleigh fire station.

The steps are a bit bumpy for cyclists, but the bit in the middle is smooth and pleasant!

Covid countdown - Western Sydney Parklands

Today's legal exercise was a bike ride through the Western Sydney Parklands. I'd walked the northernmost bit a few weeks back, and was hoping to get through to the southern end and back.








Not quite so easy. Nurragingy Reserve is still closed, so I got onto the (now extremely well patronised) M7 cycleway. I stuck pretty well with that afterwards, finding that the options for parkland traversing were more limited than I'd realised.



Here's a nice little diversion, on Border Rd, Cecil Hills.

The cycleway occupies one of the many bridges forming the tangled M4/M7 interchange.

Covid countdown - some South Turramurra parks

Today's legal exercise walk was around that very pleasant little area towards the southern end of South Turramurra's Kissing Point Road. There's the Auluba Oval and the Kissing Point Village Green. Plus there's a nice patch of woodland between the two.

I've always thought that South Turramurra has a rather special feel to it. A gold medal contender in the suburban feng shui stakes.

Covid countdown - Castle Hill Heritage Park

Ten years since my last visit, and it's come along nicely.

It's on the site of what was once the Third Government Farm, and it's where the second Battle of Vinegar Hill took place. This was the convict rebellion in 1804. The convicts were Irish political prisoners. It didn't end well of course. More here:
Wikipedia article

Covid countdown - the Platypus and Bandicoot Tracks

Today's exploration-cum-legal exercise session was in the Bidjigal Reserve bushland in the Baulkham Hills and West Pennant Hills area.

In particular, I surveyed the Platypus Track and the Burraga (bandicoot) Track. Both totally unknown to me  before today.




My movements were largely centred around Excelsior Creek, but there's a big and somewhat confusing network of tracks, and at one stage I was wandering upstream along Darling Mills Creek, which I've explored many times before, but failed to recognise for a while.

It was a terrific morning's exploration.

Covid countdown - benchmarking the lockdown

We keep hearing stories of the police imposing huge fines on people sitting quietly on park benches, or horror of horrors, eating kebabs on them.

Meanwhile one leading infectious diseases expert said he doesn't see why sitting on park benches does anything to spread the disease.








The good citizens of Wahroonga were making it clear today what they thought of this particular 'social distancing' rule.

Covid countdown - Wahroonga Park

This one's small but it's almost perfect. Its one drawback is that it's usually very hard to park right next to it. Not today though.