Tag: Abel

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Abbotts Lookout 2013 Dec

Abbotts Lookout

Mts Anne, Eliza, Lot. Sarah Jane (from R to L)

I was very disappointed to discover that our group had not obtained a key to drive up the road to Abbotts Lookout, which would have then given us time to also summit Marriotts. Instead, it was announced that we would walk up the road to the first, and not have time for the second. Road walking is not really one of this bushwalker’s favourite activities. I’m a BUSHwalker, not just a walker. Oh well.

Looking west to the Thumbs

 The negatives of thwarted expectations and hopes (and one less summit) out of the way, I have to say that if you’re going to walk on a road, this is the one to choose, as all traffic is prohibited, and it could not be lusher or greener if you paid someone to water it daily (that’s already been taken care of). The real test – would I do it again? – has the answer, “most definitely yes”, and would do it again even next week if the opportunity arose.

 

The trip up, I really enjoyed as I do love exercise per se, and whilst strolling drives me crazy with impatience, being let off the chain and allowed to meet at the top gave me licence to just enjoy going at my own pace. Had I not been lugging a couple of kilos of camera gear plus warm clothes for the top, plus our lunch, I would have run, but at least I was not required to slam on the brakes or wait for long stretches as we went up the road, so that made it a pleasant outing.
At the top, if you could ignore the “Tourist Award Winning” structure, which today, like almost every other day, had not one single tourist (they paying about $100 to be driven up the same road and let inside the building), the view was monstrously fabulous. What a shame they don’t man their white elephant. We would have all very happily bought coffee and cake from the machine we could see on the bench inside. As it was, we sat on the verandah and alternately took a few more shots of the stupendous view and ate our lunch. Several members of the group took just over two hours to get up the mountain, and nearly as long to get down, so it ended up a full day’s activity. 

Telopea truncata

On the way down, I had a lovely time dreaming, singing aloud as no one was with me to get disturbed or annoyed, and gazing at the scenery. Up the top, where it was higher and dryer, with stunted vegetation (mostly dwarfed eucalyptus coccifera with a scrubby understory) and far more visibility, the road headed straight for Mt Anne. I walked along, my attention captured by one of the best views of her I can remember, while to my right was an eternity of white bauera that looked like a snow storm with so many tiny white petals, light as snow flakes. Walking gave me time to fully digest this mass of delicacy. The greens of cutting grass made a marvellous contrast to the otherwise olive colours on offer. Bright yellow pultenaea juniperina stood out amongst the green with white dots, as did the brilliant red of numerous telopea truncata. Naturally, I stopped a few times to photograph. Soon enough I reached a corner where direction and altitude changed, and first I encountered a wonderful myrtle forest, and after that the forest became more truly rainforest. It seemed like the variety of ferns was endless, each one with a slightly different shade of green, but all greens being the lime-spring green that always lifts my spirits. The fronds shook in the wind that had changed from raging on the higher slopes to a more pleasing breeze once in the protection of the bigger trees. The moss seemed as if it were at least ten centimetres thick – fresh and wonderful – and it spread sidewards to cover everything but the piece of road used for the few vehicles that are permitted that way.
So, whilst it seems silly to walk on a road when driving is possible (allowing time for the real bush), I do have to say that I enjoyed this little exercise, had a great workout, and the scenery was utterly wonderful. Given no time constraints, I would opt to walk rather than drive even if someone did give me a key. This is definitely a family-friendly walk.
To reach the start, take the Styx Road, shortly after Maydena, cutting under the main road. Roberts Road, which you walk up, is left off Styx Road. Park at the locked gate, and walk upwards to the top. The actual summit is a mound of rock on the right, just before you reach the building. The building, although a blot on the landscape, at least serves the function of providing a dry verandah and wind shelter for having lunch, if needed.

