Emerald is a small town about 45 kilometres east of central Melbourne. It is a popular weekend day-trip for families escaping Melbourne. What brought me there was my quest for a Melbourne counterpart to the Pittwater Youth Hostel north of Sydney. The hostel was known as “Wombat Corner”, for its location. My chosen weekend was Easter/Anzac Weekend, 1988; I arrived on Good Friday.
It was a different time, and rather than slow down the story by trying to explain everything inline, I have added some context as informational footnotes.
Arrival at EmeraldI eventually reached Emerald, the bus groaning its way up the slopes of the Dandenongs to drop me off at the edge of the road just out the far side of town. “What do I do now?” I asked the driver. “Oh,” he said. “Just cross the road. Go down the dirt track and turn left at the bottom.”
Dusk had fallen and the way1 was steep, but I shouldered my bag and navigated the tricky path, quivering no more than usual when a vicious barking broke out nearby on my left, following me down but happily staying behind the low fence that apparently marked the edge of the dog’s territory. I reached the bottom and turned left onto a sealed road, taking out my torch (actually my bike’s headlight) because by now it was very dark. I walked a little way, and then a set of van lights pulled up by me, going in the opposite direction, and a Dutch accent came out of the dazzle to say “Hello! Are you looking for the hostel?” My answer had to be “Yes.” “You must go on past the toll booth, about 50 metres on the left2 — you can’t miss it.” Then the van drove on. “Oh, can’t I?” I muttered to myself. Every traveller hates that phrase. But I didn’t “miss it.” The hostel was signposted, was visible from the road, and it looked like a hostel.
I pushed in through the front door, finding myself in the common room and facing half a dozen pairs of eyes — five human and one green with slitted iris. “Is one of the Dutch boys here?” I asked, following instructions from the van driver (the hostel manager). A lanky individual stood up. “The manager said there was a spare bed in your dormitory and that I should ask you which it was.”
New problem — no food! I’d forgotten to bring any. So once again I had to leave light and company and walk into the dark, up the sealed road to town — about 1500 metres. Less than a mile. A mere nothing. Perhaps twenty minutes walk. But my torch was dying.
“This, thought Armstrong, was the ultimate misfortune. Nothing more could happen to him now.” — “A Walk in the Dark” by Arthur C Clarke
It was dark, it was eerie, dogs came down and followed me along fencelines, possums set up barrages of “hisss-tck-tck-tck” in the trees, there were all sorts of odd rustlings and crackling in the undergrowth beside the road; but unlike the character in Clarke’s little horror story I came through safely and at the Milk Bar where I bought my food I also bought new torch batteries for the return trip.
1 The path was probably what is now Royal Parade, though it is less steep than I remember. The area is more built up now and it’s possible there was then a now-lost foot track opposite the bus stop. It was dark and I don’t recall. The out-bound bus stop was then, as now, just past the intersection of Lawson Rd and the Belgrave-Gembrook Rd (37°55'32.9"S 145°27'23.9"E).
2 These instructions today lead you to Wombat Corner Camp (37°55'39.3"S 145°27'34.8"E), which was established around 2000 and took over the old youth hostel building. Today’s Emerald Backpackers is in a different location and opened in 2010; I am not sure of its connection to Koos’ plans for a new hostel.
Events at EmeraldWent off to bed about 23:00 last night. Had spent some time talking to Catherine, the Swiss woman. The cat, “Kit Kat”, dozed in front of the heater till I switched that off after the Danish woman went to bed. Then she got up and, casting a reproachful look in my direction, stalked into the kitchen. Apparently whatever she wanted was not there, as she came back and availed herself of the use of my lap.
Didn’t sleep well. Finally got up at 7:45. Showered, dressed, then went into the kitchen for Weet-bix and coffee. About 8:15 the Dutch guys appeared. Kit Kat, meanwhile, had cadged some milk then decided not to finish it. But she was avid for the scraps of meat thrown her by the departing Dutchers.
After a walk with Catherine to the shops for info, I set out to explore the area. It turned out that Wombat Corner was only a couple of hundred metres from the “Lakeside” terminus of the Puffing Billy steam train, on the shores of tiny Lake Treganowan. This train ran daily but not frequently (often only once each way, in fact). There were people everywhere — it seemed that half of Melbourne had decided to spend Easter Saturday picnicking at Emerald.
