If you sleep in the shadow of the mountain you are destined to return
“The Law comes from the mountain. They go up as young people and they come back as men. Twelve years old, they’d be” (Gubbo Ted Thomas, in Chittick & Fox, 1997, 43)
The aesthetic, cultural and spiritual value for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples of the granite tors and waterfall landscapes of Mumbulla Mountain (Biamanga National Park) and Gulaga National Park on the NSW South Coast provides an instructive case study. Today, local tourism ventures seek to include Yuin perspectives in their promotional material: Sapphire Coast Heritage Tourism Strategy 2011- 2015 http://www.sapphirecoast.com.au/_assets/Part_2_The_Indigenous_people.pdf
NPWS Sign on Clarkes Road. Source South East Forest Rescue, August 2011, p 7 from http://lisaandtony.com.au/Recent%20results%20from%20auditing%20of%20RFA%20forestry%20operations%20in%20the%20South%20Coast%20Native%20Forests.pdf
These forested landscapes were the site of a remarkable transformation in the ways that non-indigenous Australians viewed the cultural and spiritual values of Aboriginal Peoples on forested land. The story is told by a handful of men and women who still kept the vestiges of traditional knowledge strong. The story emerged in disputes between forestry and woodchipping interests and the Australian conservation movement.