WALK 1978 Vol. 29 $1.00* • Recommended Retaii Price

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CONTENTS

Editorial . 3 Battery to Buffalo Athol Schafer 4 Sleeping Bags for Sleepwalkers 11 Myles Dunphy Graham Wills Johnson 13 What's for Dinner? . Janet White 19 The Early Explorers of Victoria (1824-1840) Graham Mascas 21 Reflections . Michael Griffin 24 Kanangra-Boyd, Mountain Wilderness Fred Halls 27 Climbing in the Cook Area Gary Wills 31 Ocker Easter . Arthur Frances 34 The Top End Graham Wills-Johnson 38 The Prom. by the Sea Marian Siseman 47 Eclipsed on the High Plains 49 Survival for the Beginner Yeti 54 Incident . Michael Griffin 55 Book Reviews 56 Cocoparra National Park Graham Mascas 58 Mountain Muster 61 Mapping . Barry Short 63

TRACK NOTES At the Head of the Dargo . 65 Mt Freezeout-Lankeys Road (Three days) . 65 Tabletop Signpost-Brandy Creek Mine Turnoff (One day) 68 Dinner Plain-Red Bank Plain (One day) . 69 Mount St Bernard-Mount Murray (One or two days) 71 Snob's Gap-Conn Gap Road (Short Weekend) . 74 Goulburn River-Howqua River (Two days) . 77 Horse Hill Range-Tamboritha Road (Two days) 79 Mount Enterprise-Lake Eildon (Two days) . 81 Belgrave-Kallista-Halls Track-Belgrave (One day) 83

MELBOURNE BUSHWALKERS always welcome visitors on their walks which include easy one·day excursions and weekend trips. Extended walking tours of three days or more are also included on the programme. If you are interested, then call in any Wednesday night, from 7.00- 9.30 p.m .. to the clubroom. Hosia Lane, Melbourne (at the rC'ar of the Forum ThC'atre). Details may bC' obtained by writing to the Hon. SC'cretary, Box 1751 Q. G.P.O .. MC'/bournC', 3001.

The editor of WALK 1978 wishes to thank all those who helped in this production and are not acknowledged in the text. This includes Ann Sullivan for the mapping and Fred Halls for collating the track notes. I would also like to thank those people who supplied photographs and other material.

2 EDITORIAL

"Any fool can destroy trees. They cannot run away; and if they could they would still be destroyed, - chased and hunted down as long as fun or a dollar could be got out of their bark hides, branching horns, or magnificent bole backbones."

John Muir, founding father of the National Parks systems in the U.S.A., wrote these words at the end of the last century to rally support for reservation of that country's forests. More than three-quarters of a century later we have still not learnt that simple lessan. The spectre of massive unemployment and the consequent death of small towns centred on forest-based industries is held up by the timber giants to frighten off conservationists. It should be obvious by now that tourism is one of the growth industries and that the preservation of the natural beauty of an area must increase its attractiveness to tourists. In these days of more leisure time a growing number of people are turning to the bush for escape from their mundane working world. Wise and considerate provision of services and facilities in the towns through which all must pass to reach the bush would surely boost a flagging local economy. One has only to look at the boom in prosperity of a town such as Bright to realise that tourism in an untapped goldminc.

Bushwalkers must have a voice when decisions are being made on the future of the bush. The creation of National Parks is not enough in itself, we need to partici­ pate in the formation of management plans to ensure that we are not left out in the cold.

The land use decisions being made in Victoria at the moment will be with us for decades; our style of walking will be changed by the creation of National Parks and the. subsequent imposition of regulations where none previously existed. We will have to be patient as we go through a very difficult period during the establishment of these parks. We must persist in our attempts to have our point of view recognised and learn when to stand firm and when to compromise.

In the words of Muir "In God's wildness lies the hope of the world."

3 BATTERY TO BUFFALO

Athol Schafer Opportunity knocks but once the old adage runs, so when the invitation came to join a party planning to walk the intervening ranges between the Bogong High Plains and Mount Buffalo, I accepted it at once, for it was an idea I had often thought about.

The second last day of the year found our party, comprised of George the leader, his wife Shirl, and myself, pitching our tents in the Omeo camping ground. G & S believed in using public transport wherever possible, so Omeo had been chosen as a convenient 'jumping-orr place to reach the high plains, on account of it being served by a daily mail car from the railhead at Bairnsdale.

Initially, George had thoughts of commencing the walk from the camp, for across the river was a sign post, 'Walking Track', pointing up a formidable looking mountain­ side. "In the right direction," said George, pointing out the route on the map. But he was in a minority, the rest of the party preferring an easier start.

"Much better to take things gradually. One can break in one's walking legs less painfully by starting off on the llat."

On the way up in the mail car the driver had mentioned the name of Frank Pat­ terson who took small parties out in his 4WD. That evening we located him in town. We were told to be ready by nine o'clock next morning and asked where we could like to be set down.

Mount Battery was our choice for it was a prominent landmark conveniently situated on the Bundarra/Cobungra divide - a recognised access route to the plains. A thirty km drive out along the Alpine Highway brought us to Cobungra Hill where there was a turnoff through a gate, the first of many that had to be opened and shut during our passage, and into timber recently ringbarked with a poison axe. It was a rough bouncy ride up and down slopes either cleared or timbered, cattle grazing here and there, as far as the ford on the Cobungra. a wide shallow crossing with the sur­ rounding flats under forest shade. It could have been worthwhile to have walked this section from the highway.

When it was getting on to eleven o'clock the western face of Mount Battery came into view, appearing as a long curved slope of tumbled rocks. After crossing the inter­ vening valley and climbing a timbered ridge we stopped a few hundred yards east of the summit, off-loaded our packs, and farewelled Frank who was returning home via Callaghan Road and Anglers' Rest. The short climb to the trig. brought a long view of the Cobungra valley to the distant escarpment of the Victorian Alps. Underfoot, the mountain was a jumble of rocks, but the thin soil sustained a bright display of mauve daisies and other species of wildflowers.

The map contours of our afternoon's walk were sufficiently spaced to get us easily into the swing and the gait of an extended pack-carrying tour, the gentle undulations of the forest track gradually mounting the tops of the divide. Four hours steady pace along what is known as Young's Track led to the edge of a wide clearing, where, beyond a marshy creek, stood a cattleman's hut, solidly built of logs and in the lee of sheltering timber.

On the morning of New Year's Day we left the hut, the track now continuing through timber solely as cattle pads, but on reaching any of the intervening snow plains, radiating out in aU directions, which meant much time spent in picking it up again. The largest clearing is known as MacNamara's Dinner Plain, not to be confused with another of the same name some miles to the south. Scrub cattle browsed on the snow grass and a family of brumby horses, white blaze marks on their noses, kept continually ahead of us for miles.

4 Kangaroos and emus shyly kept their distance and snakes slithered away from the roadside at our passing, the latter being more noticeable during the warm humidity of the previo11s day- a sign of a change in the weather. Early morning the rain arrived, a light drizzle gradually setting in. By lunchtime, after we got to a large bush stock­ yard, the rain became more heavy, the wind rising, whistling through the leathery foliage of huge, massively boled snowgums, and drowning the noise of our progress so much, that a passing fox, stepping slowly and lazily by, was not one little bit aware of our nearness.

Our second peak to visit as a side trip was on the southern side of the divide, a short profile of dark rock known locally as Mount Niggerhead. Since these notes were written, complaints have been made of racism regarding the name of this jleak as well as to a creek and two rocky prominences on the high plains overlooking the West Kiewa valley. None of the maps which we had had any name at all for the peak on which we stood, although it has also been known as Basalt Hill.

Returning downhill to our packs we saw the wild horses for the last time, and beyond them, far across a deep valley, the old S.E.C. survey hut. It was felt prudent to take a circuitous route through the trees rather than a bee-line to reach that shelter, as we deemed we must, for by now the sky was booming with thunder and rent with a downpour of torrential rain, proofed nylon was hardly effective against that flood. Sloshing through the muddy wash of the runoff waters we found the hut where a note was left, saying that someone had packed up and departed the same day after spending a week's stay there, though a more permanent lodger soon made an appearance - a black rat which scratched and scampered in the roof lining and peered inquisitively through gaps down at the intruders.

By morning instead of rain a light snow drifted down as a feeble sun struggled through a patchy sky. Once more we were on the track, passing the stockyard and the remains of Young's Hut (collapsed during or before World War II) and climbing up tO the high plains proper where the snow pole line lies south of Mount Jim. The hill is basically a heap of piled boulders, as it certainly appears where it is not entirely softened by a variety of low shrubs. On its south-eastern side, quarry-like gullies echo to the cawing of large !locks of black crows that delight to perch on the rocky pin­ nacles.

When approaching Mount Jim from the south. we had to negotiate a maze of rills, some muddy and seeping, others swiftly flowin!!·with cold clear water and full of little fish, all typical of th\many watercourses that originate on the hil,!h plains. This particular head gives rise to High Plains Creek, a tributary of the l:lundarra River. the latter joining the Mitta Mitta River near Anl,!lers' Rest. l:ly heading directly from Mount Jim to Mount Bundarra, then circlinl! around to Mount Cope, one may keep to the tops of the Kiewa/Mitta divide - althoul,!h. since the advent of the Kiewa Scheme, snow water that once would have tlowed into the Mitta is now cau!!ht by the aqueducts and diverted into the western basin of Pretty and Rocky valleys. In effect the divide has been moved downhill eastward to the contour lines of the aque­ ducts!

At the time of our crossing the snow pole line reconstruction was in preparation. Here was a large stack of pine poles tinged green with preservatives awaiting erection, horses would carry the poles to the individual sites, and holes dynamited where the ground proved too hard for drilling.

From the summit of Mount Cope I assumed the role of leader showinl! the way via one of my favourite valleys, snowgum sheltered, to where the Buckety Plain road crosses the aqueduct. Along the embankment a short distance from the bridl,!e an appletree nourished among the regrowth of native trees and heath. I once read the suggestion that fruit trees be planted by spreading seeds over the countryside so that any future passer-by might find refrehsment. It's an idea that was given scientific credence when Baron von Mueller urged the establishment of blackberry bushes, but

5 which today may be termed as an eco-disaster considering the land put out of pro­ duction, the spoilt bushland and the cost of eradication. However, appletrees are innocuous, and a number were passed at odd intervals throughout the entire trip, the only question raised was were they planted purposely, or had they grown from dropped apple cores?

As we stepped it out along the service track the afternoon shadows lengthened, throwing into contrast the yellow spiked Mountain Orites, a shrub that grows in pro­ fusion along the top of the escarpment. Crossing the water where small orchids with bright petals tlourished we arrived at Wilkinson Lodge to find the place crowded with Melbourne Bushwalkers up for the long weekend. One past official, taking note of our bedraggled appearance, advised that there was plenty of water for showers, and we shouldn't wait!

Thirty-six hours later and we were at Wallace Gap above one of the heads of Middle Creek, another tributary of the Mitta. Coming over Basalt Hill we could see below at Langford Gap the machinery used in clearing out silt and debris in the conduit linking the aqueduct with Rocky Valley Dam. We were on the Alpine Track now, following the snowpoles directly to The Park on the way to Mount Nelse, and taking time off to inspect the building that replaced Johnston's Hut after the latter was burnt. This area is always popular with walkers, and so we were not surprised at the number abroad on this fine summer's day enjoying the views from the summit, where we also met a works party checking the condition of the trig. stations. Our own plan was to make for Batty's Hut and Timmin's Lookout, the latter somewhere overlooking the wide north-easterly sweep of Big River.

