Walk # 11: Walking Holiday (?), Lithgow to Bathurst,
1-5 October 2019
I walked from Lithgow to Bathurst during the school holidays. It was a holiday from the work that pays my bills and an opportunity to work as a walking/pedestrian artist. Was this a holiday?
This was the eleventh walk of No Trespassing and took me across Wiradjuri Country to Bathurst, home of the courageous Wiradjuri leader, Windradyne whose walk to Parramatta in 1824 to end the slaughter of his people first inspired this project. Windradyne walked back into the project when I found his story on a sign in Hassell Park, O’Connell, NSW. All that I had learned in previous walks and research for No Trespassing came together during these four days of walking, taking photographs, and camping. It was thrilling to walk into Bathurst after months of dreaming about, planning and walking towards this city.
The solitude I experienced on these roads was utterly refreshing. My most frequent greetings were given to cows, sheep, the occasional Alpaca and horses. I imagined snakes hiding under every tree yet saw none and warded off cranky Magpies with shouts and vigorous waving of my maps. I met a few curious humans at the camp sites, some of whom had walking stories of their own. Walking the O’Connell Road was very uncomfortable due to the numerous trucks and cars speeding along the highway. I walked by the corpses of many animals and wished we humans would seriously rethink our dependence on the automobile.