Minnie Water

After our half day in Grafton we headed to the coast to the small town of Minnie Water, about a half-hour's drive away.

Maybe because we haven't been to the beach in a long time (the last trip for me out of New England was Japan via Brisbane) or maybe just the novelty of a place we haven't been before (as opposed to going to the coast at Coffs where we've been a few times now) but I really liked Minnie Water. I liked the beach, I liked the caravan park at which we stayed, and I loved walking along the coast. The swimming was really good too! So despite being a pretty quick trip overall it was really quite splendid.

For whatever reason the beach at Minnie Water collects a lot of seaweed and we were at just the right time of the tide. We collected some caulerpa, which we had known in Okinawa as umi budou - “sea grapes” and were delicious. These maybe not so much, but it was fun to learn about foraging seaweed (in NSW you can privately harvest up to 20 kilos a day! For those who aren't adding it to their diets it seems to be a popular mulching medium and garden compost additive.)

Seaweed and sponges.  There were more sponges on this beach than I've ever seen before.

 

The following day we took a walk along the coast: first north up the beach and out on the headland, later we drove into town and walked along some of the Yuraygir coastal walk which passes through this area. The Yuraygir trail is a 65km long walking trail that extends from the town of Iluka (South of Byron Bay) to just almost Coffs Harbour. What we walked was really neat, a really beautiful stretch of coastline. We're keen to come back and walk the entire trail someday.

Sunday morning the surfers were out

Walking up the beach to the (small) headland

Coastal heath

Looking for whales, maybe a little late in the season

Coastal heathland flowers

Really amazing coastal eucalyptus

This tree was a work of art.

Walking along the Yuraygir coastal trail.

Quiet rocky beach.

We're in prime butterfly season right now. These giant blue and black
butterflies don't make it inland to New England

Eagles fishing, surrounded by seagulls.

We finished our trip with the requisite fish and chips and headed back home. A quick weekend trip but a very enjoyable one.

Back on the winding road, green for now.