On July 8th Melbourne went back under lockdown for at least 6 weeks. In May and June we had been having less than 10 new coronavirus cases a day, with some days nearing zero. Then everything started to open up again and our case load went up quickly. Just prior to the Premier (like a governor) announcing that we were going back under lock down, we were having around 200 new cases a day in Melbourne. Hopefully the reinstated restrictions will help to bring the numbers back down but the last couple days we've had
300-400 cases a day in Victoria, so we'll see.
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| Lake Tyrrell, Victoria |
Just prior to the lockdown, Ross and I managed to get out of Melbourne for a long weekend for my birthday. We drove about 5 and a half hours north-northwest of Melbourne to
Murray-Sunset National Park. The park is in the corner of the state so we were abutting South Australia to the west and New South Wales to the north. While we were up there we were able to explore some of the salt lakes in that region and see a bit of the
Silo Art Trail.
We started on the road on July 4th and made our way up to our AirBnb in Ouyen. On the way we stopped by the Art Silos in Nullawil and Sea Lake. The Silo Art Trail stretches over 200 kilometres in northwestern Victoria and was conceived in 2016. The murals are meant to celebrate and recognise the region's people and many of the silos that are used for the giant murals date back to the 1930s. The two that we saw were quite impressive. If we'd had more time, we would have liked to see others but they were not really on the way. Next time...
From Sea Lake we headed up to
Lake Tyrrell, which is not so much a lake as a shallow, salt-crusted depression though it's much more interesting and beautiful than that makes it sound. The lake covers an area of about 51,500 acres and only has a couple inches of water during the winter. The water is incredibly saline and there was a thin salt crust under the water when we visited. It was possible to break chunks of salt crust off the ground under the water or you could just scrap salt off the beach along the high-wave mark. The salt is harvested commercially from the north end of the lake by Cheetham Salt Works with more than 100,000 tonnes harvested each year.
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| Salt from the shore |
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| Salt crust |
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| Salt-crusted footprints |
On July 5th we drove over to Murray-Sunset National Park and spent the day walking most of the trails in the park and marvelling at the colourful lakes. Murray-Sunset is the second largest national park in Victoria and covers an area of 1,560,000 acres. It is closer to Adelaide (capital of South Australia) than it is to Melbourne and was declared as a national park in 1991. Prior to becoming a park the area was a major part of the salt industry from approximately 1916 to 1979. During peak production, three of the lakes in the park could yield 10,000 tonnes of salt per day.
The lakes in the southern portion of the park are referred to as the Pink Lakes due to a red pigment, carotene, that is excreted by the algae. When we were there a couple of the lakes had a pink tint but the lake that was billed as the 'pinkest of the lakes' was actually orange. I'm not sure why is was orange. Maybe there had just been an algae die-off or something similar. Needless to say, it was pretty weird to walk up to a lake that was naturally an impressive orange. The only other time I've seen water that colour was because of acid mine drainage.
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| Yep, that is natural and not pollution. |
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| Salt crust along the lake shore. |
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| Australian Ringneck |
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| Ross next to a pile of discarded salt. |
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| Major Mitchell Cockatoo |
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| Slightly pink lake |
My birthday was on a Monday this year, so I took it off work for this adventure. On my birthday, we left Ouyen and headed back to Melbourne with a stop at the
Bendigo Woollen Mills. I happily looked at yarn for a while and then chose out a large bag's worth for some socks and a fairisle jumper. I am definitely my mother's daughter.
We had a weekend adventure prior to my birthday (that will be the next blog) but with the current COVID-19 case load in Melbourne, Ross and I will not be doing much for the foreseeable future (other than knitting, baking and reading). Until next time, stay safe and healthy! Sending much love from Down Under.
