13/9/2008 - Cradle Mountain at Night

Cradle Mountain is a great destination at any time of the year but my absolute favourite season is winter.  In July I had a chance to take part in a winter exercise at Cradle Mountain with the Search and Rescue team from the State Emergency Service.

1/9/2008 - Wilmot River Walks

Once upon a time, the Wilmot River in North-West Tasmania was an impressive stream formed by the confluence of the Lea and Iris Rivers.  Now, almost its entire flow is tunelled through the hill from Lake Gairdner to a power station on the shores of Lake Cethana.

I had never really thought of the Wilmot River as a potential bushwalking destination until I heard about work to restore 'Dooley's Track.'  Apart from the odd article in the newspaper, I heard very little about it until recently I stumbled across the website 'Wilmot River Walks' by Bill Shepherd.

Wilmot River from Lucy's Track

A number of interconnecting walks have been established through the valley between the Alma and Spellmans bridges.  I chose the very first walk in the 'book' and started at the parking area a short way up Gentle Annie Hill.

Barking Dog Pool

I expected to be able to cross the river and make a circuit but the Hydro had other ideas.  Lake Gairdner had not been able to hold recent rains and it was spilling.  I was pleasantly surprised by the 'wilderness qualities' of this walk as I passed features such as Barking Snake Pool and a large eddy by The Barbecue along Lucy's Track.

Eddy at The Barbecue

At Ellis Flats, private property is reached and as crossing the river to complete my circuit was not possible, I endured a road bash up Ellis Road to the top of Gentle Annie Hill then back down to my car.

This has now whet my appetite to do more of the Wilmot River Walks.  It sounds like the river gorges south of Spellmans Bridge are quite spectacular.  Unfortunately these tracks do not yet link up.  Perhaps one day a traverse of the entire Wilmot Valley all the way to Mt Jacob and Black Bluff could hook up with the Penguin to Cradle Track near Winterbrook Falls.

24/8/2008 - Cradle Snow

Marions Lookout and Little Horn from Waldheim Day Hut.

Last month, a free Saturday and snow to low levels during the week enticed us all to Cradle Moutain.  The snow was rapidly retreating to higher levels but there was still enough at Waldheim for us to have some fun.

Cradle Mountain from Dove Lake carpark.

On the way out we stopped at Dove Lake for a quick snap of Cradle as it briefly peeked out of the clouds.  We also stopped at Pencil Pine Falls but, of the 4 children with us, only 3 year old TasTrekker Junior number 3 had the energy left to do the 'board walk circuit to the falls.'

P.S. This was the first time I have encountered the new boom gate at the Visitor Centre which will only open once there are enough parking spots available at Dove Lake.  The simple system only allows for tourists who want to get the picture postcard view from Dove Lake.  Hopefully the system will be modified in future to allow for people wanting to park at Ronny Creek or Waldheim to commence their walks.  It was a little frustrating to be held up by the boom gate for quite some time only to find we arrived at an empty Waldheim carpark.  Why did we need to be delayed?

18/7/2008 - The Grampians

Recently our intrepid family planned a 5-day visit to Melbourne.  As we compiled the list of things-to-do we checked when our respective footy teams would be playing.  Lo and behold, my team (Hawthorn) was playing my son's team (Adelaide) that Saturday night.  The only hitch was that the game was in Adelaide, not Melbourne. 

Mount Victoria, Northern Grampians, Victoria

That did not deter us.  After spending Wednesday night aboard Spirit of Tasmania, we spent Thursday and Friday 'playground hopping' from Melbourne to Adelaide.  Along the way we detoured from Ararat via Halls Gap and took the road over the northern Grampians to our accommodation in Horsham.

Halls Gap playground

At Halls Gap we were struck by how similar to home it felt.  With the scrubby gums cladding the granite cliffs and bouders, we could have been somewhere like Coles Bay on Tassie's east coast.  However, instead of the blue waters of the Tasman Sea lapping at these peaks, the Grampians appeared to be surrounded by a sea of flat farmland.  Very few of Tasmania's national parks are bounded by farmland so this felt quite foreign.

Picnic at Halls Gap

After a picnic lunch sheltering from the rain, we checked out a lookout above Halls Gap.  The inside of Victorian clouds look just like the inside of Tasmanian ones!