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Millers Bluff 2013 Nov

Millers Bluff Nov 2013

 

Epicurus said (a few thousand years ago – when no one had heard of Millers Bluff) that it is more important to have someone to eat with than to have something to eat. With the silly side issue of starving to death omitted, I absolutely agree. And I would add in a similar vein that, although sitting on a mountain is a wonderful thing in itself – solo or with company – it is often the case that the company we have on a mountain is more important in forming our emotional reaction to that mountain than the mount itself. I have summitted many mountains solo, but my favourite experiences are always ones where I’ve shared the mountain with like-minded friends.

And so we come to Miller’s Bluff, a bitch of a mountain, a horror fight through prickly hakea, stabbing scoparia, tangling bauera and impenetrable walls of green junk that muster superior defences to defeat our best efforts to push through it. How many minutes did we spend in our monster epic to reach the summit perched on a rock looking at a sea of attacking, knife-edged greenery wondering which would be the route for the next 20 metres that might allow us to progress to the next rock where we could do the same? The actual summit never seemed to get any closer. In a trip that covered only 16 kms, we took 14 hours 36 in total, 9 hours 41 of which were spent in movement, according to my watch. My gps says only 5 hours were spent in movement, but I guess that just means we were moving so slowly that the system failed to define what we were doing as “movement”. (I guess I didn’t stop my stop-watch every time we halted to make another terrain decision). It was the dubious progress of snails. Lunch was only short due to lack of time; we didn’t get any dinner, and snacks were few and far between. The blank time was spent a little in regrouping, and quite a lot in making decisions about how to move forward. And I was with highly experienced and competent walkers.

 

The shadows were already lengthening by the time we reached the summit, and we got to enjoy sunset from the top, as we took over two hours (in each direction) to travel the slightly more than two kilometres-long ridgeline connecting the “nearly summit” to the actual summit, a mere 2 metres higher. The descent did not begin before we had passed nearby the fake summit again. I think for a mere two metres, it would be well worth tampering with the environment and gathering a few rocks; however, the views were much better from the real summit, and my favourite views were had along the ridge line coming back to the false one. There was a lake in the distance, beautifully lit by the crepuscular rays of sunlight, and the tiers to our right made wonderful silhouettes. That was a sight well worth savouring, and luckily we had plenty of time for that. Had someone heaped rocks on summit one, all that would have been missed, as would the adventure of descending in the dark.

For me, to sit on a highpoint in the glare of the midday sun is a bit of a waste of a mountain; the fact that it took us so long that we got to see sunset from the top was a bonus. I am never going to climb this mountain again, or be in that spot in the middle of a bed of green nails at sunset again; it’s good that I’m satisfied with the photographic memories I have. The collection will not be supplemented :-).

As we began our descent through the rubble, on went the head torches ready for complete darkness. Now we got to fight “blind” like knights of old on some valiant mission. At some stage someone announced it was her bedtime. I looked at my watch. It was now 11 pm. No wonder I was hungry. And tired. I like to be in bed by 10. I’d arisen at 5 in order to at our meeting place on time. It was already a long day. Blood sugar was not miraculously rising in the absence of dinner. On we pushed for another hour and three quarters.

I was dangerously tired on the way home, and after a momentary blackout where I started veering off the road, I bumped up my music to a volume that could possibly be heard for a radius of a kilometre, and drove at a mere 50-60 kms/hr for safety, so did not get home until about 3.15 a.m., and was not in bed before 3.45, as my poor dogs wanted food and attention, and, despite the rather odd hour to be showering, I decided it couldn’t wait until official morning.
Today, Sunday, I am weary but happy. That was a grand epic and I am delighted that I have found a group of similarly crazy people to do things like that with.

 
I nearly forgot to mention a rather scary incident that happened while we were climbing up. There were two of us a tiny bit ahead, which turns out to be fortunate, as no one was yet directly behind me. The guy had chosen a path to my left; I had chosen to ascend via an interesting chimney arrangement that offered good handholds at the top, using a crack that was 15-20 cms in from the edge. I tested it, as one always should. It felt solid, so I put all my weight (not much) into it to lever myself up. Suddenly this seemingly sturdy rock mass split away from the parent and I felt myself falling backwards down a steepish incline, closely pursued by a hunk of rock as large as a man’s torso. I find it astonishing the way that in an emergency like that, the body is able to push off nothing, and do superhuman feats. I pushed off air to lurch myself sideways so that the rock just grazed past me as it careened down the slope past me. I then lived in absolute terror for a second or two as I didn’t know where the others were – the scrub was too thick to see clearly – and I knew with certainty that that boulder would kill anyone it hit. For quite a while after that, my legs were jelly at the thought of what nearly happened. I include this here as a reminder of what one should always know and do anyway, which is to avoid being directly below someone who is climbing.
 
