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Outing to Pearl Beach and Patonga
The weather was cold & windy but that didn’t stop 18 residents and David, our bus driver, from having a wonderful trip to Pearl Beach & Patonga on Friday 19th November. After a delicious morning tea was enjoyed on the Pearl Beach seashore, the Crommelin Arboretum in Crystal Ave was visited.
The roads in Pearl Beach are named after precious stones, but the arboretum is named after Miss Minard Crommelin MBE who was a dedicated conservationist, interested in botany and natural history. While she was acting postmistress at Woy Woy from 1906-1910 she visited the Pearl Beach area with her friend Charles Gifford Pryce in his small home-made, cedar sailing boat and they fell in love with it, calling it little Eden.
She wrote:
“The beach is so beautiful with a great number of Cabbage Tree Palms growing along the little creeks and up the valleys and hillsides.
There were many little shells, little rock warblers hung their nests
from the roof of the caves under Mt Ettalong….”
Minard Crommelin was heartbroken when Charles was killed in action in France, late in Word War1.
Despite her work postings in over 150 towns, Minard chose to settle in Pearl Beach when she retired in 1935, after being left a legacy which enabled her to buy land, build a house for herself and a cottage for use by bushwalkers.
In 1947, Minard Crommelin gave the cottages and their contents (including a collection of valuable & rare books) to the University of Sydney.
Her 3 hectare property is now the University’s Crommelin Biological Research Station, adjoining Brisbane Water National Park.
Minard Crommelin lived at Pearl Beach for 30 years prior to her death in 1972, at the age of 90. The arboretum, adjacent to the Research Station, is a fitting tribute to her life-long devotion to conservation. It covers an area of 4.5 hectares set aside by Gosford Council in 1976, at the request of the Pearl Beach Progress Association, for the development of a native botanic garden. Thanks to devoted volunteers, it is now a lovely, peaceful sanctuary with grassed areas, wetlands and patches of temperate rainforest criss-crossed by very easy walking tracks.
It’s a gem.
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November Village Bus Outing
Despite very cold and windy weather on Friday 19th, we had a wonderful trip to Pearl Beach and Patonga. The bus was almost full, but nobody complained of the cold.
After a delicious morning tea along the seashore of Pearl Beach we continued on our route to the Arboretum. What a beautiful place! You can walk along little tracks among high trees, big ferns and pretty flowers or simply sit on the wooden benches put there for you to have a rest while contemplating the native botanic garden. It was very pleasant to be there among the unique and beautiful vegetation.
Everyone seemed so happy. Pat was pushing her walker as if she was walking on a carpet and Hettie & Del were singing a lovely song about …… trees, of course. Hazel was telling us the names of some of the plants.
It was hard to leave this small paradise.
David, our bus driver, drove us around Patonga, giving us lots of information about the area. He made us laugh a lot …. he is very witty. By this time we were hungry. Unfortunately, we had to wait quite a long time at the fish & chip shop as the only woman working there was very busy with lots of customers. Nevertheless, we did enjoy our lunch.
On the way back home, along the road we admired the nature, the sea, the hills, the new & old houses and the pretty gardens.
It was a day to remember.
Written by Yvonne R.