From the saddle just north of the Neises, terribly eroded cattle pads sidled east­ ware to the start of the New Country Spur. Once past those horrible tracks, sur­ prisingly cattle still grazing about, we entered some really beautiful country, and found the hut in a sheltered saddle, but beyond it was just a confusion of minor spurs, wooded and branching out in all directions, so that, after a day, we left leaving the lookout unvisited.

The return to the Alpine Track was via the Round Plain, part of which looks like a natural garden of alpine shrubs, hedged with snowgum; altogether one of those attractive places where it pays to take one's time. From the signpost outside the timber sheltering Roper's Hut the Track becomes more frequently marked on its descent of Duane Spu!' to the Big River crossing where, on the tlat on the far side, sheets of old iron, a pick-axe and other odds and ends may be found in the bushes, all relics of an old survey camp. A few tree limbs balanced precariously on rocks serve as a bridge of sorts, but the sensible usually find the water shallow enough to wade across.

A whole morning is required for a comfortable climb up to Maddisons Hut on Mount Bogong. At this point the Alpine Track is left, it taking off to the east across Bossiaea Hill, so named after the pea shrub well known for its prickles as well as its yellow flowers. From the hut pads follow Camp Creek up to Cleve Cole Memorial shelter. A hundred years of trampling have left the tracks up to a metre deep. Beyond are the higher parts of the mountain allowing views to as far as the Snowy Mountains in distant New South Wales. But nearer at hand the scene is a disquieting one of destruction where a maze of tracks riddle the spur crests where the top stands of Sub Alpine Mountain Ash have been logged out.

If the weather is fine and warm then it is also a day for long trousers and shirt sleeves, for this is a stronghold of Beelzebub, Lord of the Flies. Here his subjects are the march flies, always alert to sample the flesh of any intruder, and it is not until the descending spurs are reached that there is any respite from the tenacious attacks and a return to shorts.

6 MacNamara's Hut No. 1 Graham Mascas

Today we are quitting the mountain via the Staircase Spur. its track down to 1220 m dangerously worn. The blame could be partly laid at the increasing popularity of the mountain with walkers, boosted by much publicity of organised running and walking events. One time it was possible to miss the track going down and lind oneself amid creeks and lyre bird mounds; now it is open all the way.

Once we are on level ground we take the 4WD section of Mountain Creek Road which runs from its junction with Trappers Creek Road the Eskdale Spur, this allowing a round trip to be made to the summit; up one spur and down the other. Along the 2WD section of the road the roadbashing is not nearly as bad as it would seem. It is downhill, and if the skies are dear. there is a view of the Kiewa valley ahead continually delighting the eye. Lunch may be taken, the thirst slaked and the dust washed off the body where the road bridges the creek. Adjacent is the ford. still used, mainly by vehicles and ear"th-moving machinery too heavy for the old wooden bridge.

Subsidised for years and extensively cultivated throughout the region is a weed - as sometimes tobacco is foncly referred to. The tobacco farms have spread along the tlats of the Ovens and Kiewa rivers, and along their tributaries well up onto the slopes of the mountain valleys. As we walked down Mountain Creek Road the tields were full of labourers busily shifting around the irrigation pipes and sprays. for no rain had fallen in sufficient quantities for the last few weeks. and the word was that if we were looking for work, we could have got it there and then!

About five km out of Tawonga a short cut may be taken. Some maps are a bit vague here, but after the road takes a coul)le of turns to the south, a southerly con­ tinuation can be made along a shady unmade road, one much favoured by equestrians, leading to Round Hill bridge where the East Kiewa River is crossed directly into the township of Mount Beauty. Here, about the only !)lace to cam!) is at the caravan park between the road and the West Kiewa, one mile north of town. When caml)ing at these places one silently offers up a prayer that no late incoming motorist will fail to see one's little tent in the darkness. In the newsletter of the Federation of Victorian Walking Clubs someone once pleaded that isolated areas in caravan parks be set up

7 for non-motoring tourists such as walkers and cyclists. About the only place where this has been done is at a non-commercial ground, of which more later.

After a morning's shopping, replensihing our packs and George buying a new pair of boots, size twelve, we were ready to leave town. No move was made until after a five o'clock tea, for in these parts, the Kiewa valley, walled in by the high peaks, is a colossal sun trap. The solar heat hardly diminishing, we took the Simmonds Creek road, at first through cleared country with only sparse shade from the occasional clump of raodside peppermint or bluegum, and later into the coolness of a native forest. A cloud of dust blew over us as out of a speeding car ocker voices shouted unpleasantries at us; in tow a trailer carrying two or three trail bikes. After about five km climbing the road up from the Kiewa, to where it turns to sidle southward along a mountainside, we stopped to take in the view eastward to the opposite side of the valley formed \ly the high walls of Mounts Bogong and Emu, the immediate fore­ ground looking over long stretches of tobacco plants, the plants growing in long dis­ ciplined rows over which the water mortars burst in a sparkle of graceful arcs.

9.6 km out of town the road crosses the creek and climbs up to Young's Gap. Out-of-date maps show a road continuing upstream from the crossing. It is still there, although overgrown and after 3.2 km, halts abruptly at a washaway blanketed by brambles. From there on it is by compass, up through the thick bush to Simmond's Gap, and it means, if caught by nightfall, dossing down in the most comfortable spot available under the circumstances.

That is what happened to us. Soon after dawn the patrol road was picked up not far off, and breakfast was taken at the first crossing of Snowy Creek. In the upper reaches of this stream the blackberries grow in immense masses and to great heights, giving the road the appearance of a hedged-in narrow lane, the native plants have been crowded out and there must have been some big effect on the wildlife.

Fording the creek and its tributaries a dozen times or more and we were on our way to Freeburgh Bridge, spurred on by pleasant memories and hope for an early lunch; but on arrival our appetites were quickly forgotten. The area had become a kind of unsupervised camping ground for caravanners; gaily coloured toilet papers littered the beach of the Ovens, canned music blared, a gent tested his CB transceiver, small boys out with their Christmas airguns. "Only gonna shoot birds and rabbits, mister." We had been well warned to boil all drinking water. Refuge and shade were found across the road in the outskirts of a pine plantation, and after the day cooled, we were off through those same pines, picking up the Reliance Track, or rather its replacement, a raw new patrol track steeply ascending our next ridge.

The new track soon made itself felt with a number of steep pinches, but these would have been as nothing when compared to sections of the original relic of the mining days, parts of which existed climbing straight up the mountainside. Thump, thump. Kangaroos raced through the timber above us as we disturbed their browsing, and it was with a sense of relief that we regained our breath, resting on the ridgetop. Descending the first kilometre and a half, too, was hard on the hamstrings, bracing the legs every step down the steep road surface. When the gradient eased so did our pace, taking us swiftly down cool glades of native timber, the forest floor green with lush grasses and low ferns, until by last light we reached the campsite. The ground with a disturbed look of half-buried river pebbles spoke silently of the long gone days of the feverish rushes.

Another ridge had to be surmounted before we could enter the Buckland valley. So it was up early, finding our way out of the labyrinth of the goldfield tangled with blackberries, water courses and uncompleted new roads. Finally Growler's Creek was followed down into the settlement of Wandiligong, a very pleasant place, and then it was over the bridge at Morse's Creek and soon we were in more pine plantations, at first along easy gradients, pine needles cushioning every step, and then an almost hands-and-knees crawl up a furrowed sun-baked fire-break, and, again, more steep

8 km

15

BUFFALO

10

TO

5

0

BATTERY

14) Graham Mascas

10 pinches but through dry native forest up to an altitude of 915 m, the highest spot being further along at 964 m - the Eagle's Peak. 1.6 km to the south is Clear Spot, aptly named on account of its all round views.

Our afternoon's walk took us along the Dingo Ridge Track overlooking the Buck­ land Valley to the walls and spurs of the Mount Buffalo Plateau. Reaching the power line, we descended the service road to the paddocks below, where an unformed road, not marked on the maps, led out to the sealed main road a little distance from Devil's Creek.

Brrokside, the next camp, was a little further down the road. An angler com­ plained that his previous evening's fishing came to naught when his selected pool was disturbed by Italian labourers diving straight in, cooling off after a day in the tobacco fields. We forded the Buckland, set up camp on the far bank, where early next morn­ ing we scouted around looking for the start of the route up to the plateau. Route only it is, hardly any traces of the original track may now be seen, Federation yellow markers nailed to trees showing the way. On the lower slopes traces of the mining era still exist, aqueducts that once conveyed water to the diggings. Now there is no water between the river and the rim of the plateau.

The climb through the thick bush took a good eight hours, and it was warm for the slope faced the morning sun. George should have been awarded a mountaincraft certificate there and then the way he coaxed his complaining party successfully to the top, where, at Lake Catani tents were pitched for the last time, although we remained on the plateau for the next few days. Our walks were leisurely affairs, for the wild­ flowers were at their best, and many a specimen or group became the focus of Shirl's close up camera lens.

The camping ground contains a 'walk-in' area, where one is not disturbed by traffic moving in or out at all hours, as well as giving an added sense of security. One evening the National Park staff arranged an open air show by the lakeside. There was a talk on the management of the park, illustrated with slides. The audience applauded the statement that the camping ground was to be no more developed than beyond the existing services, that is, an electricity supply was not to be introduced, so retaining the naturalness of the surroundings as much as possible. There were also a few gasps when it was mentioned that snakes, protected creatures in the park, had to be removed from the camping ground every so often!

Another problem touched upon was the question of horses. They are an attractive way of seeing the park, but unfortunately sharp hooves cause soil damage and the seeds of noxious weeds are distributed in their droppings. One day we walked out to Mac's Point in the south, trying to avoid the road bash to Tatra Inn by following the horse tracks, a tactic not altogether successful, for in places the sealed road and bridle path are co-existent. Some of the walking tracks, too, were in need of mainten­ ance, one in particular being along Bunyip Creek where nests of logs are an obstacle making for a rather messy progress in wet weather.

Travel arrangements were concluded by securing a vacancy on the Railways bus that conveys guests between the Chalet and Wangaratta. While waiting we visited the various lookouts on the northern rim of the plateau, trying to discern the route over which we had come. But the view ended at Mount Bogong in the blue haze of distance.

SLEEPING BAGS FOR SLEEPWALKERS!

A few years ago the U.S. army's 'think tank' came up with the idea of dividing service sleeping bags from the waist down as an aid to mobility in an emergency. However, in practice, these sleeping bags proved to be much colder for it was no longer possible to generate the mutual warmth of legs being kept together. The project was soon abandoned.

11 Myles J. Dunphy, O.B.E., L.F.R.A.l.A. (N.S. W.)

Where is the history of Australian bushwalking to be found ? Together with no more than three or four other publications appearing annually or biennially, Walk is one of the few places where the continuing process of recording that history is likely to be attempted. But the history of bushwalking is an elusive thing. Bushwalkers are a diffuse and unorganised body of people, and aim to leave no sign of their passing.

