Are the ‘Ghost Mushrooms’ shit or awesome?
Well, yes. They’re shit. But also The Awesomest. Because it depends. On whether you are human or a fancy camera.
If you’re human, to be perfectly honest, they’re a bit shit. Going to see them would be like turning up to meet your Tinder date and finding out they look fuck all like the photos you’ve seen. Sure, they glow, but do they look absolutely anything like the pictures you see of them going all “you wouldn’t like me when I’m angry” Hulk? Nopity nope no.
What you’ll see. 
What a fancy camera will see.
WHEN & WHERE DO YOU GO?
So Ghost Mushrooms aren’t exclusive to the Mt Gambier area, but they’re a really good place to see them. If you’re committed, you might spot some in various other places, but if you’re lazy and just want to turn up and see some with the least amount of effort, ‘Ghost Mushroom Lane‘ is for you. You can find out more on the Forestry SA website, but it basically happens in May/June and if you go in late June like we did, there’s a good chance the mushrooms are gonna start looking like they’ve been chewed up and spat out, so maybe go earlier in the season. And don’t chew them up and spit them out.
There’s directions and maps and all kinds of useful info on the official website, but the guts of it is you head out of Mt Gambier on the Princes Highway towards Millicent and if you actually get to Millicent, you’ve fucked up big time. You’re going to want to turn right onto Kangaroo Flat Road about 12 kms out of town, bang along that road for about 4kms more, then turn onto Ghost Mushroom Lane. And if you miss the signs, just turn around and go home because if you can’t see a massive fucking sign you’ve got fuck all chance of seeing a mushroom.
Not gonna lie, we got there then were more than a bit confused about what to do next. There’s a few places you can park and we just sort of abandoned our car and wandered around aimlessly like idiots for a while before we found some actual signs and lots of mushrooms. Can’t recommend doing that. Have a proper look at the map before you go, park in the middle carpark, and follow actual signs. You’ll see more in less time and not have to drink your own urine if you get lost in the forest. If you’re not confident of working it out yourself, you can always book an actual tour direct through the Forestry SA website.
This is what you’re looking for. 
With your torch they look a bit like this. 
With a fancy camera they look more like this.
If you’re just heading out for a look, you need to get your expectations under control. Yes, they glow, but only a bit. So you wander around a bit with your torch, fucking it up for everyone else who are trying to see them glow in the dark, then you turn your torch off so you can see them glow, and someone else fucks it up for you by turning their’s on.
That part doesn’t sound like much fun, and to be fair, it isn’t. It’s frustrating as fuck.
But if you find a nice little corner, and there’s no one around, you turn your torch off, wait a minute or two for your eyes to adjust, and you can 100% see them glowing. They probably won’t even look green to the naked eye, but they will glow. Which is still pretty awesome that they do that. Plus, wandering around the forest at night is kinda fun. Unless you’ve seen Blair Witch Program in which case it’s fucking terrifying.
Pay your money. Book your time.
It used to be free but these days they charge $20 a car load (good value if you can cram a shit tonne of people in your car) and you book a time slot: 4pm-7pm, 7pm-9pm, or 9pm to midnight if you’re a keen bean and think sleep is over rated.
4-7pm is probably good if your want to walk around while it’s still light, get your bearings and maybe find some good mushrooms to look at when it’s dark – which will likely be from around 6pm onwards at this time of year, leaving you an hour to see them which is most likely 57mins more than you need.
7pm-9pm is probably the most popular time. Have an early dinner in town, drive out there, see some, drive home, be in your nice warm bed at a civilised time. Or Netflix and chill. Go the local Blue Light Disco. Fire up the crack pipe. Or whatever it is you do. No judgement here.
9pm-midnight might be the best time if you want to take photos because surely most people will already have fucked off by then. And you’ll have a full three hours to take as many shit photos as you possibly can.
HOW TO TAKE SLIGHTLY LESS SHIT PHOTOS.
Look, we’re no experts, but if you’ve got a half decent camera and want to give taking a half decent photo a crack, here’s our best tips for taking slightly less shit photos.
- Take a fucking tripod. And if you don’t have one, rest your camera on the ground. Or even take something like a towel with you and use that to prop up your camera and keep it still. Hand holding your camera is dumb and it is not gonna work.
- Use a torch to shine light on the mushroom so you can get focus. Once your camera has focus, switch it to MANUAL focus so it doesn’t get confused when everything goes dark.
- Put your camera on long exposure/slow shutter speed. We took most of ours at 30 seconds and that seemed to do the trick nicely. And it will need to be dark the whole 30 seconds otherwise you’ll get ‘light spill’ and it won’t work.
- Put your camera onto timer mode. In other words, make it so that you click the button, but it doesn’t take the shot straight away. This is so you pushing the button doesn’t move the camera when it’s taking the shot which will totally fuck it up.
- Cross your fingers and hope for the best.
Taking long exposure pics can be a bit hit and miss, mostly miss, so don’t be surprised if you take a bunch of pics and they’re mostly all shit.
