Day 6 Rest Day Ride to Find Orchids : October 20 2022

As befits a rest day, I turned over a few times to go back to sleep after a morning of weird dreams. It was a blue sky day and I recalled that one of the authors of the new orchid book cut his teeth on Raymond Island orchids. Rode down there to have a look see

Side road along Mitchell River with distant sandstone cliffs

Free passenger ferry from Paynesville - cars pay.

View down King Lake looking south. Was not sure which way to go for orchids. Cycled past community centre where there was a meeting on - smart thing would have been to ask the question. Not me. Cycled down the koala trail - did not find any either. Walked the south end of the island

Did find one orchid leaf in among the pig faces - close up of the pig face. Lots of them

A few black swans feeding - hard to get get photo of two heads up. Walked back past the ferry to north side

Swan and signet - they allowed me to get quite close. Watched the ducks and 11 ducklings heading down to water.

I made sure they got across safely as there was a truck approaching. Took a cut through road to get to the middle of the island and found a sign of hope

Not long after that I saw the first orchid - sun orchid - looks like thelymitra pauciflora but it could be arenaria - forest sun orchid

Only one flowering but a few flower spikes budding

Two more may survive having been strimmed

Found a bearded orchid. A bit of an ID challenge - there is no tape at the end of the labellum but I cannot see the basal glands. Thinking calochilus robertsonii nonetheless - no tape

Got back to the shoreline to walk back to where I parked the bike. I had taken note of a a log as the marker - just needed to stick to walking the shoreline. The top end of the island is harder to walk the shoreline

Lots of mussels shells washed in by the tides. Edges get a bit tight with the tide coming in. I did find a track which eventually got me back to the bike.

On the way back went to Bluff Lookout for views of the river and the silt jetties

A silt jetty occurs when the river flows through a spit of land and deposits silt on either side - hard to see from the photo

Walked the bike along a steep foot path to rejoin the track I came in on earlier and thence back to town

Nice to find orchids - first in Victoria

Showered and quick pop into town for a few shopping essentials

Dinner was a repeat of last night - I bought two for one ingredients the dsy before : steak, chorizo, salad and potato salad

Tomorrow it is back on the road to Orbost. Will go a little earlier and see if I can beat the rain

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Daily Activity, House Chores, Photowalking, Shopping