That which is elusive must often be approached obliquely. If the stories of some well-known "names" on the bushwalking scene are told, there is a possibility that the threads of the wider history of bushwalking will be drawn in as well by way of the issues and activities with which they have been concerned. Perhaps the result will encompass more than just the area of bushwalking hagiography. Accordingly in the next few issues of Walk a series is planned . ..

12 SOME AUSTRALIAN BUSHWALKERS- I

MYLES DUNPHY

Graham Wills-Johnson

The Orizaba Cricket Club was formed in 1908. The Kosciusko State Park was created in 1944. The connection between these two events may not at first be entirely obvious.

Owing to lack of money, difficulty was experienced by the cricket club in getting together the necessary gear, although eventually these difficulties were overcome and for about three seasons challenge matches took place between the O.C.C. and other junior clubs in the Sydney of that day. Meanwhile, perhaps because of these early vicissitudes, or perhaps as a result of surplus energy and curiosity about the world around, the Orizaba Tourist Club, with a membership list strikingly similar to that of the cricket club, came into being. The Orizaba Tourist Club staged one-day walks with the object of seeing the further environs of Sydney: Parramatta Park, La Perouse, and (after a ferry ride to Manly) Newport Beach were visited on foot.

Then, about December 1910, four members oftheO.T.C. took a train to Katoomba and stayed for a week at a boarding house. The impact of the Blue Mountains scenery was electric. For one of the four at least a new world had been opened, and a lifetime of work for which he should be long remembered by the bushwalkers of this country (the term was then unknown) was about to begin.

Myles Joseph Dunphy, O.B.E., L.F.R.A.I.A., was born in Melbourne on 19th October 1891, but grew up in Sydney and Kiama.1 The eldest of a family of six, he had to start work to help in their support when the family returned to Sydney from Kiama in 1907, and was only able to enter his chosen profession of architecture after years of evening courses and part-time study. He was registered as an architect in 1923, elected to Fellowship of the Royal Australian Institute of Architects in 1951, and honoured with Life Fellowship in 1970. In 1916 he became a part-time assistant teacher in building construction subjects at the Sydney Technical College, and he was appointed to the full-time staff in 1922. The evolution first of the University of Technology and then of the University of New South Wales over the succeeding forty years is somewhat complex, but by the time of Dunphy's retirement at the end of 1963 at the age of 71, he had become Lecturer in Architecture in charge of division "B" of the School of Architecture at Ultimo, and was lecturing in architectural subjects at the University of Kensington.

Although in 1910 Dunphy and his friends had on one occasion reached Cox's River, about half way to Jenolan Caves from Katoomba, it was not until October 1912, after gaining further experience with their experiment equipment, and "after a deal of thought and much study of the booklet 'With Swag and Bil/y'2 " that they felt in a position to undertake an extended walk into rugged Blue Mountains territory. Precisely because of the success of men like Dunphy in promoting bushwalking as an enjoyable and healthy way of life now enjoyed by thousands, it is perhaps difficult to regain the perspectives of 1912, when such ventures were not to be entered upon lightly. Much of the area had not then been mapped - some of it, indeed, had not even been properly explored, despite its proximity to the oldest city in Australia. "We were greatly interested in the blank areas of the Parish maps which we carried," says Dunphy of this period. "We noted (hat 'dray tracks' were indicated in some areas, and bridle tracksofwhich there were no signs. We concluded that cattlf'menhad ji1mished information of possible routes."

The 1912 tour started at Katoomba and went across to J enolan by way of an established track. After several days there inspecting the caves, and discovering from

13 the Chief Guide that he knew nothing of the country between Jenolan Caves and Lower Burragorang, they decided to make for Lower Burragorang anyway by setting off down the Jenolan River. They were stopped by the sheer walls of Hellgate Gorge, and in trying to flank it on the southern side Dunphy injured his achilles tendon. They had to retreat from their original project with a 54 km road bash to Mount Victoria, whence they took a train to Wentworth Falls. There Dunphy was able to buy a pair of rubber gymnasium boots and the intended walk could be resumed des­ pite the injury. They completed the journey to Picton by way of King's Tableland, Burragorang and the Nattai. The tour lasted two weeks.

In October 1913, Dunphy and H.R. Gallop, starting from Picton Lakes (Couridjah) railway station followed a route down Blue Gum Creek, Lower Nattai and the Burra­ gorang Valley, ascending then to Yerranderie, where they met many local miners and bushmen. From there the route was by way of Colong Caves to the Kowmung, up Spring Ridge to the old Werong diggings, and then to Wombeyan Caves. The Wollon­ dilly River was crossed at Good mans Ford below Bullio Station, and the tour finished one freezing night, 2Y2 weeks after it began, at Mittagong. "A better wilderness experience than the last" was Dunphy's summary.

In October 1914 Dunphy and Gallop pursued an even rougher route down Hol­ lander's River and the Kowmung in appalling weather, with repeated climbs to plateau level on either side. For the sake of the record this can be summarised as follows: Katoomba, Jenolan, Gingkin Point, Council Creek, Hollander's River to Chardon Canyon. The plan had been to follow down the Kowmung, but Morong Deep (named later) proved too tough. They flanked it on the west, returning to the river by way of Peatfield's Creek. Crossing the Kowmung they climbed to the Boyd Plateau at Morong Mountain, dropped again by Megalith Ridge to the confluence of Hanrahan's Creek with the now-in-flood Kowmung, followed it down only as far as Werong Creek and then climbed again to the Boyd by way of Misery Ridge to Wooglemai. From there they found the Boyd Rang~. and, descending the ridge (upon which then there was no track), they finished by way of Colong Caves, Yerranderie and Picton. "A very rugged experience" was Dunphy's comment in 1977. Perhaps he has forgotten some of the youthful enthusiasm he clearly felt (admittedly at an early stage of the trip, before the weather had turned really bad and the rivers began to llood) when he wrote the following in 1914 in his log book3 : "Turning east, we could see a huge gap cutting into the plateau yonder. This would be the gorge of Box Creek. the mouth of which only is marked 011 the map. It is unsurveyed and officially unknown. We could see right up Box Creek Gorge. Its rugged beauty was a sight to see. The dense, timber·covered bluffs and slopes were splendid. At the head of the gorge we were astonished and surprised to see a most magnificent waterfall of four great leaps plunging from the plateau let•el down into •Me gorge. We would be about 1·1 Y.z miles from the falls, too far away to hear the roar or to judge height accurately. I should put the total height down as anything between 250 and 400 feet. The centre leap fans out beautifully. They are t•ery sym· metrical ... Now, we are virtually the disco1•erers of these falls - they are not charted."

Their commitment by now was clear. Before the end of 1914 Gallop, Dunphy and R.D. Rudder constituted themselves as the Mountain Trails Club. Within a few weeks others had been invited to join them: R.C. Doyle, J. Cockerill, G.H. Matheson, H.G. Peatfield and L.R. Davies were among the early members. The Mountain Trails Club was a tightly-knit body which never became a public club. Membership was by invita­ tion only, and proposals for membership were subject to the veto of a single member at a secret ballot held after the nominee had been seen in action on three trips. Inevi­ tably this has resulted in a limited life-span for the club - the surviving members declared it to be on a "non-active" footing in December 1971 - but it also served to create a small, intense crucible of deeply committed members whose interests were always wider than mere walking in the mountains. A closed body it may have been, but it had a truly remarkable propensity for generating other wider-based bodies and for initiating action that has demonstrably put New South Wales nearly four decades

14 ahead of Victoria in the matter of the creation of national parks, at least in the alpine environment where the southern boundary of the uncompleted Kosciusko National Park is a continuing reproach.

These were the years before the signing of the disgraceful agreement by which British publishers have for more than a generation kept material from American presses out of this country. American ideas (and action) about wilderness were then, as now, the most advanced in the world, and the ideas of American authors were then freely available here. The very name of the club attests to the existence of trans­ Pacific influences. According to A.A. Strom4 "Dunphy and his colleagues campaigned throughout the twenties. thirties and forties, spurred on by the successes of the United States National Park serPice established in 1916." Although official knowledge of and interest in public lands may have been somewhat patchy in the early years of the century, there was a good deal of private exploitation of them- some legal, some otherwise - with effects often all too obvious to the wanderers. They observed. They discussed the issues among themselves. After ten years, in 1924, they felt sufficiently confident that they knew what they were talking about to embark on action in the field of conservation.

In the meantime news of the activities of the Mountain Trails Club was spreading. Although Dunphy was only three years of age when the oldest extant walking club in Australia was formed (MAWTC, 26 October 1894), and there were a number of other walking clubs from the beginning of the century, the form of their activities was somewhat different from what is now connoted by the term "bushwalking". Much of the early club emphasis was on competitive race-walking. More significantly, it was not until about 1920 that the pressure of motor traffic really began to force walkers off the roads. Until then walkers used the public roads a great deal more than they do now, and put up for the night at hotels and boarding houses. Even when traversing rough country, for example Warburton to Walhalla, the w~er expected shelter to be provided at day-intervals along the track, and had no tent. Much of their equipment Dunphy and his colleagues had to invent and improvise. Techniques had to be dis­ covered and evolved.

Pressure of enquiries, including those referred from the Government Tourist Bureau, and applications to join which could not be entertained, graduaily increased. The alternative to having the M.T.C. expanded into some other, much more impersonal and larger body than its members wished it to be was to share with others the exper­ tise which they had gained by way of forming other clubs. This happened on a limited scale in 1922, when a series of lectures on camping, walking and bushland recreation to the Architecture Students' Club at the Sydney Technical College resulted in the formation of The Bushlanders' Club, the Bush Tracks Club and the S.T.C. Architecture Students' Walking Club. Pressure continued from a wider public, however, and by 1927 it was clear that more would have to be done. A regular meeting of the M.T.C. on 21st October 1927 was shortened,6 and the eleven members present declared themselves the nucleus of a new, as yet unnamed club, and elected a chairman and secretary to draft a set of "Objects" and by-Jaws to be discussed at the next meeting. A date for this was set, 7 and it was publicly advertised in The Sun newspaper.

The meeting was duly held in the Long Room at the Sydney Sports Club, although the formal adoption of the Objects and by-laws was deferred to a third meeting so that further newcomers would have an opportunity to voice their opinions and to consider themselves Foundation members. The subscription was fixed, and when the question of a name for the club was brought up, M.L. Berry suggested "The Bush Walkers". At the Foundation meeting H.R. Gallop suggested the addition of "Sydney" to the name, and the new club was formally founded as "The Sydney Bush Walkers".8

Meanwhile work continued in the field of conservation with results such that Strom4 is able to say "By and large many of the schemes produced by Myles Dunphy are the national and state parks of today." The present account is vitiated by four

15 factors at least: limitations of space (a full-length book would better serve); the geographical and the chronological remoteness of the author from the events; and his isolation from primary source material (many hours of research in the Mitchell Library, for which Dunphy's own papers are destined, and the archives of the New South Wales Department of Lands would be required). When, therefore, the tentative state­ ment is made that the style in which matters proceeded seems somewhat different from that of the present day, it should be seen in the light of these limiting factors. In saying that comparatively little of the campaign seems to have been carried on in the public arena, and a great deal of it by direct approach to the relevant authorities behind the scenes and on a level of personal involvement, the present author may be revealing his ignorance. Nevertheless, the impression of Dunphy and his colleagues working quietly and patiently away for many years, well out of the limelight and to considerable effect, is a strong one. How was it done?