.Halls Gap Lookout

 Next, we just had time to check out Mt Victoria before sunset.  I wasn't expecting any bushwalking opportunities on this trip but when the children saw a sign pointing to the Balconies only 1.5km away, they wanted to take a look.

Kookaburra

Off we wandered, checking out the fungi, flowers, grass trees and a kookaburra along the way.  At the Blaconies, we were pleased to have visited something we had seen on the post cards.

.The Balconies

Back at Mt Victoria, the cloud lifted enough for us to see the sun setting on the ranges to the south.  We also snapped a shot of an interesting 'table rock' formation with Mt Zero as the backdrop.

Mount Zero and 'Table Rock'

P.S. Madly waving my Hawks scarf in a stadium filled with 45,000 Crows fans was quite an experience.  After trailing narrowly throughout the highly stressful game, the Hawks clinched full points in a thriller.

28/6/2008 - Tarkine Falls (again)

A mate was keen to go to Tarkine Falls so, despite being there only two weeks earlier, I was off again!

On the way to Hilder bridge, we took a fork in the road that led to a picturesque bend in the Arthur below Phantom Peak.  The peak was living up to its name with its head well in the clouds.

 After wading the Arthur and Lyons Rivers, we exployed a short distance beyond Where the overgrown section of Folly Hill Road turns off.  Just over the ridge, a helipad had been bulldozed into the tea tree scrub.  We could see along the ridge a short distance but cloud was still preventing us from seeing Phantom Peak and the Wynsmith Hills.

Once back on the track, we made reasonable time and just had time to setup camp at the Falls before dusk.

The following day, we decided to spend a bit of time following the taped 'Day Walk' route that heads away from the Tarkine Falls campsite.  Walking as quickly as we could, we climbed gradually for approx 2km to a point where the track was about to commence a sudden descent into the valley of Eastons Creek.  While we were very keen to make it out of the forest into clear terrain, our time was limited by deadlines back home so we headed back to our packs and toddled home.  Further exploration will have to wait for another day.

On a future trip, I am hoping to take my mountain bike in to Folley Road which can be accessed from the 'South Arthur Forest Drive.'  It should be possible to take the road to the edge of the button grass plains only a short distance from the Falls.

Very soon after returning from this trip, the State Budget was announced.  Lo and behold, there is money in it for the new Tarkine tourist road.  My prediction is that the road will be similar to the Abt Railway.  It will run way over the budget.  I'm guessing that the people who have estimated its cost are not familiar with the terrain to be traversed.  As I mentioned in my last post, the Folly Hill Road has literally fallen into the Lyons River due to a large landslide.  In several spots in that area, the road is cut into a very steep hillside and would only be a single lane wide.

I'm also curious about the approach that will be taken with construction.  The cheap way to build it will be to clear a massive wide swathe through the forest.  In the case of the Gordon River Road, it took the best part of 3 decades for the roadside vegetation to recover.  The new sealed road in to Dove Lake and Waldheim has been sensitively built into the surrounding terrain but I expect the construction techniques there are expensive.  I would be very surprised if that approach could be afforded with the money that has been allocated.

The tragic case of the Western Explorer shows that the government is not willing to spend the money on maintenance to keep the road open.  It has now been closed for 6 months following a bushfire and there's still no sign of when it may reopen.  Will this new Tarkine Road be similar?

7/6/2008 - Tarkine Falls

Recently I had the opportunity to complete part of the Tarkine Rainforest Track south of the Arthur River in the state's north-west.  The Tarkine is an area which many people still find hard to define.  It is a vast area of rainforest, remote mountains and rugged coastline roughly bounded by the Arthur and Pieman Rivers, Murchison Highway and Indian Ocean.

A few years ago, a company now called Tarkine Trails, started a 5 day commercial walking circuit starting at Farquhars Bridge and ending at Hilders Bridge.  As both bridges over the Arthur have washed away, both ends of the walk involve getting wet or using a canoe.  The taped route was originally marked by the Tarkine National Coalition and follows old logging roads for some of its length before plunging into the vast myrtle rainforests and button grass plains that blanket much of the Tarkine.

Our walk covered the last 2 days of the Rainforest Track, starting and ending at Hilders (Bridge) Crossing and staying overnight at Tarkine Falls.

