Hi everyone, I hope you are doing well. A couple of years ago I blogged about the painting of the mega mural on the wall of the Wellington Dam in the Wellington National Park near Collie in Western Australia. You read more about that on these blogs -
Painting the Wellington Dam wall mural - 2020
Wellington Dam Wall Mural and the Collie Mural Art Trail - 2022
Officially opened in February 2021, the massive 8,000 square metre Wellington Dam wall mural, thought to be the largest in the world, was painted by a single artist - Canadian born Guido Van Helten, who grew up in inner city Melbourne, Australia. (You can click on the link to read more about the project)
Renowned throughout the world for his photorealistic large scale murals, the dam wall mural, entitled “Reflections”, was inspired by local stories and photographs collected by Guido to reflect a sense of history and community.
The best way to appreciate the scale of the work on the 367m x 34metre wall face, is viewing from ground level via the walkway along Falcon Drive at the base of the wall (as seen in the first image above).
However, unfortunately the bridge and walkway has been closed the last couple of years. The bridge is over 50 years old and needs to be replaced due to deterioration. The Water Corporation is currently designing the new bridge. You can see the bridge below the wall in this image.
Falcon Road on the map below is the closed road and bridge. However, luckily for visitors the dam wall mural can be viewed from several viewpoints.
The first is the main lookout, a short walk down some stairs from the carpark near the Cafe. You can see the lookout and the view from the lookout in the next two images.
The second is a new viewing platform a little lower down. You can either walk down the steps from the lookout, or drive around to The Quarry picnic area, and walk on the wheelchair and pram accessible walkway to the lower lookout.
The third way is from the dam wall itself. Continuing on along the walkway from the second lookout, the walkway takes you across the top of the dam wall.
There is a high fence, but please be aware of the risks associated with walking across the wall. Also the gate closes automatically at 6pm. I don't think you would want to be stuck out there!
I had to stand on tip toes and hang my camera over the edge, to get these photos (make sure you have your camera strap around your neck or tight around your wrist!). Luckily I have an adjustable screen, so I could manoeuvre it so I could see what I was taking a photo of. It is a spectacular scene. You can walk right over to the other side of the dam wall.
Above is the view from the other side, with the closed bridge to the left. This is part of the 86.7km multi day Wiilman Bilya loop walk track from Collie - which is an offshoot of the Perth to Albany 1,000km Bibbulmun Track. There are several walk trails in the Wellington National Park of different lengths and degrees of difficulty - as well as mountain bike trails. Walk Trails - Wellington National Park; Mountain Bike Trails, Wellington National Park-Trailforks.com
There is a fourth way - an even lower lookout, down Falcon Road, which hasn't been completed yet. I don't know when this will be open.
This is a lovely quiet camp during the week, sheltered under trees near the dam. I've blogged about it before -
For more information:
Explore Parks - Wellington National Park
AllTrails - Wellington National Park trails
Explore Parks - Wellington Dam
RAC - The Story behind the Wellington Dam Mural
Guido Van Helten.com/projects - and - Wellington Dam Project (for lots of background information about the project - scroll to the end to see a short video).
That's it from me for today. Do you like murals? Do you have any near where you live. Perhaps you would like to tell us about it in your comments.
I am linking up to the link-ups below. Please click on the links to see fabulous contributions from around the world - virtual touring at its best!
