Onwards to Eden

Pressing on from Merimbula it was all beaches and national parks. After a stop at Pambula surf beach....

Pambula Beach

....we pulled into Ben Boyd National Park. More off roading for Reggie and he was starting to look pretty rugged and dusty :-)

 We headed to The Pinnacles - a rock feature by the beach. It was totally deserted and pretty stunning.

We then stopped by Eden for some lunch and then into the other half of the Ben Boyd National Park the other side of the town. Ben Boyd was an interesting sounding chap - a slightly crazy Scottish guy, apparently of imposing appearance. He went to Australia to build his fortune through all manner of enterprises. He set about establishing a town that would rival Sydney named after himself - Boydtown - and borrowed and juggled his way to success in his various businesses, whaling and farming and so on. He had some fairly dubious views on getting cheap labour and after a spell of success his finances crumbled and he set off for the gold fields in Australia, then the USA, also ending in failure. He was last seen disappearing into the rainforest in the Solomon Islands with a servant. Shots were heard from the trees and he was never seen again. A strange character to name such a beautiful area after, but there you go.......

There are a few of Ben Boyd's follys still dotted around - an Elizabethan style manor house and Boyd Tower, which was supposed to be a lighthouse, but was never commissioned.
Instead it became a lookout for whale spotting in Twofold Bay. It seemed hard to imagine as we stared out at this huge expanse of calm, clear water, but it used to be the scene of many a battle between whaling boats and the humpback and southern right whales that visit the area. Now whale watching is one of the key local industries, but back in the day whales were caught and killed in a weird alliance between man and orca. Killer whales herded whales into the bay, jumping around to alert the local whaling teams. They would keep the whales penned in and exhaust them until the whaling boats arrived to finish the job. The bargain was the whalers would then leave the killer whales to feast on the tongue and lips of the dead whales - the only bit they were interested in - and then come back the next day to collect. Grim, but pretty amazing.

One of the orcas was a particular favourite...Old Tom. The orca pod didn't visit after Tom died and the whaling industry sort of died with him. He was so popular they built a museum to put him in. A pretty cool building too - nice bit of art deco.

Eden was brill. Beautiful and a good pub. A few nice cafes too down at the still very active harbour. The fisherman were chuckling away in the pub the night we were in at some 'yachties' - a crew that seemed to be halfway through the Sydney to Hobart boat race stopping off for the night. I'm not sure they were too impressed with the part-time sailors.
The next morning we had a relax and a read on the beach, one last look at the stunning bay and it was time to head out of Eden. At this point Reggie's battery light came on.....meh, probably be fine.....