Wading the Arthur was not too eventful.  A ford 500m downstream from the old bridge site allowed for knee-deep wading after which the Keith River and Folly Hill Roads were followed to another river wade, this time over the Lyons River.  Just before the road crests the ridge on the west side of the Lyons valley, Folly Hill Road swings south and almost disappears into a sea of bauerea while a side road (which looks like the main road due to recent use) continues over the ridge toward the Wynsmith Hills.  It was a struggle at times as we frequently ducked under or over bauera choked fallen trees until the old road became clearer as it descended to a long-delapidated bridge over Eastons Creek.

After lunch, we slogged up Hurdle Hill, a name we coined for the 1km climb featuring the alomst impossible impediment of a fallen eucalypt over 2m in diametre.  At the top of the hill, the road peters out and a final snig track is followed to the southern limit of historic logging activity.  Once the final tree stump is reached, it is like stepping into another world.  Instead of ti tree and eucalypt regrowth, we had suddenly entered the realm of towering myrtles which sheltered mosses, ferns and the most amazing variety of fungi I have ever seen.

After some ups and downs, the taped trail led us past the Blue Peak campsite to the two tiered waterfall dubbed Galadriels Cascades.  Eastons Creek was then crossed and recrossed before we eventually reached the Tarkine Falls campsite just on nightfall.  There was just enough light to select tent spots and setup camp.  While pleasant in one sense, it was a little surprising and dissappointing to find that a large canvas shelter and seating area has been established by the commercial walk operator.  In the hollow under a giant myrtle, large white drums of cooking ingredients had been stashed under a tarp.

As I fell asleep to the peaceful sound of falling waster, I decided this must be the first walk to a waterfall where the sound of it taunted me through 15 hours of darkness before I could see what it actually looked like.  When I collected water for dinner, I rock-hopped to the waterfall base and the top of the fall was out of reach for my feeble headlamp so I knew it was more than a few metres high.  In the morning, I was rewarded with a quick photography session before we retraced our steps, making good time back to the cars at Hilders Crossing.

There is some talk in government ranks about the possibility of a tourist road through this area.  I am now in two minds whether to support or oppose it.  Tarkine Falls in my opinion are very pretty but not as spectacular as the more accessible Dip Falls which are slightly bigger and on a larger watercouse.  The section of the proposed road near the Lyons River traverses an extremely steep sided valley where a large landslide has already removed most of the road at one spot.  It would be difficult to make the road landslide-proof without making huge scars on the landscape by cutting deep into the hillsides.

In terms of the scenery traversed by the road, it is quite spectacular but, for much of its length, it will only be skin deep.  The impact of forestry operations would only just be out of view.  This type of wilderness experience is already available in many other parts of the region where roads pass through similar forests.  The Savage River Rd, Western Explorer, Reece Dam Rd and Murchison Hwy in places all traverse similar terrain.

After walking in the area, I am convinced that the only benefit of the proposed loop road is to separate production forestry traffic from tourist traffic.  This is certainly an issue for tourists attempting to access features such as Dip Falls, Milkshake Hills, Lake Chisolm, Wes Becket, etc.  I just wonder whether there is a better route that links these areas without reopening roads that flirt so closely with the precious rainforested interior of the Tarkine.

21/5/2008 - Leven Canyon & Cradle Mountain

I love to walk 'off the beaten track' but when showing visitors around, I also love to share iconic places such as Leven Canyon and Cradle Mountain.

Late on a Sunday after noon in April, a visitor from Melbourne was staying with us so I took him for a quick trip to Leven Canyon.  We enjoyed a very rapid walk around the main lookout and then down to the bridge over the Leven Splits on the canyon floor.  Sadly a feature of this visit was a massive forestry burn in the Loongana Valley which made Black Bluff compeltely invisible from the canyon and it's surrounds.

The boatshed at Crater Lake with the deciduous fagus leaves just starting to turn.

On the Monday we climbed Cradle Mountain from Ronny Creek via Crater Lake.  After basking in the summit views and chatting with several interstate and overseas visitors, we headed back down via the Horse Track.  It was a glorious day and the fagus leaves were just starting to turn.  A few dozen forestry burn offs robbed us of views to the North and East but the mountainous vistas to the west and south were quite clear.

Barn Bluff and Fury Gorge from the summit of Cradle Mountain.