As I walked across a small bridge and came up to the station, the train was building up steam, ready for a trip down to Belgrave (the other terminus). I asked after the price of the fare, learning that it was $6.00 one-way and $9.00 return. It was a tourist attraction, I was prepared for a high fare, but this was preposterous! 3
“Isabelle, I think this is awfully silly …”
3 For comparison, at the time, Melbourne’s metropolitan trains were broken into 10 “Neighbourhoods”. Ferntree Gully and Belgrave were both in the Ringwood Neighbourhood and a ticket notionally valid for 3 hours (lasting up to 4 clock hours depending when it was punched) for just that neigbourhood, cost 85¢. I lived in Reservoir (Broadmeadows Neighbourhood) and getting to Belgrave from there involved passing through the Inner and Box Hill Neighbourhoods, which required an “Anywhere” ticket that would take me anywhere in Melbourne that cost $3.10 for 2-3 (up to 3-4 hours). Confused? We were, too. Here it is, in gory detail. However, you can see why $6-$9 caused such sticker shock!
So I paid my $6 and climbed aboard.
The train was designed to carry sightseers, with the seats facing outwards rather than the forward-and-back of most trains. It chuffed along a narrow-gauge track set in Australian bushland, occasionally passing through pocket stations, of which the most notable was the one by the Steam Museum at Menzies Creek. I made a mental note to visit this, but did not carry through on this visit (I saw it on a later visit).
The train was full. Some people sat on the metal safety bars that were set horizontally across the lower portions of the windows, kicking their legs in the breeze. There was some very pretty scenery and quite good views along the track. One particularly good one was a view south and downslope, over the Cardinia Resevoir. The land went on and on down into a green haze, a tree-dotted expanse of rolling hill country.
Finally the train pulled into its own special station at Belgrave. I got out and walked along the platform to the Met section, somehow emerging without surrendering my ticket.
I collected my bike, which I had left at Belgrave because there had been no space for it on the bus the night before, and cycled from Belgrave down to Ferntree Gully National Park, a distance of about 6.7 km.
An intriguing sight on the way: coming down a long slope, I suddenly found myself looking along the length of the valley, out onto a wide plain. Far out on the horizon were some peculiar menhirs: the tall buildings at the heart of Melbourne, seen across 45 kilometres. They were all that was visible of the city: all the wide suburbs between simply merged into the tree-strewn landscape and disappeared. A strange sensation, knowing some three million people lived and worked between me and those towers but being unable to see the humbler buildings.
Leaving my bike chained to a tree, I took the Creek Track up to the observation tower on One Tree hill. The track was well kept, its surface firm, with wood-dam and concrete steps at steep sections. The bush was quite similar to NZ’s native bush in many respects — there were even ferns growing here and there beside the path. But I could not mistake it for NZ. There were many brightly coloured parrots (Crimson Rosellas, I think) in the bushes beside the track — decidedly not NZ! Somewhere a kookaburra laughed. Many of the trees I passed were gum trees, though the trees did not make the scenery “Australian”; there are similar stands of gums in NZ — around the Kerikeri area in the Bay of Islands, for example.
A sign informed me that the summit was “2.5 km, Round Trip 1 1/2 hrs”. I took just 27 minutes to reach the top. The observation tower was closed, which was a disappointment as I’d been looking forward to the view it had promised of the surrounding area. So after gawking over the treetops for what sights could be seen from the ground, I followed Tyson Track, Outlook Road, then Bellview Terrace4 back to the picnic area where my bike waited. A very Australian walk. The bush was more open than that which I had passed through on the way up; the gums stood up in relatively clear ground. I was intrigued by the hollow bases of many gums, hollows filled with char. One tree had a very large rock leaning against it — did the rock roll there, or did the tree grow up beside/beneath it? If the former, how did the rock come there: it would have taken the combined efforts of several people to even shift it on its base.
Clouds were moving in and I was completely knackered, so I took the train from Ferntree Gully back to Belgrave. Rather than pay another expensive Puffing Billy fare, and in preference to trundling up the hills aboard the bus again, I stifled my groans and cycled up the 12.6 km from Belgrave to the hostel. It was easier than I expected — I was obviously using different muscles when cycling versus walking.
