Exercise parks of Lockdown 2 - No.77: Campbell Park

Campbell Park, West Pennant Hills, home of the Cherrybrook and West Pennant Hills Lions Football Club. Or that's what it said on the sign anyway.

Today it was the home of a few exercisers, a rather stressed-looking meditator, and the usual quota of naughty inactive bench-sitters. A pretty standard sort of suburban park, but still a nice place to be on a day like today.

Ku-ring-gai Chase NP's undiscovered bits #2: Chase Trail and Banksy Tunnel

Another track near the Mt Colah entrance to the national park is the Chase Trail. Some way along the Chase Trail, there's a smaller, but seemingly well trafficked tributary track, pictured left. I checked it out, and after a while found my way to the Banksy M1 Motorway tunnel.

This tunnel is for the creek I call Golf Course Creek. It joins Cockle Creek just down the hill a bit.

A couple of years ago I walked an excellent circuit walk, which incorporated both this tunnel and the Cockle Creek one. See: 2019 two-tunnel circuit

Ku-ring-gai Chase NP's undiscovered bits #1: Deadmans & Myall Trails

 

Above: Deadmans

Left: Myall

They're both quite short and not especially noteworthy, but made for a very pleasant Covid lockdown stroll location yesterday. And what a great time of the year to be out there! They're near the Mt Colah entrance booth on Ku-ring-gai Chase Rd.

Lockdown parks of Castle Hill

I checked out a string of pleasant little reserves today. We started in Pioneer Place Reserve, then down past First Farm Reserve, through James Greenwood Reserve, to Spain Reserve. We followed the upper reaches of Castle Hill Creek.

 

 

 

 

 

It's all very leafy green scenic, and all new to me, yet again! We were close to Castle Hill's more famous Heritage Park, site of that historic 1804 convict rebellion. See: Heritage Park visit April 2020  I'll revisit that one soon, I suspect.

Suddenly the parks (and the streets) were much quieter than they have been. With the epidemic escalation and the significant tightening of the lockdown restrictions, the Castle Hillians must be seriously staying at home. It's probably helped by massive confusion about all the rule changes. I suspect a lot of people have no idea what they can and can't do, and don't want to risk a $5000 fine.

Crosslands Reserve - luxury lockdown location likely to lose legality

It's always a nice spot, but today it excelled itself. The car park was full as ever, but the lockdown exercisers must have been largely out exercising genuinely along the Great North Walk, rather than participating in enormous picnics and barbecues, like you usually see here on weekends. So the wide open spaces were indeed wide open, and it was yet another beautiful sunny day.

The Covid outbreak broke through to new records today, and the rules got changed once again. As from 5pm the whole state is finally locked down. 

What the new exercise/travel excuse rules mean for Crosslands type expeditions here in Greater Sydney is still a bit unclear to me. In the northern suburbs you used to be able to travel up to 10km for your exercise excuse, but this has become 5km. Except that, on most interpretations, you could go a lot further if you stayed in your local government area (if it happened to be a big one that is, like Hornsby!)  I'm yet to work out if the local LGA loophole still applies. Premier Gladys and her cronies rarely say anything clear and definitive during their public appearances.*  Except that there are $5000 fines involved! And the relevant section of the NSW Health website seems to be snowed under, so I can't seem to clarify the point.

* Actually they also say very clearly that they are in no way to blame for the emergency. It's the people who do the wrong thing, it's the virus that got virulent, it's the health advice they followed, it's the vaccines that didn't come, etc etc. Definitely nothing to do with a government that waited 10 days too long to do anything much, and then did far too little for several weeks. If you take your health advice from business 'leaders', you'll be led to a very bad place, in every respect, business included.

Lindfield's secret village greens

 

 

 

Well hidden away in a south-western pocket of Lindfield is St Crispins Green. You need to study your Google Maps pretty carefully to find this one. Nobody else seemed to have just yet.

But the jewel in Lindfield's crown could be the nearby Jinkers Green. Some locals have discovered this one, but I suspect they're all sworn to secrecy when they move into the area.

Lindfield's right royal Queen Elizabeth Reserve

 

 

 

A slight disappointment this one, despite its grandiose name. There are tennis courts and a playground, and a nice shady treed area. But the main grassy rectangle turned out to be pretty much just another dog park.