14/4/2008 - Derelict Mine Walks

Here's an entry I contributed to the www.Bushwalk-Tasmania.com forum recently:

Devon Mine
This is the best mine site I've bushwalked to. I expect the access has changed since Nic Haygarth wrote "On the Road to Cradle." His description starts on a 4WD track that is now a brand-new side-road labelled "Cethana" heading east from Daisy Dell. (A new logging road I suspect.) The walk is quite long (but possibly shortened due to the new road) and it descends deep into the Dove River gorge. At the end of the track is a derelict hut called the "Hotel Hilton Hell Hole" (must have been classy in its day) and a flying fox over the river to the mine on the other side (pictured below). In the main addit, there are tramway remains and a very impressive shaft head frame (pictured above). EXTREME CARE should be taken. Just before you reach the headframe, there is another water filled open shaft which is very difficult to see. We measured the main shaft to be over 30 metres deep which takes it well below river level. Given the mine's location, I expect the Dove River flows directly into the adit at times.

Pelion Wolfram Mine
My first trip to Mt Ossa started from here in 1983. This track made for a very short walk in to Pelion Plains. I can remember at least 2 gated adits in the hillside. Two wheel drive access was fine as mining had only recently stopped and the road was in good condition. In 1994 I rode my pushbike in to the Wolfram Mine and the road was just passable as far as the damaged bridge just before the mine. When we arrived at the hut (below), I was surprised to find a heap of people there. Someone had broken their ankle and had been carried (shouldered) this far to wait for a Parks 4WD to pick them up. Perhaps this was one of the last vehicles to go all the way in.

In 2004, a colleague mountain biked in with a group of quad bikes. The road had deteriorated to the point where she was able to keep pace with the quad bikes as they had to spend a lot of time negotiating obstacles.

I still hope I can return to Patons Road as I would like to find the buttresses of Sloanes Bridge and perhaps find the Razorback Track up to the Commonwealth Creek Mines (see below).

Pelion Copper Mines
Located just down stream from the Old Pelion Hut. Not much to look at. I like mines with a good explorable adit and/or shafts.

DPA Mine
As mentioned above, this is over the western flank of Black Bluff. I did this by pushbike so I also can't offer much help with walking times. It's a good one to explore as you can enter the adit for a certain way and there are remains of the tramway that was used to cart ore to the surface. I tried to follow
the road down the valley beyond the mine as the map showed it continuing through to Middlesex. However, it was completely overgrown by button grass. I was sick of carrying my bike so I returned to Smiths Plains the way I came.

Lake Will
There's evidence of surface mining on the Lake Will Track only a few metres from the Overland Track. Nothing exciting though.

Commonwealth Creek Mines
I read about these mines in another Nic Hargarth book about the history of the Mersey-Forth high country. I went dangerously close to these mines on a walk to the Hydro Hut when we visited Razorback Falls but we did not go out of our way enough to fossick. I've since heard that some equipment and water race remains can be found if you're keen enough. We were fascinated to find a large log with huge square metal pegs in it close to Lake McRae. You can read about my Hydro Hut expedition here. As the crow flies, the Hydro Hut is close to the Wolfram Mine, but 700 metres higher.

Mt Ossa
The track up to the saddle between Ossa Thetis passes by a small coal mine adit high on Ossa's NW flank. While there's not much to look at, I was fascinated that someone would be keen enough to mine way up there. I've since learned that Ewart's Track from Pelion through the Wallace and Murchison River valleys passed over this saddle so perhaps this mine dates from when this was a thoroughfare of sorts.

Dolcoath Hill Mines
This is another "On the Road to Cradle" walk from Nic Hargarth's book. This one didn't inspire me much. All the mines were alluvial sluicing so there's not much to look at unless you are into gem stones in which case, I believe this is one of the best fossicking spots in the state. The highlight for me on this
walk was a derelict hut with a couch on the veranda facing a view to Cradle Mountain past the HV powerlines from the Pieman Scheme.

Thorsby's Tunnel
A good one to take the children to. A short walk along the track from Ferndene, this adit is long enough to make it fairly dark without the torch and there's a gate to protect the vertical shaft at the end.