A glance at any one of the vast number of maps Dunphy has produced suggests at least part of the explanation at once. He may have written comparatively little by way of magazine articles on the country to which he was so devoted, but any of his maps is covered with a series of notes which amount to quite a lengthy essay on the area. If the mapping authorities in earlier years covertly relied on "cattlemen" to "furnish information of possible routes", there is no doubt that they looked with very keen interest at the maps Dunphy was producing: even if the drawing of these had been assisted by information which they had been able to provide (as was ack­ nowledged on the maps), the exchange of information was by no means one-sided. The title-block of a Dunphy map always contained a prominent reference to "The Proposed Blue Mountains National Park". If the notes were full of advice to walkers, they were by the same token a constant reminder to officialdom of the claims of a valid form of land use.

Deeply immersed in his enthusiasm, Dunphy seems almost to have been taken by surprise by the stream of people unaccountably turning up wanting to join the M.T.C.; and equally caught off-balance when "About 1930 Surveyor-General Mathews, hearing of the Blue Mountains National Park Scheme, requested M.J. Dunphy to sub· mit it to the Department of Lands for investigation. It was not in a condition to be submitted, requiring much more regional design research. He obtained about two weeks' delay to knock it into presentable shape; then accompanied by maps and description and a book of photographs, it was submitted, accepted and retained. "1

Of course, in the usual fashion of Government departments, it promptly went into a pigeon-hole, for "Later it was explained to him that staff surveyors were busy working on Returned Servicemen's rehabilitation schemes. Until they had been dealt with the surveyors would not be free to investigate the huge scheme", but at least it had been registered in the official mind. If the conservation scene is a great deal more tumultuous today, perhaps part of the explanation is the desperate speed with which the machines now at the disposal of those in power can completely transform the landscape, but another part is that bureaucracies with sophisticated technology at their disposal are no longer ever in a position where they might derive assistance from the common man, be he cattleman or cartographically-inclined bushwalker. Only more strident voices are heard today.

Nevertheless, a formal conservation body was formed. Known at flrst as The Blue Mountains National Parks Committee, it became the National Parks and Primitive Areas Council in 1932, and continued to function unti11965. Perhaps the struggle was not always so quiet in the past, for the reservation of the Garawarra Park in 1933 involved "a frenetic campaign, a petition of over 4600 signatories and two deputations to Ministers. "1 There are at least two published accounts of the slightly earlier Blue Gum Forest conservation cam~aign of 1931-2, one by "F.C.F." (F.C. Fuller?)9 and the other by Dunphy himself. 0

At Easter in 1931 bushwalkers were horrified to discover that the Blue Gum Forest in the Grose valley was being ringbarked by C.A. Hungerford of Bilpin by

16 authority of a Conditional Purchase Lease granted by the Lands Department. Hunger­ ford indicated that he would be able to transfer his activities elsewhere for a sum of £150 (the equivalent of $2,5 00 in terms of March 1977 currency, 11 although it should be remembered that this was at the very depth of the depression when £150 was a target much more difficult of attainment than $2500 now would be). Although the Lands Department would not revoke the lease, it would sanction a transfer of the lessee's rights if enough money could be raised to buy him out.

The final result of negotiations with Hungerford was that a total of £130 had to be found by the end of December. £50 was raised fairly quickly, but it was quite clear that in the six weeks Hungerford allowed from the date when the terms were finally settled it would be impossible to raise the remaining £80. The situation was saved by the generosity of W.J. Cleary, who made an interest-free loan for a period of two years on condition that he remain anonymous. Hungerford was paid off, and the Blue Gum Forest was gazetted as a reserve for public recreation on 2nd September 1932. "In effect," says Dunphy,10 "the clubs and supporters bought the land at a high price and presented it to the State". "They [the Blue Gum and Garawarra campaigns] drew attention to the fact that there existed an active organised outdoor section of the community ready . .. to initiate schemes to save some of the natural features that make the Australian environment and scenery unique." "The important principle that the best scenery should be dedicated or reserved for public use and benefit" had been indicated. More than forty years later, in other states, the H.E.C. and the F.C.V. are still possible. If private merchants of "progress" can be bought off, no way yet seems to have been discovered to turn aside bureaucratic pigheadedness.

By now the movement for conservation of parklands in New South Wales had acquired the momentum which carried it through thirty years of remarkable successes. Unfortunately it is here possible only to summarise these in a footnote. 12 Unusually intimate insight into the sequence of events which immediately preceded the pro­ clamation of the Kosciusko State Park in 1944 has, however, been provided by W.K. Hancock13, and bushwalking, both intrinsically and as a comment on the insecure parks of Tasmania and the non-existent ones of Victoria, that these events must be examined in detail.

Hancock relates that E.S. Clayton, head of a government committee on Soil Con­ servation, could see little sense in cutting up good catchment country to make star­ veling farms. However, "That, precisely, was the ampition of a patriotic and flam· boyant Monaro man, District-Surve)!or C.J. Harnett". Seeing a set of plans for the "development" of the Snowy Plains14, Clayton persuaded the Premier, W.J. McKell, and the Minister for Lands, J .M. Tully, to come riding with him for two weeks in the high country. "It was on that ride, we may well believe," says Hancock, "that the decision was taken forthwith to draft a bill to establish the Kosciusko State Park". The bill was introduced on 22nd March 1944, and proclaimed on 5th June.

In setting the scene for this remarkable occurrence, Hancock describes the activities of the bushwalking/conservation movement in considerable detail; those of the much older movement for catchment preservation in rather less. He seems too busy with a wider canvas to have time to stop to analyse why he felt impelled to do this. The bushwalkers, he says, "formed clubs and a federation of clubs, which soon became recruiting ground for a very determined conservationist, Myles J. Dunphy. In the early 1930s Dunphy called for volunteers to form a National Parks and Primitive Areas Council. In 1938, this Council drew up proposals for a Snowy-/ndi Primitive Area - a million acres of mountainous country in New South Wales and Victoria. This proposal, strongly supported by other groups ofbushwalkers and conservationists, aroused the interest of W.J. McKell, the wartime premier of New South Wales."

It can be seen once again that Dunphy had the knack of making his ideas known in the right places, and this can be attributed only in part to the steadfastness with which he promulgated those ideas year after year. How much easier Clayton's task of "persuading" McKell and Tully to come riding in the mountains with him had been

17 made by their exposure to material which clearly reflected the bushwalkers' joy in those same mountains can only be a matter of speculation. If the government felt the need to alter its posture, that was doubtless a result of readily apparent needs related to catchment preservation; but in altering its posture it found a broad, firm, and thanks to Dunphy and the NPPAC, already thoroughly familiar stepping stone onto which to move. Perhaps these are the underlying reasons why Hancock feels the need to go into some detail here, even though he does not fully explicate them.

Despite the fact that its worst excesses have not yet been contained and that it has not yet been shown that it can be made to conform to the vital requirement of achieving an indefinitely sustainable steady state, the conventional view (by no means universally accepted) is that technology is a liberating influence in human life. If the conventional view is accepted, the question left unanswered is "Liberated for what?" Persistent social refusal to come to serious grips with this question, and a continued adherence to a set of value-judgements which fitted a different, now almost-vanished, reality are creating increasing problems, especially for the young. "Liberated for what?" Perhaps the relevance of the work of dedicated men like Dunphy in many parts of the world will more readily be apprehended as time goes on. Official recog­ nition came in 1977, when Dunphy was 85 years of age, with the award of the O.B.E. "for services to conservation" .IS

REFERENCES AND NOTES 1 Where no other reference is given, material is taken from manuscript kindly supplied by Mr Dunphy, and now lodged at the LaTrobe Library, Melbourne. This does not give his place of birth, which was taken from a caption in his own handwriting on the reverse of a photograph which has been returned to him. 2 "With Swag and Billy", H.J. Tompkins (Warragamba Walking Club), published by Government Tourist Bureau, 1907, 1910, 1914. 3 Quoted by P. Manning, "On the Boyd", Habitat AustraliJJ 3(1) 19 (1975) 4 Writing in Tile Last of Lands, ed. L.J. Webb, D. Whitelock and J.leG. Brereton, Jacaranda Press (Brisbane) 1969, pp142-151. 5 An article by F.F. Clausen, "Baw Baw Memories", The Melbourne Walker 39 57 (1968) concerning a trip made at Easter 1914 is revealing of the "state of the art" at that time. An article "The Walking Club Visits Mornington" on p.26 of the same issue, concerning a trip in 1902, is also relevant. 6 The Sydney Bush Walker, 215 26 (1952) 7 11th November 1927? See reference 6, "List of Secretaries". 8 This account (from reference 1) differs slightly from that given in The Sydney Bush Walker 215 29 (1952), but being more detailed, is probably more reliable. The latter source dates the third meeting at 8th December 1927. The word "bushwalker" is now recognised in The Australian Pocket Oxford Dictionary, but has undergone the usual travails of the process of coinage. Thus on the banner page of reference6 it is written as two words while on the cover i1Js one; a situation which is exactly reversed in the 1962 issue of reference . Even as late as 1975 the author noticed prominent Victorian J. Brownlie (Algona Guides, "Victoria's North-east Corner" etc) pronouncing it as two words: bushw

18 Primitive Area; Kurnell Peninsula Reserves between 1933 and 197 5 - incursions by oil refineries; Beecroft Peninsula 1945; Warrumbungle National Park pro­ posed 1937, gazetted 1953; Brisbane Water National Park gazetted 1959, originated as Patonga Reserve project 1936; Blue Mountains National Park gazetted 1959, portion of central division of 1930 proposal; Kanangra-Boyd gazetted 1969, southern division of 1930 Blue Mountains proposal, Forestry Commission threat revoked 1975: Morton National Park. originated as Tal­ Iowa Primitive Area proposal. There were many other projects on the NPPAC' files which have not (yet) come to fruition. 13 Disc01•ering Monaro. Cambridge University Press, 1972, pp.l65-7.

14 At the head of Gungarin River. Strangely enough, this area was e~cluded from the K.S.P .... but the actual shape of the park boundary thereabouts is evocative. Did even the government find it easier and quicker quietly to surround rather than noisily to confront one of its own officials"? The power of the entrenched bureaucrat should never be underestimated! 15 The Sydney Morning Haald. 31st December 1976. p.2.

WHAT'S FOR DINNER?

Janet White

I'm convinced bushwalkers are the greatest gourmets (and wine and port con­ noisseurs - consumers would be a more honest word) of any group.

You can't learn much from the eating habits of walkers on day trips because usually light lunch is the only meal involved. For the weekenders - base camps, weekend backpacking and e~tended trips-· well, that's different.

Base camps: Breakfast must be eggs and bacon, toast, butter (not your ordinary marg.) and honey or exotic spreads. A vegetarian fanatic has pumpkin soup - very nice too, once you're used to the idea at that time of the day.

