In this visually stunning series, actor Aaron Pedersen (Mystery Road) and writer Holly Ringland (The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart) guide viewers through our land’s unique stories, inviting us to deepen our connection with nature.
In Kosciuszko National Park, Aaron and Holly visit an unheralded site: the birthplace of the Snowy River. These headwaters have long been sacred to Ngarigo people.
They walk to the Ramshead Range, a stunning landscape of silent beauty, filled with granite tors carved in the last Ice Age. The vegetation here draws and holds moisture from the sky, releasing it to form rivers.
Three of Australia’s most iconic rivers are formed in these Alps: the Snowy, the Murray and the Murrumbidgee.
Each summer, millions of Bogong Moths find their way here to the granite caves, navigating using the Milky Way. Aaron tells Holly about the festive ‘Bogong ceremonies’ long enjoyed by First Nations people.
At Charlotte Pass, we see twisting, intensely coloured Snow Gums. Descending, Aaron and Holly cycle along the Cascade Trail to Cascade Hut. Local writer Elyne Mitchell once sheltered here: famous for her childrens’ books, she was also one of Australia’s earliest environmental writers.
Further down in altitude is the Lower Snowy River. River Guide and Wiradjuri man Richard ‘Swainy’ Swain shows Aaron and Holly how to introduce themselves to Country. They kayak on the river.
Back on land, Country opens up. We see a large wendai (canoe scar). Swainy explains that the tree from which the bark was taken is still thriving because the people who cut the bark would have sought permission from the tree. Around a campfire, Swainy shares that Country is crying out for all of us to listen to it.
Production credits: Back To Nature is a Media Stockade and Threshold Pictures production. The series was commissioned by ABC TV and funded in association with Screen NSW and The People and Parks Foundation. Executive Producer: Aaron Pederson, Series Producer: Jane Manning (Threshold Pictures), Producers: Rebecca Barry and Madeleine Hetherton (Media Stockade), ABC Executive Producer: Frances O’Riordan, ABC Head of Entertainment: Nick Hayden.
