In the years that have followed a cave at Burrill has been neglected, abused and largely forgotten, with just a small, dirtyl and faded sign giving any indication of its significance..

However that will soon change if plans put together by Ulladulla TAFE students come to fruition.

The students are undertaking a Conservation and Land Management course headed by local Aboriginal elder Noel Butler, and are looking specifically about what can be done to protect, preserve, and “heal” the internationally significant Burrill Lake Aboriginal Rock Shelter.

Many of the students spoke about healing the land, and several were even moved to tears as they spoke on site about their lives, why they were undertaking the course, and what they wanted to achieve.

The feelings were summed up by one of the leaders, Phil Butler, who said the site was “very significant”.

Looking at the graffiti and named carved into the rocks, he said, “It feels really desecrated, so we’d like to make it well again.”

That is easier said than done, as scientists in the 1930s excavated the site to a depth of three metres and took away about 7000 artefacts – many of which are stored away in drawers at the Australian National University in Canberra.

Noel said the artefacts should be returned to the region and stored in a keeping house or museum.

While a museum is not part of the students’ plans for the site, they hope to build a proper access track to the rock shelter so all people can reach the significant site.

Initial plans also include signs at regular intervals along the track, slowly taking visitors back the 22,000 years to the time Australia’s first people started occupying the cave  

As visitors walked along the track they would be taken back 1000 years at a time, and introduced tp the plants and animals common in the area at the time, along with being given an idea of the cultural practices taking place during the period in history.

When the rock shelter was excavated so artefacts could be removed, scientists ordered the site be backfilled with rocks and sand.

Noel said the students hoped to pull the rocks out of the cave’s floor, and use them to create a reflection pool while also restoring the cave more closely to its original condition.

Figures in the cave set up to represent how people lived 22,000 years ago could also be considered, Noel said.

The ideas have yet to be put forward to the relevant authorities, and there are several as the cave and the area around it come under the control of the National Parks and Wildlife Service, the Department of Environment and Heritage and Shoalhaven City Council.

However Noel said the project was important, noyt only to heal the land but to also help heal the people taking part in the project.

“There is a lot of pride for these people, restoring this site, because it is their families who lived here,” he said,