Those who have come to walk take a light lunch though even then hot stews in vacuum flasks appear. For the base camp stay-at-homers lunch could begin at II a.m. and include soup, pancakes and honey, muffins and so on, continuing into mid afternoon, followed by a siesta.

Dinner is one continual "eat" culminating in a delicious Brandy Ale~ander Pie cooked at home by one of the male gourmets. Later in the evening it's liqueur time with home-made boiled fruit cake and the inevitable toasted marshmallows.

Yet most bushwalkers don't seem to be overweight. There are exceptions- one I know has a problem with a pear-shaped ~tomach - underneath the bottom of the pear a be'lt is held neatly on the hips to keep up the trousers. I'm told it's rela~ed muscle. But even that can be whittled down to the core by solid walking for two weeks on a starvation diet, carrying a 25 kg pack and doing 20 to 30 km a day in rugged country.

The idea of attempting a weekend trip carrying a heavy pack is a little daunting to most. You're terrified of collapsing from the weight of your pack and spoiling everyone's weekend while an ambulance is sought.

You start off on the first weekend walk with carefully weighed dehyd. meals, Kendall Mint Cake, chocolate and barley sugar for energy, and dried fruits to replace the fresh fruit you're used to eating. You end up with violent diarrhoea (or other equally uncomfortable related complaint), rotten teeth and desperately thirsty, having

19 nicely soaked up your body fluid with dried fruits (which you didn't realise would be reconstituted in the body).

After that attempt if you're one of those people who write notes to yourself you make a list of DOs and DON'Ts; DO without dehyds. DON'T give up- the first is the worst DO bring more loo paper DON'T forget your tooth brush

With more confidence but ghastly memories of possible food poisonin!!, on the next walk you graduate more to safer things like soup packets, rice as the staple food and dried v~:getables. Dried fruits are only used at night as dessert, reconstituted as stewed fruit - very refreshing. Snacks become more healthy - raw nuts, raisins, sultanas, carrots, cheese, even a fresh fruit.

Hardened walkers (i.e. those who carry 25 kg but complain as much if they carry only 10 kg) usually produce fresh eggs and bacon for breakfast, cooked porridge, toast, etc. There's an art in carrying fresh eggs all day in a pack - and I've never seen any broken.

Dinner seems to be soup, fresh steak (and eggs if liked), fresh vegetables, potatoes cooked in the coals. Here it's fascinating to watch the men prepare their feasts - I've come to the conclusion that a man's place is definitely in the kitchen in the home - their cooking's superb and so long as they do their washing-up as well life would run very smoothly.

With the dinner several vintages of red wines appear. Dessert tends to be tinned fruits or tinned puds with tinned cream - pancakes are out of fashion this year for backpackers. Port or whatever with coffee, followed by marshmallows toasted. (The tinned food fanatics do the right thing and carry out empty tins.)

20 But back to the main course. If you're not so hardened and can only cope with a 10 kg pack, or you haven't had time to shop, and foolishly end up with dehyd. meals, you not only deny yourself a tasty meal but lose your friends too. Next day you find yourself walking alone - a gap ahead and a very long gap behind you. Those who haven't tried dehyds. may not understand this social segregation. Confidentially, though, "chicken supreme" isn't really too bad so long as it's well-disguised with rice and lots of dehydrated vegetables.

Of course these menus aren't necessarily representative of all walkers. Personally, I loathe washing greasy dishes and wouldn't be capable of cooking breakfast and still be ready to start on time. (Waking up alarm is the cracking of sticks as the keen ones get fires started.) But for me, it's cold muesli for breakfast - if I'm hungry, a second helping, served in the all-purpose mug with dried milk and water. This can be con­ sumed without leaving the sleeping bag, let alone the tent. For afters, if it's not too much trouble, a hot cuppa, but more often a long drink of cold water.

Parsley is a great idea to go with a light lunch - minimal weight and extremely nutritious. Dinner - steak (cooked with someone else's griller) and vegetables with rice boiled in billy. If a knife to cut the steak is essential it can be wiped clean with loo paper; same applies to a plate or billy lid. The same billy is used for boiling water for after-dinner hot drink. The mug gets rinsed out and the billy doesn't need washing either. No washing up - marvellous.

Then there's the more serious business of extended walking, e.g. two weeks in south-west Tasmania (NOT TASSIE - the Tasmanians get very offended). You need about 14.7 MJ a day for this kind of hard walking.

Forget about dehyd. foods and try freeze-dried - there's a world of difference. Dehydrated foods are merely dried by extreme heat. For the freeze-dried method the temperature is dropped, the pressure lowered and the food is dried in a vacuum. Occasionally very gentle heat is used. The food ends up extremely light, tasty and nutritious, though more expensive. Dehyd. vegetables are acceptable and if you have a variety of beans, peas, onions, carrots, etc. you do quite well. Natural brown rice is a very good food for a long trip.

Freeze-dried egg powder is a boon. Combined with milk powder, grated parmesan cheese, dried chives, parsley, herbs (all very light) and water added it makes a great scrambled egg- but you do have to wash the billy!

Honey, chocolate, raw nuts, butter should be included - it seems with a long trip you crave sweet and fatty foods. Cabana is marvellous and keeps for weeks.

Once out of the bush you rush for greasy foods, fresh bread, milk shakes, beer if you're that way inclined, nuts and more chocolate. The dreams of these foods have kept you going on a long, hard day trudging in the bush through the rain. What a pity we've become so "civilised".

THE EARLY EXPLORERS OF VICTORIA (1824-1840)

Graham Mascas

What kind of men were the very early explorers of this State of Victoria'! They placed on the maps the areas we now love as bushwalking venues, but did they appreciate the wild and "remote" country we now enjoy'! How many of them were bushmen of the ability of, say, Alfred Howitt'! (See Walk 1976).

21 To answer these sorts of questions about the explorers set me reading, a task I enjoy at the best of times. However the results were quite confusing as different authors seemed to have quite different opinions about the character and ability of these famous men and not all were flattering to their subjects. Let us examine some of what is said about the earliest visitors to Victoria - the big names in exploration.

Hume and Hovel! were the first on record as having crossed the Great Dividing Range after sighting the Alps in 1824. They were an incongruous pair who embarked on what is recognised as the worst equipped expedition in Australia's history. Hume was a 27 year old Australian born in Parramatta who had obtained good bush experience on explorations with others, notably John Oxley and had quite a few dis­ coveries to his name prior to his epic journey to Victoria. That he was a capable bush­ man by this time was of little doubt though most of his experience had been gained "locally". Hovel! however was a very different sort, a 36 year old sea captain turned settler with experience of command and navigation. He had commanded vessels trading along the coast of Australia and with New Zealand but had taken up farming after being wrecked in the Bass Strait. I could find no details of his ship wreck which may or may not be relevant. It was Hovel! with his sea experience and the senior of the two who was expected to work out the degrees of latitude and pinpoint their journey. Unfortunately his estimate of their destination puts present day Geelong in Westernport Bay. However it is Hume who is remembered by the Weir and that infamous highway. Their journey is well documented mainly as a result of Hovell's diary. The dispute about who led and the muck slinging that ensued upon their return lasted over 30 years with each writing a series of articles and pamphlets damning the other. They were not a harmonious pair.

The next people into the Alpine area came secretly looking for pastures for their cattle and didn't want to advertise their presence at all. Bushmen they certainly were - not only had they managed to cross the Alps but they brought their cattle with them to such as the green and extensive tablelands of Omeo. In 1835 McKillop and McFarlane after considerable difficulty formed an outstation at Omeo, which they called Strathdownie, after following a course below the Australian Alps and crossing the Snowy River many times. Most of these explorers are not the big names of history but are remembered by the rivers and mountains named after them. Typical of these hazardousjourneys,dictated by drought conditions, was one by Hutton in 1838 when he set out from Nangutta station east of Genoa River, with five men and five hundred head of cattle. He followed the coast via Mallacoota Inlet, Wingan Inlet, Point Hicks and the Snowy River where three attempts were made before a successful crossing was achieved. Hutton drove his herd to Lakes Entrance before hostile aborigines forced him to abandon his cattle and return to Nangutta.

The stubborn ability of these people is typified by Angus McMillan. This dour Scot ms the first to systematically explore Gippsland although squatters and stockmen had occupied large areas from Omeo to the coast by the mid 1830s. His three journeys through the Gippsland bush to Port Albert were among the great feats of Australian exploration. Born on the Isle of Skye to a family with thirteen brothers and two sisters, Angus was a sensitive, solitary person who became passionately fond of his native land. He harboured a dream from childhood of climbing Sgurr Alasdair, the highest of the Cuillin Range, but though he attempted this on more than a dozen occasions, failed to reach the summit. Brought up by a strictly religious mother from whom he received most of his formal education he emerged from the islands of Scot­ land with narrow and bigoted views quick to censure any conduct which did accord with his own high principles. One example of this was his refusal to eat of a sheep butchered on Sunday. This was on board ship en route for Sydney. Because of his principles he went hungry but didn't fail to criticise his companions loudly and at length. However he found the inhumanity of man to man in the new colony more than he could stand and was soon away from the main settlements and working at the outstation of a large property. He treated the convicts as human beings, probably for the first time in their lives, and was rewarded with a loyalty which was rare. While working at Corrawong and the Monaro Plains he befriended the Aborigines and

22 learnt much of his bush craft from them. A large proportion of his exploration was in the sole company of an aboriginal chief in whom his trust was not repaid as at one time, far from home, he tried to kill McMillan. This stubborn Scot was determined to find a route for his cattle from the Omeo district to the whaling station at Port Arthur. After several attempts he succeeded. His tracks were well marked and explorations well documented though not well publicised until his dispute with Strzelecki over who discovered and opened up Australia Caledonia (McMillan's name) or Gippsland (Strzelecki's).

During this opening up of the eastern part of the State by the cattlemen the west and south west was being systematically explored with military thoroughness. Major Thomas Mitchell (another Scot) may have not been a bushman at all but his ability as a surveyor, organiser and explorer was supreme. His expeditions were probably the best run of any in Australia's early history - here was the efficiency and ability which brought success. He was one of Australia's most remarkable figures holding the posi­ tion of Surveyor-General for NSW for more than 25 years in spite of the continuous storm of political controversy that surrounded him. He was responsible for the first adequate mapping of settled parts of the colony, for the construction of the main roads and bridges and layout of the towns. He is best remembered, however, for his work as an explorer. His journeys took him over most of eastern Australia and opened up wide areas of new land, particularly southwestern Victoria, which he named "Australia Felix".

It was his early experiences in Spain and Portugal that prepared him so well for his life in Australia. He spent a large proportion of his time on staff duty, away from his regiment, engaged in topographical and survey intelligence work. It was during this work that his skill as a draughtsman and as an artist began to be recognised. When the war in Spain ended, approval was obtained to have full plans made of all the Peninsular battlefields and Mitchell was selected for this job. He spent over two years on this task and the results can still be seen and, indeed, justify this choice. After completion, he returned to England on half pay but agitated for further work, pre­ ferably in the colonies. He came to NSW in 1827 to the position of Surveyor-General in succession to Oxley who was already an invalid. His time in this position seemed to be in constant turmoil with his fights with successive Governors and Colonial Secre­ taries. The expedition into Victoria was in direct conflict to Governor Burke's orders but presumably the results justified the end.

