Currawong Bush Park

Roads do a lot of damage to creeks. Here is the Mullum Mullum Creek as it goes under Warrandyte Road. Obviously the council does not want to risk losing the bridge when there is a big volume of water.

Before I can follow the creek back to my car parked at the Currawong Bush Park, I have to find a way around the Crystal Brook Caravan Park that occupies the east bank. They are rather risk averse at this tourist destination.

From the entry road you can see the almost complete loop the creek makes as it twists and turns, leaving the hills and heading into its open plains section in Templestowe.

But I am going upstream, back into the hills and this means climbing some steps.

And then some more steps until I am high above the creek.

The view is across to the hills of East Doncaster. The blackberries are on part of the land occupied by the tourist park. There were wrens darting in and out and a Crimson Rosella feasting too.

After all that going up, there is the coming down. The track is on the power line easement, quite a nice walk if you don’t look up. The steps are a little slippery, another reason to keep your eyes on the ground.

Finally back at the creek there is a sign for walkers coming in the other direction to make sure they don’t stray where they are not welcome.

Currawong Bush Park is a 59 hectare council owned park that stretches from here all the way to Reynolds Road. Much of this top section is the bank of the creek and the power line easement. After following the path for a while there was a sign giving me three options.

Ruby’s Track sounded promising, but I took the diversion to the left first. This lead to the Billy Baxter Wetlands. Part way there this roo bounded across in front of me and made me jump too.

The series of ponds filter runoff from nearby properties before it enters the creek. They were alive with calling frogs and a couple of ducks. A very peaceful spot.

Back on the track which roughly followed the course of the creek I soon spotted the reason for my interrupted walk earlier in the day.

A huge manna gum lies fallen along the Mullum Mullum Trail. I am not sorry however that I couldn’t walk that section. This route is far more to my liking.

Although late in the afternoon there was still time to explore the bush park, so I turned onto the fire track circuit and before very long found myself in the middle of a large mob of grazing Eastern Grey Kangaroos.

At first I didn’t see them at all. They blend perfectly in with the shadows, trees and fallen timber. As I moved along the path they ignored me, but if I stopped up they looked up to stare back. Then there were some on the other side too, that had me a little worried. But they bounced up the hill.

Most of the females had joeys in the pouch, one joey, nearly as big as its mother was suckling. You can see what happened next in this video .

The park is well worth a visit. The before its time modernist former home of Robin and Bunty Elder now a conference centre. There are picnic areas, sculptures and many interpretive signs for schoolchildren and associated audio guides. The bushland had become very degraded and now is more park than bush in this main section.

Currawong Bush Park sits on land of significance to the Wurundjeri Willam people. There are a few scar trees and a stone artefact find near the creek. The scar tree near the highest point has fallen, although a sign shows its location. I got distracted watching a pair of galahs working at a nesting hollow and did not take a photo of its location. This one is from Film Victoria.