Great Southern Land.
Icehouse.
You walk alone.
Why am I sleeping on the kitchen floor?
5am and it’s dark. An early start to a long day. A restless sleep on the kitchen floor of my elder son’s apartment in Coburg. My younger son sleeps nearby in the lounge room next to the fish bowl.
Breakfasted, packed and on the road by 7am. A three hour drive to Wilsons Promontory on Victoria’s southern coast, listening to audiobooks and podcasts.
Check in at the visitors’ centre at Tidal River and a short drive to Telegraph Saddle where my walk begins. My target: Sealers Cove.
Sealers Cove – the long way
The direct route to Sealers Cove is closed due to storm damage, so I need to walk 26kms via Waterloo Bay. It’s all on track.
The first 6.1 km is on a fire trail and all down hill (you pay the price on exit). Then a 4.7 km bush track to Waterloo Bay, where you first get to walk on the coast. White sand, blue water, clear skies.
I follow the coast north for the rest of the day, past Refuge Cove and around Kersop Peak.
Local dinner guest
At first I think I am alone at Sealers Cove. The long walk put people off, and they stopped at Little Waterloo Bay or Refuge Cove. Later, one other hiker arrives.
I have a local dinner guest. A resident possum, rotund, cock-sure and in no particular hurry. I first notice his presence after returning from the toilets, finding my empty cup knocked over. He (or is it she?) stares at me nonchalantly from a distance of a few metres, and is not perturbed when I shoo it away. Eventually it makes a meal of a large mushroom growing nearby. I stow my food bag in my tent for the evening.