Round Mountain Mine
This was just 2 wheel drivable when I was last there about 5 years ago but some of the ruts were over 1 metre deep so this area may have now become the exclusive domain of bushwalkers or mountain bike riders. The main adit is where the main road from Staverton to Lorinna used to cross Machinery Creek before the Hydro Roads were constructed. It is a large gaping hole in the mountainside from which deep slimy water emanates which discouraged me from exploring too far beyond the entrance. Apparently my grandfather-in-law used to work at this mine.

Jane River Goldfield
Speaking of my grandfather-in-law, he is credited with cutting the original Jane River Track which now forms the first part of the Frenchmans Cap Track over the infamous 'Sodden Lodden.' The Jane River gold fields is a derelict mining area I would love to visit because of Mrs TasTrekker's family connection. However, the lack of bridge over the Franklin at the 'new' Jane River Track has discouraged me from doing so. Maybe one day! I have read about groups using 'The Jane' as access to reach Algonkian Mountain and the POWs. I would love to hear from anyone who has been there.

8/4/2008 - Mt Tor

Yesterday I finally ticked Mt Tor off my peak bagger's list.

I drove in to Loongana and continued along the road to where it ends at a locked gate.  It is important to realise that roads in this area have changed dramatically in recent years.  Most maps show Loongana Road becoming Alstergren Road and heading north to Loyetea which is south of South Rianna.  This road is now closed (according to the sign - someone with a chainsaw and 4WD may prove this wrong).  The other development is that Gunns have bought all the blocks of land surrounding this idyllic valley between Black Bluff and the Loongana Range.  Rather than take the logs out via the narrow winding tourist road in the vicinity of Leven Canyon, Gunns have built a new road called Loongana Link which hooks up with their private network of roads and gives easier road access to their woodchip mill at Hampshire.

Mount Tor from Loongana Link Road.

From the locked gate, I rode up Loongana Link, right into North Dempsters Road, left into Dempsters Creek Road and left into Leven Road (un-named at this intersection).  After a short ride along Leven Road, it becomes unused as there has been no logging in this part of the Leven Valley itself for many years.  The road is still in good condition making for a fun rapid descent to a picnic shelter beside the Leven River, 45 minutes ride from the car.

Picnic shelter beside Leven River.

The bridge decking has been removed so I carefully shouldered my bike and walked over the logs that now span the Leven.  As per the instructions in "The Abels," I took the left fork of Ring Road, then a right fork and a final left fork to arrive at the 750m level high on the western flank of Mount Tor.  Most of the road is completely overgrown with large bushes but I naively dragged my bike through the saturated shrubbery in the vain hope that there may be some clear riding further up.  This took an hour of hard slog which is the same as the time "The Abels" said it would take to walk up these old roads.

After leaving the bike in the bushes on the highest point of the spur road, I followed snig tracks for a while before leaving these and heading on an easterly bearing through relatively open rainforest.  One above the tree-line, I arrived at the cliffs and had the choice of some basic rock climbing or sidline around to the south where a broad gully beckoned.  I sidled most of the way round but decided to engage the rock as the scrub started getting nasty.  After the first band of rock, I was above the thick scrub and shrubs were generally only ankle to knee high.

Mount Roland and Black Bluff from Mount Tor.

Very easy walking led around to the eastern side of the summit block and along to the highest point where a small cairn had been assembled.  This took just over an hour from when I had left the bike.  The view from the top was dominated by Black Bluff to the east and the massive tree farms of the Surrey Hills to the west.  The Leven River cuts a deep swathe around Mount Tor as it flows north and then east toward the gaping jaws of Leven Canyon.

Cradle Mountain and Barn Bluff from Mount Tor.

On the way down, I opted for the 'open' gully rather than the rocks and found myself bashing through tea tree and baurea for a short way as I skirted around towards the north to regain the rainforested slopes above the spur road.  By following a westerly compass bearing, I managed to arrive back at the snig tracks that led directly to my abandoned bike.

Back at the bike on the top spur above Ring Road.  The trees behind the bike are growing in the middle of the road!

Having the bike was virtually no advantage in terms of time because it almost took me an hour to bash it back down through the scrub back to the Leven.  What I saved in leg effort was lost in arm effort as I braked constantly to avoid my hands, face and shins being shredded by the constant barrage of twigs and branches.

The clear road from the picnic shelter was a relief but the climb out of the Leven valley was quite relentless. Finally I attained the more level ground through the tree farms and an hour after leaving the picnic shelter, I was back at the car.

