Manly to Spit walk

This is an urban bush-walk, with some sections being less negotiable than others.  Catching a ferry to Manly puts you at the start of a long track, running all the way to the Spit bridge.  The whole walk will take you about three hours, and it is now fairly well marked with  signs and arrows.

Keep your eyes open for all sorts of wonders, like the extreme jointing in the sandstone near Fairlight (left) and various sorts of wildlife. Much of the area on this walk is total no-take, aside from photos.

As you come off the wharf, turn left along the water front, go past the toilets (or use them) and follow the steps that lead up onto the headland beyond.  You now have more than a kilometre of concrete path open to you, running along above Delwood beach (right) and Fairlight pool (seen below in a storm). That is a tidally-fed rock pool, that is occasionally closed and pumped out for cleaning. There are toilets  and change rooms.

Near several boatsheds, you will come to a small rough patch of road to walk on (due for upgrading "one of these days"), and Treharne's serves coffee, followed by several hundred metres of paved walk, coming up to the head of North Harbour.  As you join a road, look ahead to King Avenue, turning off to your left, and join this.

Soon you will come to a small memorial claiming that Governor Phillip landed here when he first explored the area, but Arthur Phillip was no fool.  I don't know exactly where he landed, but it wasn't here: I have one of his maps to prove it!

To the right of the memorial, follow the stairs down to North Harbour Reserve, walk across this, and at low tide, cross the sands on your left to walk to the marina. 

On the right, this is a king high tide. I have always found a special joy in high tides, as you will soon come to recognise.

If the tide is high, go up the stairs on your right, turn left up the hill, and left again to cross a small footbridge. Go ahead along the road, following the coastline direction until you come to the marina. Beyond that, walk ahead to Forty Baskets beach (safe swimming in the enclosure).

This is Forty Baskets at king tide time, when you need to follow a different route, or get wet feet. The sloping path on the right takes you to that route, but if you enter the bush and the end of Beatty Street, cross a bridge and take a left to go down the stairs.

At other times, go along the beach, along the track at the far end for a hundred metres or so, and then right up those same stairs. This is Plan A, which is a Bad Plan, except that you may see a swamp wallaby. Then again, you may see one with Plan B.

At the top, follow the track to your left for some five or six hundred metres, until you come to a "crossroads". 

Plan B: Plan A stinks because you have just missed all the best views. Go down or past those steep and interminable stairs and walk along until you reach Reef Beach (on the right). Follow the track behind the beach, enjoy the views and the flowers. This gently sloping track brings you to the same "crossroads".

At the Crossroads

The track going south is a dead end (Crater Cove), but nice to explore if there has been no rain, the track to your left goes to or from Reef Beach, the one on your right leads to the top of the hill and then on towards the Spit. From the top, you may see the Bombora running.

The Bommie or Bombora, which has killed quite a few people.

The view down to Grotto Point.

Follow the track up: it ends up skirting the roadway, staying just below it, then pass the turn-off to Grotto Point Lighthouse, and head on towards Castle Rock.  From here, there is a choice of a street route or a track: look for the signs.  Either way, you will get to Clontarf, where you may be lucky enough to see a pelican. It is a few years since I took this...

There are changing rooms, toilets and coffee at Clontarf.

Follow the beach past Clontarf and around to Sandy Bay, then look for a track on the point in front of you.  This track then leads you to The Spit, where you can catch a bus, either to the city or the 144 bus will take you back to Manly. 

As an alternative, try walking the track the other way, from the Spit to Manly.  You can catch a bus to the Spit from Wynyard, or from Manly Wharf.