Devil's Elbow - Gosford #3 - Brisbane Water Walk #9

I'm hot, sticky and cross. It's a fucking sauna out there today. That bloody storm never showed yesterday and I got going late today, seven thirty. As I went past the pool shop I was seized by a powerful urge to scramble over their fence and sink into their display pool. It was so blue and so shady up the end and so full of beautiful cool water. I could've floated there for hours, just my nostrils showing like a croc.

I didn't walk far today. Up to Devil's Elbow then down and round a couple of factory streets. The Devil's Elbow is the same as every other Devil's Elbow in the world. A hairpin bend on a narrow road with a nasty drop on one side. This one's in my hist list as "Roadworks ... pre 1879". The 2005 street directory lists it as on South Road but it's on Debenham Road in West Gosford, up behind the abandoned Pizza Hut.


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The view from up there's not bad. There's a lot of trees in the way but you can see out over North Gosford and Wyoming to what looks like the ridge at Holgate.


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Straight ahead is the racecourse and Presidents Hill and the hill above Gosford behind that. Over on the right you can see over Adcock Park and Fagans bay to Point Frederick and the hazy ghost of Green Point on the far side of the water.

By the time I got to the Elbow, the sweat was running free. But at least there was plenty of shade on Debenham Road. After that it was a slow hot trudge round a couple of streets full of factories then back to the bus stop. Another short walk but I got to see the Devil's Elbow at last. Been looking forward to that one for a while.


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Some poor bastard called Tim who must've died on the road below the Devil's Elbow.


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Old sign on a factory in Dyer Crescent. I've got no idea what Skippy's holding.


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What better place for one of the world's most toxic plants than beside a Pizza Hut? No wonder it's abandoned.

The heat tells me it's time to switch to the summer plan. That involves walking the lanes of Woy Woy at dawn on hot days and walking in Gosford only on the coolest days. I was looking forward to biting deep into the crunchy heart of Gosford but it'll have to wait. Walking in Woy Woy again means fewer and shorter bus rides and that means I can spring out of bed in the wee hours and walk as soon as it's light enough.