The moral of this story is that the pushbike was a good way to access the start of the walk at the Leven River but it is definitely not worth taking it any further.  By far the easiest way to do this walk would be to ask Gunns for permission to drive to the Leven River picnic shelter and walk from there.

23/3/2008 - Lees Paddocks

TasTrekker, Mrs TasTrekker and 3 junior TasTrekkers (9, 6 and 3 years old) left the Mersey Forest Road at 11:30 Sunday morning. Pushbikes helped our older 2 children make a speedy descent to the Mersey River and up to the end of the vehicular track that crosses Pine Hut Plain. Here we stashed the bikes safely behind a man fern and continued on foot. TasTrekker junior number 3 spent most of the time on his mother's back but occasionally hopped down to do his own small share of the walking.

Bikes made the start of the Lees Paddocks Track a bit easier.

At 12:15 we detoured to visit Lewis Falls and soon after 1pm, we arrived at the dry slabs of rock above Oxley Falls for a gloriously lazy lunch in idyllic surrounds.

Lewis Falls (top) and Oxley Falls.  Lewis and Oxley Lee were the original brothers who first took cattle up to 'The Paddocks' as they have been known to several generations of mountain cattle folk.

Between Oxley Falls and Big Creek we had the pleasure of meeting TasWaterfalls on his way out. We also met 2 of the Lees descendents on horseback accompanied by their dogs. They reported that of the 40 cattle that should be present, only 27 were spotted. They planned to return at a later date to try and reunite the herd.

We estimated that Big Creek was the half way point of our walk and this encouraged the children who were starting to wonder what they were in for.

When the children arrived at the Survey Creek gate, they were over the moon and announced that they had arrived. They didn't care when I said it was a bit further to where we would camp. Their sense of accomplishment was tremendous.

From here, our group seemed to change up a gear and it was no time before we strode out onto the glorious grassy plains with Pelion East, Mount Massif and Dean Bluff all standing sentinel over this most beautiful of valleys. We arrived at camp to join Son of a Beach, Corvus and FlyFisher at 4:15pm. We were immensely proud of our achievement.

I was stoked when a couple of Hobart walkers we passed said "Your missus is doing a great job carrying the young bloke." High praise indeed. When you add 15kgs of boy to the weight of the Macpac Possum and the various drink bottles, snacks and jumpers that ended up on her back, it was a fine achievement.

Our campsite at Lees Paddocks below Dean Bluff.  I'm not sure where it came from but the children seemed to find some spare energy to run around at the end the day's walk.

After a pleasant meal in the company of fellow forum members, we retreated to the downstairs bedroom (the lower river flat) to give some separation in case our junior walkers were noisy during the night.

The next morning dawned cool and clear with a tiny hint of mist shrouding Dean Bluff. Breakfast, packing up and farewells were dispensed with by 8:30am when we hit the track. The promise of fishing from Grandad’s boat at Moina later in the day was the commitment that kept us from staying longer. In any case, the chorus of "I want to go HOME" from our youngest walker suggested we were on borrowed time.

After flowing west through the Never Never, the Mersey River swings north to flow through Lees Paddocks before swinging east toward Lake Rowallan.  The effect at The Paddocks is a four sided valley with Mount Pelion East (top) to the west, Mount Massif (above) to the south, Mount Pillinger to the north and the ridge between Dean Bluff and Cathedral Mountain to the east.  If you look closely at the top photo, you can see the 27 4-legged bovine bushwalkers munching peacefully in their mountain paradise.

The walk out was impressive. We made excellent time and there was not even the slightest hint of, "Are we there yet?" from anyone. The only concern was that middle TasTrekker junior wondered whether her bike would still be there.

Indeed the bikes were still there and we had to chase the speedy cyclists over Pine Hut Plain before recrossing the Mersey. The last climb up to the cars extracted its fair share of sweat from us in the midday heat but our speed barely eased off. Junior number 1 proudly announced that we arrived 3 hours and 33 minutes after leaving the campsite.

By 1:30pm, we had joined the in-laws for an afternoon of boating, fishing and barbecue fun on their bush block at Moina, beside Lake Gairdner in the shadow of Stormont and Mt Jacob. Junior number 2 was most proud to land the only trout of the day.