Tomaree Coastal Walk ~ Birubi Point Aboriginal Place to One Mile Beach
By Sue Olsson Coordinator
NPA Bushwalking, Port Stephens Group
Sunday morning 15 June 2025
Sun, glorious sun, warmed our hearts after so much rain. Our walking group met at the One Mile Beach bus stop, jumped on the 9:24 to Anna Bay.
Journey with us to explore the diverse scenery and story from Birubi Point Aboriginal Place to One Mile Beach
This section is about 8 kms of easy walking, a very leisurely 3.5 hours with morning tea and other discussion stops.
We alighted the bus near the Birubi Point Aboriginal Place and Lookout, the southern gateway to the national park. A fantastic and apt setting to start our morning trek to One Mile Beach.
Birubi Point is a declared Aboriginal Place, a place of significance for Worimi People, A QR code onsite enables you to listen to Worimi artist Gerard Black describing the meaning in his artwork.
We were welcomed with Birubi storytelling: ‘Matjarr nguka biinba’, meaning ‘give me your hand’ in Gathang language. It’s the title of an artwork and audio storytelling experience here, a significant Aboriginal site for the Worimi People, the traditional owners.
Just around the corner, the Birubi Point Historic Cemetery bears the names of many early European settlers in the area, and numerous unmarked graves.
We crossed over to the Birubi lookout, and followed the rocky shores where cormorants are usually plentiful between here and Iris Moore lookout.
At Iris Moore, many enjoyed whale watching and we spotted a black-shouldered kite overhead, though Australian (nankeen) kestrels are more frequent
The Castle at Iris Moore seemingly dominates the view, though this was an unusual perspective
The great work here of the Friends of Tomaree National Park (Southern group) around Fishermans Bay headland was evident.
Along the walkway to the lookout, the bitou and the dastardly turkey rhubarb is under control with the planting here in October 2024 now prospering and looking fabulous.
As we ascend the Fishermans Bay headland, the impact of the hot January 2024 fire was clearly evident.
We were amazed at how the post fire vegetation has thrived following our Autumn rain.
The charred headland is rapidly turning green as shrubs and trees compete for their place in the sun.
The invasive weeds are continually removed — thank you to the Friends Southern Group. The Bracelet Honey-myrtle, Melaleuca armillaris, though severely burnt is either shooting from any surviving root stock, or from seed shed following the fire..
The quickly growing Wrinkled Kerrawang, a low trailing bush not seen here for several decades, pops up after fire and is now bountiful.
This will again disappear, its seeds remaining dormant until the next fire.
Wrinkled Kerrawang mostly grows in coastal heath on cliffs or in gullies and is only found to NSW.
Our vegetation is so amazingly dynamic.
Departing the headland, we followed the street through Fishermans Bay hamlet to enter the shady coastal forest. We marvelled at the orchids and fungi and enjoyed the bridged gullies where streams flowed to the sea.
A bridge across the gully provides ample opportunity to discover what lies beneath.
Fungi are always intriguing following rain in late autumn and early winter.
Pixie Caps are the most common orchid on the Tomaree Peninsula.
Like the fungi, Autumn and early winter orchids are plentiful. Tomaree National Park is an orchid hot spot, though the pixie caps and Greenwood orchids while less colourful than the late winter / early spring orchids, have a multitude of interesting shapes.
From forests to rugged rocky shores, descending to Little Kingsley Beach
Reaching our morning tea lookout on the headland south of Kingsley Beach, we could watch more whales frisking on their migration north. A magnificent landmark for whale watching and NPWS sign tells us about the Worimi relationship to durrungan (whales).
A busy morning on the headland. Groups arrived from the north, though they cross cut and missed the headland.
A group of Sydney walkers revelled in the sunshine, having walked Tomaree’s northern section in rain yesterday.
We enjoyed a long relaxing morning tea before continuing north. Not that we needed the rest, sitting in the sun watching the ocean and chatting was a delight.
We crossed Kingsley Beach. Tannin stained flows seeping from the dunes, punctuated the sandy shores, creating intriguing golden patterns.
Those who knew the daunting amount of invasive bitou around Kingsley and One Mile appreciated just how much the Friends of Tomaree NP have achieved. Bitou pervades Little Kingsley area which is a Friends target for around October this year. Bitou and prickly pear on this whale watching headland is gone, though one walker collected a small prickly pear on our walk. The remnants of the dense, now dead, bitou across Kingsley Beach’s southern end is still visible, though that in the dunes of Kingsley Beach has disappeared.
We stopped off at the Boat Harbour Whale Watch Lookout one of the best easily accessible land-based whale watching spots.
Looking back to that Lookout, you can see the watchers silhouetted against the sky.
Departing Boat Harbour we wound through the bridged littoral rainforest gully following the track along the rocky coastlines where bridges span rocky, slippery gullies.
Our group looks rather dazzling in the sunlight, as they enjoyed the colourful palette of the contrasts of water over rocks and in sea pools.
We reached the picturesque Split Canyon though just after midday, our shadows on the cliff face and those of the trees, disguise its spectacular colours.
We took the little track just a few metres north of the lookout to explore the sprawling headland and some of the volcanic dyke swarms,
The dark intrusive volcanic dykes are a fantastic feature in our headlands. Being much softer, they slowly erode leaving the deep canyons we see on our rocky cliffs. The Split Canyon being a great example.
It’s fascinating following them over the headland as they plummet across a gorge.
We returned via One Mile’s headland to the beach where our cars were waiting.
A great morning’s walk with a fantastic group of people.