Solo camping - well kind of.

By solo I mean, no one else came with me. The spot I chose had heaps of people so I didn’t feel alone. That wasn’t the point of the trip, if I wanted that I would have gone somewhere remote. I don’t think my wife Laura is ready for that just yet.

I just wanted to be able to do my own thing, when I wanted. And by own thing I mean photography.

This trip wasn’t meant to be solo either. After a few false starts the weather turned and the last mate standing decided it was better if he took a rain check. Given he has a rooftop tent and I had to peg my swag down because of the wind on the first night, he made an excellent decision.

Lunch time on the Friday was spent running around packing my car. Thankfully, I left not long after lunch. And not a minute too soon either. The traffic on the M1 towards the Gold Coast was the normal hectic Friday afternoon.

After an eternity, or so it seemed, sitting on the M1 in bumper to bumper, stop start traffic, I was off the highway and on a country-ish road. A pleasant 40-minute drive on the winding roads behind the Hinze Dam and I am about to arrive at my destination. Before I do I had to ‘evade’ the police border check point. Not really, I just turned right before the check point and 150 metres I was at my destination.

Natural Bridge Retreat was the destination. It had been popping up in my socials feed and had piqued my curiosity for some time. Dam algorithms.

A warm welcome from Keith and Zandra, and I was personally shown to my site perched above the creek. The outlook was great, over looking the creek and up to the mountains.

A storm was on the horizon, so I decided to set up camp before doing anything else. This was quite easy. As it was just me, all I had to do was set up the swag, pull out the awning and get the sausages on for dinner. The storm, or by the time it got to me, came and went with little fuss. Thankfully, the supercell went the other direction. Some lightning shots would have been nice though.

By the time the storm had past, the sun had set, and it was dark. Time to explore my surrounds a little further. Off I went with my headlamp on, and camera at the ready. You just never know what creatures are lurking around.

To get to the toilets you must cross the creek. By no means is this a mission, a couple of little rock hops and you are over. As this was my first-time crossing, I paused before I crossed and had a look around with my torch. Thankfully, I was not in a rush as I came across a snake lying just off the path. The snake was not too concerned with me and I was not too concerned with it. I got a couple of photos and it just slithered off. As for what species of snake it was, I am not sure. I spoke with the owner Keith and he thought it might be a night tiger, or neon tree snake. The eyes had him questioning his ID though - the in-camera shot did not show the cat like eyes of a night tiger. After some research at home, I have come to the conclusions the snake was either a rough scaled snake or a keel back snake. I say it was a rough scale, but I need that confirmed by someone who has more knowledge of snakes than me and my 5 minutes on the internet.

After the snake encounter, I found the facilities and then decided to call it a night. I had plans on a sunrise shoot. This meant a 3:30AM alarm. It was a 20-to-25-minute hike up the hill in the dark before first light.

Normally I sleep very well when camping. I am not sure what it is, I need to work it out so I can replicate it back in the city. Although I am not sure a canvas tent in the bedroom is the look Laura is after. Anyway, to say it was windy would be an understatement. As I said before, I even had to peg the swag down to stop it blowing away. The constant waking up thinking the swag was blown away or that a tree would fall on me made the early alarm somewhat easier to wake up too.

It was by no means an epic sunrise. But sitting up there at that time of the day was very peaceful. There is something about sitting high up on a hill with no one around that make you realise how small and insignificant any problems you might have are.

After lazing around all day, with a swim in the creek it was time to find what the snake I encountered the night before was after. Again, with my trusty head torch I went out frog spotting in the creek. The frogs were plentiful and easy to find. Not that I have looked that often for frogs before, but they were plentiful here.

All in all, this is a great spot that I will have to return to.