Walk status: Off-lead
How can you resist checking out a reserve named Dingle Dell? It sounded magical, and even on a wet winters day, it lived up to it's magical name.
If you put Dingle Dell Reserve into Google Maps, it will bring you to Fern Glen Road South. However this is small winding road with no suitable parking. I ended up parking at the end of Parkside Street, but there is only a very small area to park here. It seems there isn't many options for parking around Dingle Dell, with the surrounding roads being more of a accessway for the local houses, than to allow you to visit the reserve.
You may find it easier to park at one of the streets further out from Dingle Dell and just walk down one of the streets that give access to the reserve itself.
As we entered via Parkside Street, this is how I will document the walk, but as its a mix of bush tracks you can choose to start and finish wherever you like. Entering via Parkside Street, there is a concrete path that leads you down the hill and past the sign that shows the history of the reserve and also the many tracks within it.
At the bottom of the hill, the track splits to head left or right. We turned left in this instance, and then immediately crossed some small stairs and open grass area to enter back into the bush on the opposite side. Heading left we started making our way up hill, choosing to stay on the track referenced by the wooden directional signs as Scenic Bush Walk. Throughout the bush you'll see many different tracks you can choose to take. You'll see from our GPS Mapping that we just went exploring, taking different tracks and when reaching where we started, heading off in a different direction and seeing where that lead us.
Dingle Dell Reserve is the perfect option for Summer, with options for wide open spaces for a game of fetch, or heading into the bush to get away from the heat. You can spend as long as you like here, exploring the different tracks or you could try and use the map I photographed to plot out which tracks you want to take. However if you're like me, you'll probably soon give up on that idea and just enjoy getting lost.
George and I are loving the walks we are finding out East. After leaving Dingle Dell, I realised we were just 5 mins away from Churchill Park (previously documented here: Churchill-Park). We took the opportunity to do another walk around Churchill before heading home.
Location: 37 Parkside Street, St Heliers
Carparking is very limited, find parking in surrounding streets
Things to know:
There are toilets here at the Woodside Cres entrance
Grass areas will be muddy, especially in winter