Sunk without trace

Some stories need to be brought to the surface, so this article is free to all (8 minute read)

When I think of Australia, I think of a vast, dry continent, a land of baking sun, dust and desert. I picture the graceful forms of the gum trees, with deep roots adept at finding water in the parched soils. I think of shrubs with thick, leathery leaves, superbly adapted to drought. I see the shimmer of heat haze on the horizon.

However, I had enough sense to check some weather forecasts before I left New Zealand and realised that some of the areas I’d be visiting were receiving a fair amount of rain. It wasn’t going to be too warm, either. So I packed some thermals and my wet weather gear – a good quality raincoat and a pair of waterproof overtrousers.

I was glad I did. The two full days I had devoted to walking both turned out to be wet. It allowed me to enjoy a different picture of Australia.

The Venman Bushland National Park is an area of forest south-east of Brisbane. It’s an important area for koala conservation, although I didn’t see any. I wasn’t looking very hard, though, because I kept getting distracted by plants. It was typical, open gum tree forest (although in the wet weather, I didn’t stop and attempt to identify the exact species present). In the undergrowth, there were sedges and creeping violets – similar to what I’d see in the forest in New Zealand. I also spotted a selection of shrubs such as banksia, which certainly wouldn’t see in New Zealand.

The track took me down a hill, and when it flattened out, I noticed a change in the trees. Most of what I’d seen had been gums with dark, furrowed bark, but they gave way to trees with peeling bark of white and pale brown. These weren’t gum trees but the aptly-named paperbarks – their bark as soft and delicate as layers of tissue paper. Although there are many different types, there are several paperbarks which thrive in swampy conditions, and that was the case with the paperbarks I encountered in the Venman Bushland. They surrounded a series of forest pools, the water black and opaque, the kind of place you might imagine infested with mosquitoes, crocodiles and bunyips.

paperbarks in the Venman Bushland (image credit: Melanie Newfield)

In fact, I saw nothing of the sort. I did, however, catch a glimpse of a delightful bird. It had the shape of a fantail, with a long tail and small body, and seemed about the same size as it flitted through the branches. However, it was a brilliant blue. As far as I can tell, it must have been a type of fairy wren. Unfortunately, birds are a great deal more difficult to photograph than plants, so I don’t have any bird photos to share. I was also constrained by the weather – there were times when it was raining too hard to keep my camera outside its dry bag. But whenever the rain eased a little, I pulled out my camera and photographed the trees.

Walking in the forest in the rain is a special experience. While I prefer a sunny day, there’s something to be said for being warm and dry inside my layers of waterproof clothing while the rain falls around me and my boots squelch in the mud. It’s often more peaceful, as fewer people are out and about. I did see one other group in the Venman Forest, but I mostly had the place to myself.

In my preparations for my trip, I discovered the most marvellous thing about the national parks in Queensland. On the Queensland government website, it’s possible to request a species list for any park or region in the state. So, I downloaded a plant list for the Venman bushland. The list was a little overwhelming – five pages of scientific names – but it did help me understand more of what I was seeing. It confirmed that there were a few plants related to New Zealand species – a vine, some sedges, a couple of ferns. It also confirmed the identity of some of the weeds I’d seen. It allowed me to work out the name of one of the gum trees, one of the delightfully-named scribbly-barks.

I’ve included a photo of a scribbly-bark, because they are amazing. It literally looks as if someone has been scribbling on the bark. In fact, if you are in an area where people have the habit of carving their initials in tree bark, it can be hard to tell where the graffiti ends and the natural scribbles begin. There are a number of species, but I was able to work out which one it was with the help of the species list and an online identification guide.

Eucalyptus racemosa, one of the scribblybarks, in the Venman Bushland (image credit: Melanie Newfield)

The scribbly-bark’s scribbles are the work of a caterpillar. In fact, there are a number of different species, all closely related, which burrow under the bark of certain types of gum trees, creating tunnels which the tree then fills with scar tissue. As the seasons pass, the outer bark is shed, revealing the scribble-shaped tunnels underneath. Because the caterpillars are picky, and feed only on certain species, it means that the presence of scribbles is a feature which can be used to work out the identity of the tree.

I’ve been longing to walk in the Australian forest for years, and now I’m here and the gum trees are as wonderful as I imagined. But, after I’d been walking around 45 minutes, I began to hear the rushing of water nearby. I assumed that as well as the inky-black ponds, there must be a stream. What I didn’t expect was to find that the stream had flooded. I rounded a bend to find water that looked almost knee-deep pouring across the track.

I walked up to it and looked closer. It wasn’t as deep as I thought, but it was definitely higher than the sides of my boots. It wasn’t deep or fast enough to be dangerous, but it meant that I would finish my walk with wet feet. I needed to wear the same boots the next day when I took the bus and then the train from Surfer’s Paradise to Sydney and on to Katoomba, and then for my planned walks in the Blue Mountains. How much did I want to cross that stream?

I was on a loop track, but the idea of retracting my steps bothered me less than several days in wet boots, so I turned around. I went right back to the start, then walked the loop the other way, until I was stopped by another area of flooded track. This one was so wide and deep that it was growing aquatic plants. So I didn’t quite manage to complete the loop.

When I returned from my walk, I tried to learn more about the area, but I found some gaps in the information. I found a page which promised to tell me about the culture and history of the area. The first line on the page gave me chills, and not for the reason the author intended: the history of the park was described as a heart-warming story of how one man made a great contribution to the conservation of 255 acres of bushland. I don’t doubt that it’s true, but it’s what didn’t make the page which is more significant. History appears to begin in 1911, with the birth of Jack Venman, who purchased the land at some point then donated it as a park.

But that’s not where the history of the site begins. It took more effort, but I found that there is evidence of human occupation of the area, although not necessarily the park, going back at least 21,000 years. I’ve found it hard to interpret the documents I read, because I don’t have the background knowledge that I have for New Zealand history and culture, but the coastal areas nearby are Quandamooka land, and the park may be as well.

Even in documents which acknowledge the existence of the land’s traditional owners, there’s often a lot left out. One document mentions that they’d lived in the area for tens of thousands of years, states that European settlers arrived in the 1820s, then brushes over what came next with the words: the new arrivals caused huge change to Quandamooka lifestyles. That’s all it says.

Although I haven’t found anything specific about the park, I have read a more thorough history of the indigenous people and European colonisation in the general area. It’s a similar picture to elsewhere in Australia. People were driven from their land and there’s at least one documented attack by soldiers which could rightly be called a massacre. One event from the region stands out though. A ship called the Sovereign capsized in a violent storm to the south of Mulgumpin/ Moreton Island. Forty-four passengers and crew drowned, but ten were saved by a group of Mulgumpin men who risked their own lives swimming out to the wreck in dangerous conditions. The government honoured their bravery with engraved brass plates, then moved the entire indigenous population off the island so they could establish a pilot station and settle the harbourmaster there.

I love visiting Australia and am fascinated by the land and its incredible plants, but there’s always something nagging at the back of my mind. In New Zealand, there’s no avoiding our history, and while that can be uncomfortable and confronting, it’s also progress. I feel as if I understand at least some of the things I need to do and some of what needs to happen to make us  a better, fairer country. Here in Australia, I don’t know where to start, especially as an occasional visitor. The least I can do, though, is make sure I don’t ignore the history, and acknowledge that what happened wasn’t right.

The track lay under this water, somewhere (image credit: Melanie Newfield)