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Barrow 2013 Oct

Mt Barrow 29 Oct 2013

Yesterday was a perfect day – blue sky, no wind – just the sort of day that anyone who is sane and is not obliged to be working right now would decide to go up a mountain. So, my daughter, Elin and I  picked up my husband after work and told him we were going up Mt Barrow. I had packed his clothes.
Mt Barrow is a fabulous mountain if you don’t have much time. Both my daughter and I have run up it quite a bit from the bottom. Today, with toddler Gus in tow, we were just going to do the last climbing bit before the summit to give Elin another point. She’s enjoying this points game. She’s been in Tassie only a few days and has already accumulated three points to her great satisfaction. She’s plotting more mountains and more points on a return visit next month.

 We parked and did some mini-rock climbing with Gus before having a kind of summit relay that enabled a combination of babysitting and summitting for all who wanted to. Gus had a ball climbing smaller rocks and throwing stones into puddles while we all had an even better time jumping bigger rocks along the ridgeline from the top of the stairs to the trig.

We have been doing a “plank challenge” that is more than a little testing, but Elin said her legs were shaking, not from the planks, but from the precipitous drops we managed to find to increase the fun.
We were home in time for a not too late dinner. What a grand thing it is to live near mountains!!!
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Arthur 2013 Oct

Mt Arthur 27 Oct 2013

I have been sick in bed for two weeks, so just wanted to do something small today – but boy was I keen to do SOMETHING after so much hanging around in bed.
One of the many fantastic things about Tasmania is that at 2.30 pm you can make an announcement like: “Let’s go climb a mountain”, and it’s possible. Off we set to go up Arthur and take some photos. I had been up Arthur lots about 15-17 years ago, but hadn’t been up since, and had never actually been beyond the first of the many steel structures up there. I had also never seen the view, despite having done the climb on numerous occasions.
We were in a rush, and I knew Arthur well, so we packed nothing and off we set. On the way I thought it was a shame that I’d neglected to bring my instructions on how to get there. No problems. We found a sign pointing to the track on the main road, so took it, but everything seemed very different from the last time. I must be getting old. Memory fading ….
We parked in the car park, which I also did not remember, and off we set. WHAT? Up a road??? I remembered a sweet little track and a rockslide. Oh well. Must be getting very old. Memory fading …

We found the funny tin shed thing. Ah. I remembered that. At last we had a small attractive path. The views were wonderful, and it was fabulous to see them after all these years. We could see a huge stretch of coastline and expanses of countryside and other mountains. We loved it. My only regret was that the lighting was still too strong for nice photography, and I had forgotten my GND filter. Oh well.

