A group of us were heading up the Blue Mountains on the weekend to attend a book launch at Mt Tomah the next day. We intended to camp that night at Mt Wilson so we could get to the book launch in time, and wanted to do a bushwalk on Saturday.
We eventually decided to have a look at the old shale railway at Hartley. This is an old railway formation that once operated to service a shale mine in Hartley Vale. The ore (or oil?) was taken up the valley by a very steep funicular railway and from there it was transferred to another line that joined the main western railway line near the old Grose Valley Colliery.
We parked at the turnoff to Hartley Vale on the Darling Causeway. In the party were John, Chuin Nee, their young sons Jasper and Sebastian, Keith, Su Li, Brent and myself. At the turnoff is a barrier marked private land. This leads to the start of the railway.
It was easy walking on the very gently inclined railway formation – across embankments and through cuttings for about 2 km.
On the way we spotted some nice orchids and a number of interesting spiders, including a beautiful Red Headed Mouse Spider. I got very close to it taking photos and only found out later that it is a relative of the Funnel Web Spider.
At the end of the railway formation, we arrived at the old winding station for the haulage system used to operate the funicular. We could peer down the steep slope – but there was a clear sign indicating no access beyond. The only parts of the haulage system that survive are a pit and some stone and brickwork.
There were good views down to the Hartley Vale –
On the way back, at one point we noted an abundance of small jumping spiders –
And a few more photos –
More photos are online here on my website.
The cred-headed mouse spider on your pictures appears to a male (female’s head is not as brightly red) was it less than 2cm in size? Females are larger – more than 3cm.
They don’t say anything about male’s venom, is he as venomous as in funnel-web case? Or mabe not: it would make more sense if he scares the adversaries with his colour rather than relying on his bite… So maybe your experience wasn’t that dangerous after all?
But the front picture where he shows his fangs is just priceless: what an image of powerful fangs! I think no one has captured such view before and many researchers will be drooling at it! Thanks for sharing.
Beautiful story – Thank you