Walpole and the Tingle Trees

We spent 2 days at Walpole. The first day was cold and raining and the second was slightly better, although still jeans and jumper weather. After so long enjoying hot and sunny weather, from August through to the end of October, while all our friends back home were experiencing winter, we are now experiencing cold and wet weather while it is getting warmer and more summery back home. I didn't expect it to be quite as cool as it has been, given that we are mid November.

The first day at Walpole, after setting up and checking out the town, we decided to drive to the Giant Tingle Tree. Tingle trees are rough barked eucalypts and are impressive, not because of their height like the Karri trees are, but because of their girth. The Giant Tingle Tree has a girth of around 24m and is estimated to be around 400 years old. The Tingle Trees are very gnarled and many have quite a lot of burls, which produce very good wood. Tingle Trees are shallow rooted, so their base grows outward with buttress trunks to support their size. They are very susceptible to root damage due to the shallow nature of their roots and many of the older ones are hollowed out by fire that has gotten inside the tree to the heartwood. They continue to grow and survive as the essential part of the tree is located just underneath the outer bark. It results in trees with very big girths that are hollowed out by fire.

We also did a bit of a drive through the National Park to take in the scenery, and made our way to Circular Pool, which really wasn't very inspiring. It is dirty brown, due to tannin staining. That didn't bother me. It just didn't see particularly interesting, and in the cold and wet (we had been rained on when we did the walk to the Giant Tingle Tree) I wasn't overly inspired by it.

But I did find a very pretty spot for a picnic!

Circular Pool

The second day we went to the Valley of the Giants. This National Park encompasses a 6km drive through Tingle forest and ends at the Walpole Discovery Centre. There are 2 walks you can do there; the Ancient Empire Walk and the Tree Top Walk. The Ancient Empire walk is free and there are Ranger guided walks throughout the day. We went with the Ranger and found it very informative. Sometimes it's nice to do these walks alone and just absorb the surrounding forest and information plates, but if you get the right Ranger it is completely worth doing the walk with them. The lady who took us around held a wealth of knowledge and it was good to learn about the forest, the local Aboriginals and the plants and animals from her. They actually have quokkas that live there, although they are nocturnal, unlike the quokkaas of Rottnest Island. 

Grandma Tingle

This one's girth is only around 14m I think

The Tree Top walk cost us $52.50 which felt like quite a bit of money for what you got, in some ways, but it was really interesting to do as it lets you get right up into the canopy of the Tingle trees. Because the Tingle trees have very shallow surface roots, they can't have people walking among them as the roots are easily damaged and the trees killed. Years ago there was a giant Tingle tree people could drive their car into and loads of people did, and this killed the tree which fell down in 1990. So they have restricted access to most of the Tingle trees to try to protect and preserve them, as they only live in this part of WA. The Tree Top walk climbs up 40m into the canopy of the forest and is a really good perspective to see. If you're scared of heights, or don't have much faith in man made structures, then I'd avoid it as you are up pretty high and the walkway bounces and sways a lot. I thought it was quite fun but there were other people up there who really didn't.

Looking down from 40m up

You can see the highest section of the walk in this picture