Royal National Park Art Walk – 16 June 2022

Bob and myself decided on a trip to Royal National Park to see if we could find some Aboriginal Art sites.  On the day we visited five separate sites and found some amazing art. All the art we saw were rock engravings.

As well as engravings, we also saw a lot of sharpening grooves. 

Site 1

This site featured sharpening gives and engravings – mainly of male human figures.

The male figures above appear to have been re-grooved. Below are some very faint male figures.

Here Bob is looking at some lines radiating from a circular depression. I think it is probably on natural origin.

Site 2

This was close to the first site. It featured sharpening grooves and engravings.

Here is a human figure –

And below are fish engravings –

Site 3

This site featured three very large engravings of whales. They are so big that they are difficult to photograph clearly so you can see the full outline.

Whale 1-

Whale 2 –

Whale 3 was a bit further away –

And nearby are two engravings of fish –

Not too far away, was an engraving of a human male figure wearing a three pronged head-dress.  Bob cleared away a lot of sand to reveal the full engraving.

To get to the next site, we had walk along a section of the Coastal Track. As we set out, a he flock (200 +) Yellow-tailed Black Cockatoos flew past squeaking loudly.

And we saw some whales and  birds –

This was not the engraving site we were looking for!

We found a nice place on the clifftop t have lunch and watched the wales passing.

Site 4

This is small site, but it features at least five engravings. One male figure and some animals.

Site 5

This was close to site 4 and contains any engravings spears out over a large area. We spent a fair bit of time here looking for the quite faint engravings.

Below is a large fish –

Here is a “bisexual figure” – it has a penis and breasts.

Some outlines, perhaps fish –

Not very easy to see, but there is a large whale engraving –

And nearby are some small animals –

And another large whale and more small animals –

This could be a stingray –

There is also some great eroded sandstone – Natures own art –

Here are more engravings –

And more eroded sandstone –

Below is an engravings of a “butterfly” the figure –

An perhaps an feel –

And to finish, more whales, sandstone and birds –

Whipbird

Little Wattlebird

New Holland Honeyeater

Beautiful Firetails

New Holland Honeyeater about to grab an insect –

This was a great day out seeing some very special art sites. Thanks to Bob for his careful research in trying to work out locations from old published reports.