Lake Elizabeth is one of those places around here that most people I know haven't walked around. It always boggles me. I guess it's because it doesn't have a waterfall. Still, it's only 45 minutes from here so it's often our bushwalk of choice - it's about 4 km around so not too far, and is really beautiful - AND you get to see playtpuses! Platypuses here are notoriously shy, so you can't rush up to the lake screaming 'IS THAT A PLATPUS?' as they'll likely pretend to be a duck.

But first things first. Let's start with the walk to the lake, which sends a lot of people back, as it's quite uphill. Not for toddlers. There's a lot of treeferns and views through the bush. Just stunning.

And of course, the trickle of a stream, and a lot of mushrooms, teeny ones, too teeny sometimes to photograph. Late Autumn is even when the layperson gets excited over mushrooms, because they are everywhere, like a freaking fairyland. Ruby bonnets wiggle, tremellas tremble, and occasionally, if you are lucky, you might stumble across a beautiful clitocybe nuda, call him Marvin, and take him for a walk around the lake before bringing him home for dinner.

Sadly the tremella was a little old so I didn't bring him home for soup. I did find some friends for Marvin when I got home though, jumping the fence into the reserve next door and electrifying myself in teh process as I didn't realise the cows were in and the fence was switched on. Ooops.

After twenty minutes or so you arrive at the lake itself. The lake was formed due to a landslide, so some of the trees in the middle stand like gravestones to a lost forest. There's a small jetty and some canoes. You can paddle board here if you are willing to carry your board uphill, which has never seemed tempting to me.

If you stop here for a moment and look, you'll see bubbles in the water that are absolutely platypus. I never believed Jamie until I saw one break the surface, the flash of a tail. Impossible to capture at a distance with a phone, but I'll include it anyway, as proof. Can you see the disturbance in the water? That my friends, is a platypus.

Continuing along the wet and muddy track, we could see glimpses of the lake through the trees, more mushrooms, and the occasional splash of a duck or a platypus.

Then the track heads through giant bullrushes along a boardwalk to the even muddier, wetter, and more mushroomy side of the lake. There was less people here as most don't walk all the way around. It's a bit of a magic fantasy world with overhanging ferns and the thin track through the giant tree fern trunks.

After we returned back, we drove along a 4wd track home, slipping and sliding and wondering if we'd packed the recovery equipment should we get stuck. We didn't get stuck. We saw a massive wedgetail eagle and many wallabies and kangaroos. It was very cold and there wasn't a single other car on the track.

For dinner we had a egg pasta aglio olio with purple wood blewitt mushrooms - that's just olive oil, pepper, salt, garlic, fried mushrooms, lots of parsley, and some parmesan cheese - and some red wine in front of the fire.

Now that's what I call a perfect day.

With Love,

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