The hostel was full of strangers, including a couple of unrelated Scots and a moslem Israeli, all watching the 1939 Beau Geste movie.
“Go ahead, Beau; after all, it’s your room, must be your mouse.”
4 Basically a counter-clockwise walk around the hill. I am a bit confused where I went, but since I hit Bellview Terrace then I must have gone down what is now Ramu Ave. From the Bellview sign I would have followed the Link Track (thinking it was Bellview) to Lyrebird and thence up to the Kokoda Memorial, no small climb, then decended via the Thousand Steps. No wonder I was knackered!
On Sunday I walked the Dandenong Walking Track, from Lakeside Station to Gembrook. It was a moderate walk, only 10 km, but with side-trips and stops for sightseeing it took me well over two hours to reach Gembrook. The track passed through some quite nice bush scenery, but I must say that it was far from being the best example of such that I had seen in Australia. The first section, from Emerald to the town of Cockatoo, was the better section, with plunging bush-covered hillsides, streams, birds, and many tempting side trails. After Cockatoo the track started moving through farmland, and although some of the views across open hillsides were impressive, farmland was unlikely to move the soul of anyone born in NZ.
The end of the track was a parking lot near the Gembrook Domain. No wonderful climax, no final beauty, just mundane houses and then churned muddy ground. I was not keen to walk back through the boring Cockatoo-Gembrook section, so I walked out to the road and hitched back to Cockatoo. I then walked the first section again, this time exploring some side-tracks that I’d passed-by before. I amused myself by walking the very last bit, back to Lakeside Station, on a disused continuation of the Puffing Billy rails that ran along the side of the path.
“It is so much like a Swiss valley in Autumn,” said Catherine as we walked along the road into Emerald; “Everything is so well kept and all the trees are turning to gold, and all the leaves are falling to the ground.”
I laughed, lunging to catch a leaf that had twirled across the road in front of me. “Here’s one leaf that won’t reach the ground,” I said.
Catherine looked at it. “Soon you will drop it,” she said, “and then your effort will be wasted.”
I said nothing, but placed the leaf gently in my diary. I still have that leaf, and it has not yet touched the ground.
The hostel was crowded that night, and a couple of people had guitars. But the singing did not last long, as most of those present went out to the local pub. I was tempted, but felt a bit tired. So I stayed back, chatting with a group of about half a dozen stay-at-homes. Watching Australian TV. Kit Kat thought this an extremely congenial way to pass the evening, migrating from lap to lap, finally settling down to purr the evening away as close to the heater as she could get without igniting her fur. (The mythological Salamander is probably neither lizard nor frog. I think it is a cat.)
A lazy morning. I got up and went into the kitchen, where Koos — the Dutch warden — was talking to hostellers and handing out the cards of those who were leaving. I reclaimed my own, then stopped to join the talk.
Many of those not leaving this morning were working in the area. Emerald was a popular place for people wanting to earn a little travelling money while in Australia. (The majority at Emerald at this time, interestingly, were Dutch.) This had not always been the case, said Koos; up until a few years back, when hostellers asked him if there was work available in the area, he had always said no, there wasn’t. Then one day a hosteller arrived who had been travelling for about twenty years, never staying more than a few months in one place. “Is there any work around here?” he asked Koos. “There is none,” replied Koos. “In three days,” said the hosteller, “I shall have a job.” He was right. He got work trimming trees in a local orchard — work that was normally assumed to be the lot of the local youngsters. He did so well at it that the locals took to ringing the hostel to leave messages advising of work available, or phone numbers hostellers could ring in case a day’s work did turn up. One person arriving and knowing how to find a job in an area formerly presumed barren, completely changed the nature of the area. (Probably did the hostel’s usage no harm, either.) Emerald Backpackers performs the same service today.
Now it was time for the final adventure of the weekend — cycling back to Melbourne. This would be the nearest I had been to cycle-touring since coming to Australia, and the distance — about 50-55 km by road — was just right for a softened pair of legs. Besides, I had been riding a bike at work for months, now: I was not entirely unfit.
Following advice from Koos, I cycled down to Clematis — an easy task with gravity to aid me — and then turned off onto Wellington Road. After a few hills, I struck a long downgrade which brought me past the shores of Cardinia Reservoir, one of Melbourne’s major water sources. Bare hillsides, concrete retaining walls. Boring, though I could see some pretty hillsides across the water. That was the only thrill of the day. After that it was a long, sweaty slog into the city, crossing a series of ridges that seemed expressly placed to hinder anyone attempting the feat. I was surprised by how far I had to go before I entered continuous suburbs — Melbourne extends a long way out to the east, but I was coming in through a green belt between two major arms of development.
