Baby's Feet Cave

Baby's Feet Cave

An extraordinary unmarked Aboriginal art site near Rylstone, NSW.

Some of the hand stencils at Baby's Feet Cave

In my wide travels across our ancient land, I've been blessed with so many incredible encounters with the oldest surviving living culture on the planet. I compare the pride with which most New Zealanders now hold their Maori culture, with the mixed disdain that so many Aussies seem to have for our much older Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures, and shake my head. I even remember having a strange discussion with a visitor from England, who lamented the fact that Australia was bereft of any cultural tradition. I pointed out we actually have the oldest surviving living culture in the world, dating back an estimated 40-60,000 years, and she dismissed it as "oh yes, but there's nothing to show for that is there?"

Although Aboriginal sites are found pretty much everywhere, occasionally I am introduced to a site that  just oozes "special place". Whether it's the spiritual connection of land and spirit, the echoing footsteps across tens of thousands of years, or just an awe-inspiring feeling from my own psyche, I don't know, but this feeling of awe doesn't happen with many of the more "mundane" sites that I visit.

Places where this sense of stepping through the gateway of time, into a sort of cross spiritual/physical realm, include a spot I was choppered into on the border of Arnhem Land and Kakadu, where art works filled caves, and an ancient Aboriginal skeleton was tucked up in the corner of one cave. I've also been taken to a secret men's initiation site north of the Nullarbor Plain in South Australia. A condition of going there was no photographs and not to write about it, but I can say the eons of men who have left their mark there provides for a haunting and deeply spiritual experience.

Although my experience last weekend doesn't quite compare to these, I did come across a place that had that sense of awe about it. It's locally called Baby's Feet Cave, and is a five-minute walk off the Bylong Valley Way, between Rylstone and Bylong. It is unmarked, and the visitors information centre at Mudgee seems to know nothing of it, even though school groups used to go there.

Getting there

The bird-shaped boulder, Baby's Feet Cave

It's about 15km north of Rylstone, NSW, in a locality called Growee Gulf, opposite the northern end of Ferntree Gully Environmental Reserve. Bylong Valley Road swings downhill around a corner (to the right, if heading north) and a large blue sign saying "Fireplace" on the left hand side marks a fireplace, small picnic table, and room for one or two cars to park. A 4WD track heads away from the fireplace, but turns to a walking track within about 50m. Take this track down into the little gully, past the prickly Bursaria spinosa plants and up the other side. Where the track forks, head left to the extraordinary bird-head shaped boulder.

What's there

Up high on the right side of the rock, you'll see dozens of hand stencils. (NOTE: not hand 'prints', which are found throughout the world, but hand stencils, which are a much rarer form of indigenous art created by blowing an ochre or pigment over a placed hand.) Some are very clear, and others appear much, much older.

Most of these hand stencils are up way too high for the current ground level. 

Are they so old that the ground has eroded away that much since they were painted? Or were ladders or scaffolds or human pyramids used to get them so high? 

I was reminded of some paintings I saw up really high near Ubirr Rock in Kakadu National Park, and when I asked about them was told by my Aboriginal guide, perhaps tongue in cheek, "oh, the spirits painted them".

The spot takes its English name from two little baby's feet, placed higher up than all the other stencils, and way out of reach of even the tallest person. They are an aberration, but a delightful one.

The baby's feet, alongside a hand stencil high on the wall.

There is a visitors book dating back more than a decade.

Nearby, the vast wilderness of Wollemi National Park, holds hordes of such cultural treasures, most undocumented and many undiscovered in living memory and requiring multi-day off-track treks to find, but I found the location of this very special place - just five minutes from the road - so beautifully surprising.

Visit it, but as always please be sensitive and protect this very special Wiradjuri site.

www.kensbigbackyard.com.au

Special thanks to former Wollemi National Park ranger Chris Pavich who showed me the spot.