23 The last of this short selection of early explorers is the enigma Paul Edmund Strzelecki. There have been many images of Strzelecki presented to the world, the best known being the one he so carefully fashioned himself. To most Australians he is a vaguely romantic figure, the Polish exile and explorer who was the first to ascend Mount Kosciusko. The real man behind these facades seems more entitled to pity than hero worship. Gifted and charming he might have appeared, but unhappy and unlucky he was too. As a bushman in Australia, the image is confused, but his overall ability is doubtful. His records are full of inaccuracies, some trivial, but others less so, and one wonders how much is imagination and how much is fact. The exaggerations of Strzelecki's stories deserved the trenchant comment from historian Scott: "He followed McMillan's track into the west of Gippsland and reached Western Port after a toilsome and perilous journey on foot, the difficulties of which were aggravated by his lack of bush craft and obstinacy in going straight ahead where a more expert leader would have chosen his road with a view to avoiding as many obstacles as possible".

The quarrel that flated up with McMillan after his flamboyant report about his "discovery" of Gippsland rumbled and re-echoed for twenty years. Everything one reads about this man conflicts with the popular impression of the character he tried to project. It is even suggested that his explanation for naming Mount Kosciusko was invalid and that he had the name in mind to give to the highest peak he could find. However he did climb the highest mountain in Australia and will always be remem­ bered for this feat.

Of these explorers of our State I feel that few appreciated the country they found and most came for quite differing reasons. Perhaps McMillan and the cattlemen were the only true bushmen who really enjoyed the challenge of the country and saw it as a place with a great future. Mitchell, the Surveyor, who came against orders realised its potential but one feels was without appreciation. For the others glory and reward appeared to be the main incentive. Professor Scott, summarising a number of expedi­ tions of that time ended by stating" ... much heroism, some bravado and less intel­ ligence and knowledge than was desirable went to the revelation of the country. The most picturesque exploits were not always the most valuable."

REFERENCES Thomas Mitchell by J .H.L. Cumpton. 1955. Angus McMillan- The Pathfinder by Kenneth Cox. 1973. In a Dark Glass- The Story of Strzelecki by H.M.E. Heney. 1961. The Discovery and Exploration of Australia by Feeken, Feeken and Spate. 1970.

REFLECTIONS

Michael Griffin

The road hummed monotonously beneath the wheels, as we moved towards the mountain. Sporadic conversation and a rhythmic cassette helped to keep the outside world at bay. In the back, sets of skis stretched still and straight, seeking out snow. Sibilance of wheels, headed for Wilkie.

How many times had I travelled along this road, following the white line against its ribbon of black? Thoughts started up like birds surprised into flight, going back through the years to previous times. Wilkie had so often been the setting for a joyous weekend, among people I felt comfortable with and affectionate towards. There was something about the place, perhaps just a cue to relax and forget about city strife. In all its moods, Wilkie and the surrounding high plains offered a quickening of the spirit, a chance to feel clean, involved, free. 24 Yet there were times that jarred, too. Moments when the rounds of conversation clattered harshly to the ground, a stack of cards ruflled by a breeze and collapsing into disorder. How difticult it is to really know anyone, how easy to shore up the time with a scaffolding of words. I was drifting back through the years, sifting out the various trips, surprising a fleeting smile as I remembered the moments of warmth and love. Sometimes now it seems to take so much effort to get close to these bush­ walkers whom I call friends, and I am aware of the deficiencies in myself in this regard. So easy to settle for a dangling conversation, the sweet music of a chandelier rustled by the wind. Surface sounds at most.

We had reached camp by now, and the tents struggled up in the dark, taking shape against the cold. I felt almost exultant, standing unseen in the night, under a roof of stars. Tomorrow would be my first attempt at skiing, an event I had delayed for so long. There seem to be several factors contributing to my reluctance. I was always so clumsy at school, a disaster at sports. For years my reflexes seemed interminably slow and my co-ordination gross. How could I expect to be any good on skis, demand­ ing a good sense of balance and a degree of agility. Then, eleven years ago, I was hit by a car and suffered a compound fracture to my right leg. The pin which they inserted still remains and I was often apprehensive at the image of a leg broken while skiing, and the effects of that long unyielding needle. More recently, a girlfriend had broken both legs on the slopes, and although this was downhill with its anchored boots, in contrast to the touring version with a free heel, I had added the memory to my existing caution. Yet at last the drought would be broken, a personal event of some significance, which I probably did not communicate to anyone. The years had seen a gradual improvement in my physical skills and it seemed that I had finally learnt that risks were worth taking. The stars stared down at me, as if divining my thoughts. The morning slowly filtered through the green of canvas, and a breakfast fire battled with the cold. Overhead, the sky was practically clear. It was going to be a good day. Sandshoes gave way to ski boots and we were soon ready to tackle the snow. My skis channelled into the icy ruts along the road above Falls Creek, and we were on our way. The white world passed slowly by, opening up new vistas ahead. Strange to be on skis along the road, instead of travelling by car. I had never managed to learn the names of many plants or trees, but recognition of their familiar forms along the way triggered off another drift through time. I remembered particular angles, shades, con­ figurations of leaf and stem, from so many times before. They almost leapt into relief, a sudden closure that reoriented me in this crystalline land.

It is strange and wonderful, how the mind slots back into earlier sequences and produces them for comparison with the present. Just as I was now seeing the trees along a dimension through time, so my present thoughts conjured up a jumbled array of past events, somehow merging with the here and now to produce a new gestalt. My momentary reflections recalled a trick I had used in preparing for exams, sometimes put into practice on these ffigh plains. During the week, the brain was crammed with a congeries of assorted facts and then, come the weekend, I would focus my attention on bushwalking and allow my mind to quietly collate and systematize the data. Would I now add the present experiences to the past store in similar fashion, emerging with an organized picture of this country which was composed of many separate recollections. Bushwalking, it seems, had often been a time for integration, almost an opportunity for my thought processes to wander free and sort themselves out. In the approach to Wilkie this day, was there another space for some mental cleansing? A therapeutic notion.

The crystals of ice gleamed in the sun as we tracked our way through them. Geometry was preserved by our parallel furrows, echoing the symmetry of snow. I disturbed the pattern by falling down yet again, floundering around like a stuck puppet as I tried to get body and pack back over the skis. The downhill sections were riddled with spills, driving out my thoughts in the immediacy of righting myself. I was now intent on making the distance - the reflections were temporarily shattered

25 Langford's Gap Bob Douglas

as though someone had smashed the water with a rock. The world reduced to the small patch of snow I was standing on and my timeless horizons collapsed in on me.

Soon there was a sign post pointing to Wallaces Hut. It stood out freshly amid the snow, promising an imminence of warmth and food. Downhill through the massed trees, alone in a silent world. I could sense my breathing and the drag of skis through snow. A moment's relaxation, surveying the way ahead, searching for first sight of the lodge. Thoughts drifted back now, as the concentration eased. Could I remember the first time I had seen Wilkie, with its perfect frame of trees and level ground? Yes, the enchantment was still there, not tarnished by familiarity. And so it was again, seen anew in its aura of white, approaching silently in a slow glide. The stocks punctured the snow near the railings and I was there, drifting to a halt many minutes behind the others, who had already set up chairs outside and were partaking of lunch.

The evening was like so many other evenings at Wilkie. Plenty of food, some wine, and pleasant conversation. The day's ending deserved to be peaceful after the earlier effort, and there was no thought of intimate conversation. Perhaps there are times when depth is inappropriate, when we cannot cope with closeness in any demanding, risky way. Yet not so long before, on another trip here, a few of us had despaired at the clang of words, the superficial lines. Camaraderie then seemed like an empty shell, a collective hiding place. We change with the scene, and are lucky if we meet even fleetingly at the same level. Looking back over my journeys here, there arose some special memories of that type of interaction, moments when people could meet on common ground, without the clashing of gears.

The tracks of our lives, like ski furrows in the snow, can meet for a moment if we leave our grooved safety and chance the uncharted space beyond. Its riches shine like crystals in the powdery snow, just outside Wilkie.

26 KANANGRA-BOYD, MOUNTAIN WILDERNESS

By Fred Halls

About 180 km west of Sydney, the Greater Southern Blue Mountains region extends south from a point east of Oberon, for a distance of about 70 km, while its extent in an east-west direction is about 45 km.

In this region is situated the Kanangra-Boyd National Park, a wilderness of high mountain plateaux, very deep gorges and canyons, massive sandstone cliffs along canyon rims and plateau edges, a well-watered mountain wilderness, rain forest and sandy heathlands, magnificent high and spectacular waterfalls and a large system of little known limestone caves. In all, wild terrain that provides a strong challenge to experienced rock climbers, canyoneers, bushwalkers and speliologists; a must for bush· lovers who savour the wilderness experience, a mountain wilderness with a size of 140,680 acres, (220 square miles) or 550 sq.km. As a bushwalker I prefer to think of wilderness parks in terms of square miles (or km) as then one can more readily relate to bushwalking miles, as covered during a day's travel.

Geologically, Kanangra-Boyd National Park is most interesting. On the western and south-western sections of the Boyd Plateau and the upper reaches of the Kowmung Canyon the predominant bedrock is a showy granite of red and grey tones, huge granite boulders stand high on the rolling Boyd Plateau.

But in the broken country along the plateau edge east and south, on the Kanangra Tops and the High Gangerang, sedimentary strata are predominant, ranging from hard impervious sandstone cappings (Permian sandstone 230 m), dark shales and coal measures, coarse gritty sandstones to extremely coarse conglomerates and soft talc­ like sandstones.

As one would expect with such a great variation in environment, there is a great wealth and range of plant life from heathlands of the well-drained sandstones to rain forests sheltering not far below mossy under-cut rock shelters

It is through the sandy heathlands that walking is sometimes difficult due to the prickly Heath, the spiny tipped Tea Tree, the hard branched Heath Banksia and the crowding Casuarinas that obstruct the route; tearing hard at sunburnt arms and legs. How we often suffered pushing through the Kowmung scrub.

On the sandy heathlands of the eastern plateau not only arc there splendid views, but usually during mid-November there is a great show of native plants common to the sand plateau environment.

Numerous blue and salmon Sun Orchids bloom in the warm sun while large golden Drumsticks (lsopogon anemifolius) proliferate nearby, along with the Conesticks, Heath Banksia, Pink Boronia, Coral Heath, Tantoon Tea Tree and White Heath.

The Boyd Plateau is an environment entirely different to that of Kanangra Tops. The high Boyd Plateau is mostly open rolling gum forest along the ridges, although swamplands of dense scrub divide the pink granite rises.

These !lowering swamplands along the course of the Boyd River and its tributaries are the home of numerous very showy native plants such as Golden Pea, Coral Heath, Showy Podolepis, Matted Bush Pea, White Heath, Violet Kunzea, Heath Banksia and Tantoon Tea Tree, etc. Nearby, there are enchanting grassy glades between mossy boulders of pink granite.

27 Growing on the rolling, grassy slopes of the Boyd Plateau native orchids bloom in great abundance; in particular, flowers of the genus Diuris - Golden Doubletails, Snake Orchids, and very large, fresh specimens of Spotted Doubletaiis or Leopard Orchids (Diuris maculata). Also there are large fresh blooms of the Musky Caladenia and the deep colouring of Pink Fingers.

