I went for a walk with my wife today. From our front door, it took us about an hour and 15 minutes to return. This was enough to let us explore parts of a neighbouring suburb where we have only walked a handful of times before.
We walked down to Greenwich Point. At one place along the main street, a sign points between two adjacent blocks of flats, indicating “Path to Reserve”. (A reserve being in this context a park.) I knew there was a park further along the road, and thought this path would lead through the bushland along the waterfront behind the houses, emerging at the park. So we ventured down the steps into the bush. The path led a hundred metres or so, then descended a steep set of rough sandstone steps to a tiny beach, on which were beached a couple of rowboats. I could see steps leading up from the far side of the beach, so we crossed the sand and climbed up again.
On this side, however, the steps led nowhere except up the slope to the rear side of a couple of houses. There was no path to follow – the only exit was directly into the back yards of the two houses. We’d stumbled on a semi-private path meant to be accessed only by the residents of these houses. We didn’t fancy going all the way back to where we’d started, and we could see a woman on the back porch of one of the houses. So I called out and said we’d gotten lost in the bush, and could we walk through her yard to the street. She said we could, so we walked through her property to the front gate and back out on to the street.
From there it was still another hundred metres or more to the park. I’m not sure what that sign back at the beginning had been meant to indicate, but there was clearly no path to this park from that sign. Anyway, once at the park there was a proper, well-maintained path along the foreshore bushland, behind the houses, all the way around the point to the ferry wharf. This was a much nicer walk, giving us good views of the harbour, the boats, and the surrounding headlands.
It’s nice to be able to take scenic walks – and get lost on them – within about half an hour’s walk from home!
What a cool story! I thought for sure you were going to say that you took the rowboats to a little park on a small island or something. Weird that a sign would direct people into a private dead end.