Hornsby Blue Gum Walk

As suggested by the name, this walk is one of the few in Sydney where you can still see the Sydney blue gum outside of plantations. These trees were big. Sydney blue gum has smooth, faintly bluish silver bark, and is a rich dark red when you cut it down for noble purposes like flooring. I have used some recycled Sydney blue gum in the past to create furniture, and do not recommend it unless you have machines to do the grunt work and don't mind blades becoming dull. It is very heavy and very hard.

There was more wildlife than usual. Immediately after leaving the road we heard laughing kookaburras, complaining cockatoos, and my favourite, the electric eastern whipbird. We also saw a red-bellied black snake, a juvenile Australian brush-turkey, and an athletic eastern bearded dragon (possibly? not good with reptiles), which entertained us by jumping around; we did not know they could do this. Photos of the latter two:

There were a few good things about this walk besides the wildlife. A friendly stream wound along it and there were a few time-gnawed sandstone overhangs. There was some variety of flora: apart from the big blue gums there were areas covered in jurrasic style ferns, and other things, we are not botanists, suffice to say Chris said it was like walking through a few different biomes in Minecraft. It was a good workout for someone of low to medium fitness.

The circuit is around 4 to 5km if you have a car, but if travelling by train it's a 7km loop from the station. There are many stone stairs leading down at the beginning, which you will regret on the way back if you are unfit. The track is well marked with little white plaques on the usual greenish wooden signposts (you can see this in the photo below beside the word 'fishponds' and 'Hornsby station'. The confusing thing is that the signs also constantly point to a rifle range in the same direction as the walk, and you're never quite sure when the walk ends and the shooting begins until it's too late?

Here is the guide to this walk on Wildwalks.

Finally, how quaint is this Hornsby council crest? It has everything. Agriculture, pulleys, pigeon, many stars of David, Indigenous person with spear jumping over river, waratahs, bottle brush, boomerang. Who even made this