The Main Range proper consists of large granite outcrops interspersed with mount­ ain Mallee and Tea Tree. It is difficult to forget that massive pink granite boulder poised high on the ridge not far from Boyd Trig.

The good view from Boyd Trig. (1270 m) includes the Big Misty, Kanangra Valley and Walls, Byrnes and Kowmung Gaps, in the far distance are the shimmering golden ciiff walls of beautiful Burragorang Valley. From this high granite outcrop one can view completely around the horizon.

However, a note of warning must here be sounded. Take care in navigation of this region. When we were walking in the vicinity of Boyd Trig. heavy cloud made direction finding difficult, especially as the compass was behaving in a most erratic fashion. Near some rocky outcrops the compass needle vibrated and veered by as much as 45°. There must be some strong magnetic influence exerted by rocks in this particular area. This opinion has since been verified by that of a most experienced bushwalker who knows the district well. I have a suspicion that granite outcrops on other sections of the Boyd Plateau also have this same disturbing tendency.

In certain spots, there is some difficulty finding the track along the Uni Rover Trail on the South Boyd Range. The views are mostly restricted by the growths of timber, but still this is interesting walking, mainly because of the varied growth of native plants. Coral Fern, Wild Violets, Conesticks and Golden Pea and strangest of all, a distinctive Club Moss just north of Mount Goondel. There were the unusual many-branched stems of the Bushy Clubmoss growing half a metre tall, strongly resembling a miniature fir tree.

28 From the red granite knob of Lost Rock there's a good - although somewhat restricted - view of the valley of Wooglemai and Wheengee Whungee Creeks, out towards the unseen canyons of the Kowmung with the distinctive cliff-girt Byrnes Gap further behind - also Black Hollow and Kowmung Gaps. Then still further back to the shining golden cliffs of Burragorang. Off to the right is Yerranderie Peak, while further west there is the great square bulk of Big Rick, (Mount Co long) the centre of a vast system of limestone caves.

Merle and I were greatly impressed and often awed by the grand scale of Kanangra canyons, the best we have ever seen in the Blue Mountains.

Many times thick fog swirled in through heathy hollows on the plateau, followed by the rumble and flash of lightning, the scud of rain blocking out glorious mountain views. But, later on, there was compensation in the several days of warm sun, cool scented nights, sunbrowned arms and faces. We had a week of tramping the dizzying heights above sandstone canyons, with wide uninterrupted views, and rests in the shadow of cool cliff shelters.

Cool defiles such as Wallaby Pass, Gordon Smith Pass, etc. are the environment of mosses and ferny plants below the cool dripping cliffs and overhanging rocks.

Around the cliffy flanks of Mount Colboyd there are extensive caves and overhangs situated under the south-eastern and south-western faces; in particular, near the southernmost corner of Colboyd. One very large caYern on this side overlooks a cool ferny gully, a peaceful haven of reddish Rasp Ferns and Fishbone Ferns. Tracks of the teeming wildlife are clearly etched in the fine talc-like sand of the wide floor. There are tracks of living native creatures such as Kangaroos, small Wallabies, various Lizards, Native Cats, Lyre birds and the tiny paw prints of Marsupial Mice.

From the flat slab which is the summit of Cottage Rock, the viewpoint overlooks the timbered ridge of the Gingra Range and the depths of Arabanoo Creek Canyon twisting down towards the distant Kowmung. As viewed from this point changes in the colour of the mountain greenery reveal the borders of the various types of vege­ ta tion, the blue-grey of dry schlerophyll forest, the soft green of ferns in moister gullies and the dark impenetrable green of rain forest; an attractive contrast in this timbered defile.

On Seymour Top there is the metal plaque marking the spot where pioneer Thomas Seymour first ascended to the tops in 1864, and also commemorating the first track to be cut in 1868. Just over the cliff edge to the east may be seen what remains of the old benched track where cattle were driven up from the lowlands.

But it is the grand scale and depth of the Kanangra canyons, the great cliffs and buttresses flanking the sandstone tops which are the most impressive features of the Kanangra-Boyd Park. All this is amply illustrated when viewed from the High Ganger­ ang looking north into Kanangra Deep and west across into magnificent Danae Brook - probably the finest and most spectacular canyon in all the Blue Mountains- where the stream plummets 430 m through a narrow slot. Deep down in the glen the floor of the canyon is choked with massive square boulders, their very size dwarfed by the tremendous flanking cliffs and huge vertical spires - a most impressive sight.

Another instance of immense size is that of the Grand Gorge below Mount Guouogang, the depth down into Whalania Deep being about one vertical kilometre. West of the Kanangra River is mighty Guouogang (c. 1300 m) with its 920 m Nooroo Buttress.

On Gangerang Range, along the northern side of Crafts Wall the coloured sand­ stone cliffs present a solid facade, while the southern face is overhung in many places where the finest cave shelters are located. There is a huge overhang normally giving

29 shelter to large numbers of diverse native creatures, as evidence the myriad varied tracks in soft sand.

As we wandered around the rock wall I was intrigued by breaks in the southern wall, forming rugged towers covered with blankets of damp green moss glowing in the warm sun. Water dripped from the walls nurturing hundreds of delicate fishbone type ferns. We scrambled up through a narrow pass on to the scrubby top of Crafts Wall.

From the rocky slabs of the topmost point, we were treated to superb views over most of the Kowmung River country, the High Gangerang, the Grand Gorge of Kanangra and the Kanangra Walls. Situated as it is in the midst of all these places, Crafts Wall offers a grandstand from which to view the best of the Greater Southern Blue Mountains. The magnificent views of the Grand Gorge are overshadowed by the summits of Big Misty, Thurat, Storm Breaker and Cloud Maker.

The sawtooth peaks of Rip, Rack, Roar and Rumble are part of the broken skyline which makes up the summit of Mount Cloud Maker 1165 m, best seen when outlined above the deep hollow of Gingra Creek. Further around to the east there is the double cliff line of Tiwilla Plateau. To the north the tiny silver thread far below twinkling in the sunlight is Kanangra Creek as it passes through the Grand Gorge.

Distantly, just off to the left of wide cliff-girt Byrnes Gap there is the broken sky­ line of the Blue Breaks, a name evocative of this characteristic wild terrain located high above the Tonalli Basin. This is an enchanting panorama that encompasses the best in the Kanangra-Boyd wilderness.

At the foot of the ramp just below Kanangra Walls, the track to the right leads under deep cliff overhangs to the Platform Cave, which is often used by bushwalkers as a camping cave. A cement drip bowl contains water which has dripped consistently from the overhanging cliffs.

Before the turn of the century dances were held at the larger of the caves, where a dance platform was erected. Local pastoralists and their families attended these social functions which were held irregularly, travelling thence along mountain bridle trails, traces of which may still be seen throughout Kanangra country.

Much of the precipitous country southeast of J enolan is deeply scored by gorges one thousand metres deep and through these chasms tumble the magnificent water­ falls of Kanangra country. This is the stamping ground of canyoneers who abseil, clamber and swim through deep chasms, following down streams which plunge from the sandstone plateau; through rifts such as Danae Brook, Thurat Rift, the Pooken Hole and Kanangra Gorge.

During early morning, mists drift lazily through the depths, but often much later - from the Kanangra Tops the entire height of both the Kalang Falls and the Kanangra Falls may be seen. If the morning sun should shine there will be strong contrast between square-edged buttresses, deep chasms and the tall spires of Thurat further enhanced by the silver ribbons of Kalang and Kanangra Falls. The nine spectacular falls of Kalang group total 460 m. Of further interest are the showy red Devonian sandstones situated near the top falls, and this occurrence is repeated lower down with further bands of red stone.

The Kanangra Falls are situated on Kanangra Creek, the total depth of the canyon is 610 m and the top falls are 155 m high. Other falls of note are the Margaret Falls, 100 m situated below Mount Bungin and Wheengee Whungee Falls, total 140 m on Wheengee Whungee Creek. Also worthy of mention are the Morong Falls, a large waterfall c. 270m where the Boyd River tumbles from Boyd Plateau into Kowmung River.

30 There is such a rich tapestry of native plants, great diversity of terrain and native creatures living in Kanangra-Boyd Park that makes this wilderness such an important National Park.

What a superb wilderness is the Kanangra-Boyd Park!

CLIMBING IN THE COOK AREA

Gary Wills

The first time I saw the mountains of the Cook area was in the summer a couple of years ago on a \mshwalking holiday with W-J and Stan. As we trooped up the Tasman Glacier to Malte Brun hut I was firmly convinced that anybody who ventured more than twenty degrees off the horizontal was a complete and utter lunatic. I looked at the mountains with a certain amount of awe and thought it would be nice to try to climb them. But how!

Well, after a basic and stage II course at the School of Mountaineering at Mount Cook and the acquisition of some climbing gear here 1 was ready for the 76-77 climbing season, all fired up and ready to go! ... It was a wash out ... "The worst weather for twenty years," said those who knew.

Well things weren't that bad, the sun shone once or twice and during one of those periods 1 managed to stand on top of Mount Sefton. In the company of Pete and Andy I set off to climb Mount Sefton via the West Ridge. This involved a trip over the Copland Pass to Welcome Flat followed by a walk up Scott Creek to "The" bivvy, a spacious and comfortable rock. The bivvy being at about 1220 m and Sefton being a bit over 3,050 m, we had a long way to go and so we started early, at about 4.00 a.m. The attempt ended at sunrise with soft snow and cloud filling up the valley beneath us .. . A quick retreat to the bivvy and sleeping bags. The next morning the

31 Mt Aspiring Gary Wills same thing, early rise, force down the porridge and off we go upwards. A full moon made torches unnecessary. Up we go, we come to the snow, follow yesterday's tracks, now frozen solid. We come to the end of our tracks, mark of yesterday's retreat, put on crampons, hands freeze in the icy wind, curse the wretched straps for not doing as they are told. The sun rises, we rope up for crevasse travel, three people tied together. I have to keep up, keep putting one foot in front of the other. Welcome Pass and the Douglas Neve, we rest and have something to eat. Continuing on, we can see the summit now, doesn't get any closer. Keep on cramponing up. The theory becomes practice, keep feet apart, let ankles roll so all ten points are in, concentrate on this. Standing below the summit now, belay each other up the final 6 m. The summit 10 a.m.

Take photos, eat biscuits, congratulate each other and enjoy the sunshine. The .descent. Very carefully we go down. Snow still frozen, crampons bite in. Welcome Pass and knee-deep snow, slog down to the snow line then hurry to the bivvy, pack up our gear and then the bone jarring descent down Scott Creek to Welcome Flat and the hut. Very tired, we lie in the hot springs and reflect on the day's climb.

Andy and Pete decide to go out to Fox, I returned to Mount Cook village and the Tavern Bar via the Copland Pass.

A bus ride to Wanaka, finding Robyn and a slow hitch-hike to the end of the road in the West Matukituki valley, was the start of a trip to climb Mount Aspiring (3029 m) by the Northwest Spur.

