Wendy was keen on a walk and she suggested a visit to Muogamarra Nature Reserve. Muogamarra Nature Reserve is only open to the public for a short time each year – six weekends during the wildflower season.
The reserve is just north of Cowan and accessed from the old Pacific Highway. When we arrived, a NPWS worker at the park entrance was stopping cars saying the main carpark at the visitor centre was full, so if we wanted to visit the park we would have to park close to the highway and walk in (2 km). We did this, and it prove to be blessing in some ways as some of the best wildflowers were close to the road and we also were able to see a large area of aboriginal engravings that we would have missed if we had driven in.
Once at the visitor centre, we each paid the $15 admission fee, and then were able to select walks to go on. Many of the walks had both guided and self guided options. For the self guided walks, we were lent laminated walk notes. We chose to walk out to Lloyd Trig and then extend that by continuing to Deerubbin Lookover.
The wildflowers were particularly impressive on the plateau close to the visitor centre.
The walk was interesting, not only for the flowers we could see, but also the history. There were convict pick marks from old road building and nearby aboriginal engravings.
We had lunch at Deerubbin Lookover, which provided fine views of the Hawkesbury River while a sea eagle flew overhead.
Back at the visitor centre, we could look at large display boards and try and work out what flowers we had observed.
On the walk back to Wendy’s car, it was very dusty – we had chosen the same time to walk out, as may of the visitors that had driven in decided to drive out.
More photos are online here on my website.