 Once on the summit, my daughter grew anxious, as she’d left her toddler in the car with my husband who was not well. She thus decided to run back down quickly, while Elin and I took more time enjoying the view and photographing. Now, in case you just think this mistake was made by someone who is not used to bushwalking, or not clever,  I will stress without going into details that would involve bragging, that my daughter is very, very smart and she also a brilliant navigator. She was flustered that what I am about to describe happened, and was angry that there was no indication that the path was about to split, with each sub-path leading to an entirely different part of the mountain.
For, unbeknown to her (or us), and completely without signage, the path forks in an important manner, and my daughter took the wrong one, not even seeing the fork. I am detailing this here by way of a warning. The map that we had consulted had one track on it, so why should she question anything? Yes, she was hurrying to get back to her toddler, but she is not unobservant.
Meanwhile, Elin and I had finished photographing, and set off down the mountain. We came to the point of division in the track, not knowing that we had. It’s just that I went right around a rock, and Elin left. “The track’s here”, I called. “No, it’s here”, she called back.
“My track’s good and is well marked”, I insisted.
“So’s mine”, she responded.
Now, Elin is a top orienteer who hopes to make the Swedish junior team next season. I trust her judgement, but I also trust my own. I called out to maintain our tracks and see if they merged, or see what happened. We began to diverge, but were still in voice contact. Elin called out that her track had the hut on it, so I went to join her.
“My track must be the one I was remembering from yesteryear, but I have no guarantee that it goes to the new car park, so let’s take the road for speed”.
 This we did, and found a very happy baby Gus with my homemade muesli bars kind of spilling out of his grinning, satisfied mouth. However, my stomach felt very ill, when my husband asked where our daughter was, and we realised she had not returned.
Had she twisted her ankle or injured herself right up the top, or was she on the “other” track? Probably the latter. Let’s sound the horn in case that can guide her in. It didn’t.
Frantic with worry as she ran downhill, she realised she was on the wrong track, but reasoned it must be going somewhere useful, so she might as well follow it to the bottom and find someone who would let her use their phone. After much horn bipping, with the sun getting lower in the sky and with me wondering whether we should think about calling Search and Rescue, the sound of her phone ringing was music to our ears. She had found a very nice lady and called her phone which was still in the car, knowing we’d answer. Her track ended up at a place that was 11 kms away by car. Toddler Gus kept munching his muesli slabs, unconcerned at the absence of his very worried mother. But now all was well. We drove to collect her.
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Emmett 2013 Sept

 Mt Emmett   28-9 September, 2013

Above Twisted Tarns
This trip was so very beautiful, we sounded like a pack of dogs going “Wow, wow, wow” all the time. I took an unconscionable number of photos, from which fourteen appear here. Even that number seems rather large, but having only just come back today, I find it hard to eliminate any more than that. I need a bit more distance to be more selective.

The track between Scott-Kilvert Hut and the Emmett-Cradle saddle was a major cascading waterfall with deep pools in it, and the bushes overhanging it were laden with water, so that we were sopping by the time we reached said saddle and its furious wind, having managed to somehow keep our boots dry the whole morning, despite the snow and rivulets on parts of the track.

From the saddle, we began a kind of goose-step march through thick snow over / around (bit of both) the nameless hump on the map, down to the Emmett-Hump saddle and then through the thick scrub of that next saddle where we had to fight closely packed bushes as well as deep snow. The wind was so strong and the going so tough (and the clouds so thick) that I didn’t take any photos in this section.

 

Climbing Hanson’s Peak

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The rocks on Emmett
In fact, this here is the first photo I took after leaving Scott-Kilvert Hut. This was, alas, our turning around point. It depicts the final few hundred metres before the summit. Maybe those boulders don’t look very big. They’re not as big as, say, those on Pelion West. However, the snow made them treacherous, and we knew that a slip in between rocks that wedged a foot, or a breakage would be disastrous. And daylight was running out. It was already way too late for any help to come, and to be out there overnight would be death. We were only 400 ms from the top, but it was time to say “goodbye” and try again another, hopefully rather less snowy, day.
We arrived back at the hut sopping wet, and cold from the icy blast that had raged on the exposed flanks of the back of Cradle. We had been planning to sleep in our tent, but changed our minds. Scott-Kilvert Hut was by this stage a kind of island in the middle of a flowing lake. A hot cup of soup and dinner were in order. We hung up our sodden gear, pretending that might help it dry, but knowing that we’d have to don it again in the morning.
My sleeping bag was warm and cosy. Every now and then I could hear the wind having a bit of a rage during the night, but mostly I slept warm and snug, despite the lack of real heat in the hut. (For European readers, and I see I have many [thanks], these huts are not like yours. They are shelters with floor to sleep on, and no electricity. You bring your own stove, food, mattress and sleeping bag, and if you want a shower, you go outside for five minutes and stand in the rain.)