I had never walked to Spion Kop, a hill overlooking Brisbane Water near Woy Woy. The name seemed unusual for an Australian location, and there are indeed other Spion Kops around, including one near Waterfall in Heathcote National Park. I think the original name comes from a “kop” – the dutch word for hill, so it is likely that this features were named about the time of the Boer War. Doug knows the area well and had visited it and assured Bob and myself that is well worth visiting, and is accessible by a track. Bob worked out a route from Kariong that took us past some Aboriginal engraving sites.
The first Aboriginal engraving site was close to the fire road we followed from Kariong. It was a clearly marked kangaroo –
We then let the fire road, and headed to a rock outcrop.
We reached the rock outcrop and soon found the art. There were many engravings.
Fish –
Human figure –
Fish –
Eel –
Human figure –
Kangaroo –
Human figure –
The same figure from a different angle –
We were lucky that a lot of the outcrop was wet and this meant it was a lot easier to discern the engravings. Particularly when viewed at a certain angle.
Here is the outcrop –
View of Brisbane Water –
The next site, had more engravings. Here is a turtle –
And a fish, with mundoes inside –
Nearby was an engraving that is very hard to discern from the photo, but was of a copulating couple –
We then visited Lyre Trig.
We found a few more engravings –
From the trig, we followed attack down to the Kariong Glyphs –
These consist of hieroglyphs carved onto a cliff. They are made using the correct pictographs but don’t have any sensible meaning and they span pictographs used over serval dynasties. And Ancient Egyptians were not known for using iron tools. So more likely made by a returned WWI serviceman.
We then followed the fire road towards the Koolewong Fire Trail. Here we can get a view towards Barrenjoey –
We left the fire road and descended on a track to Waterfall Creek.
There is nice walking along the creekbed here.
We could not find the engravings that Doug had seen in the creekbed on a previous walk, but we did spot these sharpening grooves –
Near a waterfall, we climbed out of the creekbed up a track that led towards Spion Kop.
The track was generally easy to follow.
And Spion Kop featured great views of Brisbane Water.
Here we can see part of Woy Woy and the Rip Bridge –
Looking south to Barrenjoey and Lion Island –
There is also a nice rock formation –
And some chiselled graffiti from 1898 and 1905 –
We had lunch at the lookout.
Walking back I spotted this nice Ramaria sp. –
Back at Waterfall Creek, we examined the creekbed carefully for the engravings Doug had seen on his previous walk, and we eventually spotted them.
A human figure –
And another engraving –
Another view of the human figure –
And further down the waterfall –
We then followed rough track up to the Koolewong Ridge –
We next followed an umarked track that led us down to Koolewong to the back gate of the residence of Doug’s sister ad brother in law. After enjoying their hospitality, we gratefully accepted a lift back to the car at Kariong.