The Shoalhaven River descends from headwaters in high granite country, wending its way through the deep wilderness sandstone gorges it has cut, before leaving the escarpment to reach its floodplain and the sea. Not far from exiting its lower gorge, the river passes through Coolendel, beneath the Bugong Plateau. Here Bugong Creek joins the main river after descending through dark rainforests. Not far upstream, the Kangaroo River and its Valley of the same name joins the Shoalhaven Gorge – one of only seven totally enclosed valleys in the world.

During the afternoon we had been loitering in the rainforest along Bugong Creek. Above one pool, was a seemingly anthropomorphic old tree, that appeared to have the torso and legs of animal, sitting, waiting, on a rock. Leaving the rainforest for the plateau, Melody and I, reached the outlook above Coolendel not long before sundown. In the rainforest I had seen…