Conditioned by New Zealand cities such as Wellington and Wanganui, I had been accustomed to thinking of Melbourne as quite boringly flat. Well, so it is in many ways and in many places. But I discovered on this short cycling excursion — can travelling in to Melbourne — be called an excursion? Hmmm — that parts of the eastern suburbs can be quite hilly, to a cyclist. The hills take the form of long ridges, oriented more or less north-and-south. They also seem to be much higher on the eastern side, though the possibility exists that I am being a little subjective about this.
I was glad when I reached a friend’s home in Oakleigh, where I stopped in to drink his coffee and drip sweat all over his furniture. But the stop ruined me, for I stiffened up once I was off the bike. After agonising about the dilemma for a while I conceded defeat and used the trains to get back to my home in Reservoir. I couldn’t ride till I dropped; I was due back at work the enxt day — riding a postie’s bike.
ConclusionsAlthough the area was popular with Melburnians wanting to escape the city, Emerald was not the wonderful place that Pittwater was for me. Too many people, too tame, not enough variety.
The area was pretty, and had plenty to recommend it. Although I didn’t explore them, there were many small eateries scattered through the Dandenongs, typified by those offering “Devonshire Teas”.
The parks in the area were well-maintained and offered some good easy walks. Nor did I exhaust them in this first trip. The Dandenong Walking Track, which I followed from Emerald to Gembrook, actually stretched from Gembrook to the town of Montrose, including the summit of Mt Dandenong (633 metres). I did not look at Sherbrook or Olinda Forests, and I should probably walk some of the other tracks in Ferntree Gully National Park.
The hostel was one of the area’s good features. At $7 per night (1988 figure) it was inexpensive and well equipped. I was somewhat leery of some features, however, including the washroom, which was floored with loose tiles (it seemed to me that the adhesive had perished) that floated in a perpetual lake of water. Not pleasant to use, even wearing thongs to avoid as much contact as possible. But the common room was comfortable and virtually invited the hosteller to sit and talk, as long as nobody turned the TV up so loud as to drown out conversation. There were a number of books left by hostellers, various magazines, and perhaps most importantly, there was a Visitor’s Book.
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28 Dec 80 — “What can I say. Is this really a Hostel. I spent Christmas here, 4 nights, and not one of them in the male dorm. Thank you, Sue and Rex.” — Vincent, ???.
28 Dec 80 — “Quite an unusual Christmas yet wonderful all the same. Spent 4 nights here and not one of them in the female dorm. Thanks for everything Rex and Sue. Six in one bed not bad next time we’ll try for 12. Even though this sounds pretty disgusting, ‘Don’t worry about it’, Happy Christmas to you, and ‘Don’t forget your Boogie Shoes’.” — Beverley, Vancouver.
9 Mar 81 — “Spent 2 nights here and not one in the boys dorm. Too bad no girls! Had a good time anyway. A nice place to come back to.” — Joe, Sydney.
3 Feb 84 — “There is a lady here with a little boy who is bashing ‘Kit Kat’ over the head with a billiard cue!!!” — Joshua, Vic.
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As was normal with hostels, the inhabitants were a mixed bag. Dutch was the best-represented nationality, followed by German/Swiss. (This did not make for a Babel: most of the hostellers used English for international conversation, that being the language that most had in common.
The building I stayed in was the “old” hostel. Apparently Koos was building a new structure nearby, which would — he said — have more beds than the present hostel and be a lot nicer besides. If the friendly feel of the old transferred successfully to the new, it would be a good experience.
The Victorian Pittwater, however, eluded me still. There were reputed to be several very nice hostels down the other side of Geelong. Some long weekend I must go and seek them out, I decided. Maybe I’d take the bike and make it a cycle-tour.5
5 Sadly, I did not. Most of my trips in the next few years were on foor and public transport. I rode from Lilydale to Healesville and back, and from Woodend to Hanging Rock and back, on day trips, but riding a bike for a living killed the fun of full-packed multi-day cycle-touring for me.