A walk up the river first to the foot of French Ridge and the steep climb to French Ridge hut and welcome relief from the wind and rain. Next morning we continued the climb up French Ridge to the frozen snow of the Quarterdeck where we put on rope and crampons and slowly wound our way up to the Bonar Glacier. The plod through the snow of the glacier was made interesting when we started falling down crevasses. Eventually back on stable ground and Colin Todd hut for hot refreshment and a sleeping bag. Half an hour later Mike and Nick unexpectedly turned up. That evening

32 the weather turned bad in the form of freezing winds and occasional snow so all the following day was spent spine bashing; in fact Colin Todd hut is so small we had no choice but to stay in our sleeping bags.

A fine and sunny day eventually dawned and caught us unawares so that it wasn't until 7 a.m. that we started off along the ridge with its easy but often exposed rock climbing. The last 460 m was steady cramponing on the still frozen snow. Concentrate on carefully putting one foot in front of the other as Robyn and I slowly siz-zag our way to the summit. Nick and Mike are well ahead of us. At last the summit! A clear warm day makes it all worthwhile. The careful descents, the hut and relaxation.

The plod back across the Bonar and eventually to Wanaka, lots of food and ice­ cream.

Back to Mount Cook and a few more climbs ... Can't wait for next summer and more climbing ...

MtSefton Gary Wills

33 OCKER EASTER

Arthur Frances

"Bloody bushwalkers! Dunno 'bout you mate, but I reckon they've got wheels in their heads.

Hey, Jill, another couple of beers here for me and my mate - Thanks luv - Good barmaid that Jill.

Heard a good story the other day about this pack of bushwhackers from one of those bushwalking clubs, Melbourne Bushwalkers they call 'emselves. Well, these four blokes and a sheila decided to fly over to Devon port, in Tassie, on the Thursday before Easter, and walk for six days, mind you six bloody days, to visit some God forsaken place called the Walls of Jerusalem. Geez, don't they get some stupid names for these places.

Anyhow, they got to Devonport alright courtesy of Reggie, and some bloke picked 'em up in a Landrover and drove 'em up to one of those big hydroelectric lakes in the mountains. Yer know mate, that Tassie has more hydroelectricity than they know what to do with. Why they flooded that Lake Pedder I'll never know.

As I was sayin', these bushwalkers got up to Lake McKenzie and didn't see a thing gettin' there because the rain was coming down by the bucket full and it was as foggy as hell. They were no sooner out of the Landrover when they put on all the wet weather gear under the sun. Parka, balaclava, mittens, you name it, they had 'em on.

After standing in the rain havin' lunch they started to walk. They walked all after­ noon, got soppin' wet, freezin' cold, saw no thin' and camped in a boghole. Talk about miserable!

Another beer please Jill. Crikey that Jill turns me on!

Anyhow, ow bushwalkers woke up the next morning, Good Friday, nothing good about it though because it was still raining and cold, geez it can get cold over there.

They started walkin' again after packing all the wet tents and stuff into their rucksacks. Yer know how much those things weigh? One of 'em said his pack weighed stxty-two pounds! Now what stupid ass is going to carry that all over the wilderness for six days? By the time all the wet gear goes in it weighs a bloody sight more.

Well the leader's got his compass out, thinks he knows where he is, one of these academic types with a hyphenated name, and all of a sudden the weather clears a bit and there on the horizon are these great chunks of mountain called the Walls of Jerusalem. They were a welcome and rich sight for this mob because for the last couple of days they hadn't seen more than ten feet in front of them.

Anyway, the clouds rolled in again and the leader was back on compass leading his little party round all the tarns.

Do you know what a tarn is mate? Didn't think you would! All my mates are ignorant. Well a tarn is a little lake, very picturesque they are with fancy names like Pencil Pine Tarn.

During the afternoon these bushwalkers saw lots of rock wallabies and they reckon also a Tasmanian Devil which are s'posed to be around the area.

34 Late in the day the Walls of Jerusalem were reached, a large complex of rock mountains, towering into the mists with water pouring from them, most of which seemed to be running through the camping spot at Jaffa Gate.

After pitching tents in the rain our party explored such places as Zion Hill, The Temple and Lake Salome. They then managed to get a fire going in the rain, cooked their tea and stood round the fne till they sank up to their ankles in mud and then went to bed.

Now one of them was feelin' a bit crook because not only had he a wog the previous week, but also he'd been eatin' this dehydrated stuff these bushwalkers carry and the muck didn't agree with him, and so up it came. Poor bloke wandered around this Jaffa Gate place in the middle of the night, in the pouring rain, sick as a flamin' dog.

Next morning, Easter Saturday, it was still raining and off they went through a nice green place called Jaffa Vale where another group of bushwalkers were also camped, enjoying the weather. Our party walked round Lake Ball which looked pretty cheerless in all that murk, then up the ridge near Lake Adelaide.

If you want to see where these places are on the map you'll have to look at Mersey 1:50,000 or something complicated like that.

By now the leader's really workln' overtime on the compass 'cos they can't see a thing. Up and down mountains, round tarns, 'cross ridges they go. Someone asks the leader where they are and he says that Lake Meston Is somewhere down there and points down into the fog. Well, yer wouldn't read about it, but the sky opens up and there where he's pointing is Lake Meston. Talk about ass! A great cheer goes up from the rest of 'em because they now think they know where they are.

Well, so as not to make them too cocky the weather closed in again and it got colder just to make things really uncomfortable. So uncomfortable in fact that they only had five minutes for lunch because once they stopped walkin' they started to freeze. Real brass monkey's weather. They camped that night in a sheltered spot high on a ridge above Lake Meston. No camp-fire was lit, everyone was in their tents by five o'clock. It was a miserable evening. The only bright thing about it was that the instant pudding set straightaway because it was so cold.

For the first morning (it was now Easter Sunday) since the walk started there was no rain beating down on the tent when they awoke. There was good reason for this because it was snowing instead, quite heavily, all over the mountains. They say it was beautiful but yer couldn't take a photo so early in the morning because there wasn't enough light.

By now this crowd is conserving their dry clothes so as they can sleep dry in 'em at night, so it's wet clothes back on every morning. Can you Imagine it? Wet singlet, wet underdaks, sopping shirt, freezin' cold wet socks and dripping boots all lying in a pool at the foot of the tent, every morning, and they reckon they do this for recreation!

After an Easter Sunday breakfast that didn't include hot cross buns, the steep wooded ridge was descended down to the Mersey River. It's really thick wild country down there and the river was fast and dangerous. Saw a colour photo one of them showed me. There they are, all standin' in the rain eating morning tea, wet as shags, and lookin' like a bunch of drowned rats.

Anyhow they spent the rest of the day bashing through scrub or climbing over roots of gigantic Antarctic beech trees - you can hardly see in those forests because it's so dark. 35 36 Rob Harris After a bit of classy navigation the leader got the party onto the main overland track that runs through the Cradle Mountain-Lake St Clair National Park. Then it was full steam ahead to Windy Ridge Hut.

By the way, just in case you've forgotten, it was rainin' and snowin' and this hut, although recently built, had a leaking roof. Luckily it wasn't over the bunks and our bedraggled crew from Melbourne Bushwalkers had another early night.

On Easter Monday morning it snowed like crazy as the group set off, south, down the overland track. Once, just once, the sun shone through and revealed Mount Geryon and the Acropolis capped white, the trees along the track bent with huge masses of snow which finally slid to ground.

A few kilometres down from Windy Ridge the track divided and so did the party - temporarily. Two, a bloke and a girl, went on toward Lake StClair. The other three decided to walk into Pine Valley.

Another beer please Jill, bit dry this story-tellin'.

Ahhhr - that goes down well!

Now just imagine the picture. Here are these three blokes sloshing through mud and water and snow, into Pine Valley and one of them goes up to his knees in a black bog, his pack pushes him forward and he goes face first into the ooze. One of his mates, thinkin' he'll drown in the stuff tears his pack off and pulls him out.

By now the wind is how lin', and the snow's goin' horizontal and all the makeshift Jog bridges over the swollen Cephissus Creek are starting to float away. A couple of blokes are on one bridge when it starts to move. Well, the bloke who fell in the mud is having a bad day because now he falls into the creek.

Yer Jearn something every day because I'm told that when you fall into a river or creek with your pack on you don't sink for the first ten seconds because the pack has buoyancy, but then it fills with water and down, mate, you go. Fortunately they fished this fella out before he drowned for the second time in one morning.

When they finally made it to Pine Valley hut there was nothing to do but drink hot soup and spend the rest of the day in a warm sleeping bag waiting for the weather to clear. Of course it never did, so next morning, off again toward Lake StClair.

During the next hours they went through miles and miles of black mud that would make the centre of the MCG on a wet winter Saturday afternoon look like a bow lin' green.

But despite the weather and the mud the journey from Narcissus hut on the northern tip of the lake to Echo point hut was extremely beautiful. There's these big Antarctic beeches and the track winds between 'em with the lake on one side and the snow covered mountains across the water.

So it was in the late evening when our group reached Echo Point hut, a small one room place with just four narrow bunks and a huge stone fireplace. Soon the fire was roaring and all the clothes were hanging on the mantelpiece, steaming away and each bloke spread out leisurely, in his bunk.

Just as they were makin' themselves cosy for the night along comes another party consisting of one bloke and two girls. Now the place was crowded, and when bedtime came it didn't need Einstein to work out that there wasn't enough bunks and virtually no floor space. One bloke and a girl from the other party took the fourth bunk and of course that obliged one of the Melbourne bushwalkers' party to share his bunk with the other girl.

37 Now, you'd think this would be terrific; you know, sharin' yer bed with a strange bird in a little log cabin on the shores of a lake. But when you haven't had a shave, shower or shampoo for six days, when the mud caked on you is starting to stink as it dries, and the bird's a bit on the nose too things aren't so idyllic.

Well, to cut a long story short, the three blokes finally made it to Cynthia Bay where they were joined by the other two members of the party.

After six days of such conditions, rain, mud, snow, numbing cold, wet gear, you'd think they'd give up this Bushwalking caper for ever. But they don't, they go back time after time.

As I said mate, when I started tellin' you this story: Bushwalkers have wheels in their heads!"

THE TOP END

Gr~ham Wills-Johnson

I suppose I should tell you immediately that this isn't a story about the Northern Territory. I mean instead the top end of the Kosciusko National Park. Gazing absent­ mindedly at a map one day late in 1975, I was suddenly struck by two thoughts almost simultaneously (quite an event in itself these days!). First: for no clear reason, I had never been to Mount Jagungal - or anywhere further north than Gungartan for that matter; secondly: whether you start at Bradney's Gap (winter) or Tooma Dam (summer), the Top End is much the closest part of the KNP to Melbourne. Bradney's Gap is in fact only a lateish Friday night, and there are no miles of winding, narrow, rough dirt road such as must be faced by those who don't believe they have reached Kozzy until they get to Dead Horse Gap. This devastating bout of white-hot cere­ bration resulted in no less than four visits to the area in the next twelve months, cul­ minating with a week in the snow.

The mental fatigue of organising the actual trip, once the moment of inspiration has passed, should, of course, be avoided if at all possible. A few carefully-planted vaguemurmurings and muttermumbles had the intended effect, and before long the commendable Rodney was organising a four-day November trip to the desired region for a party (as it turned out) of nine. On a cool, overcast morning we left the cars at Round Mountain and set off southwards along a four-wheel-drive track closed by a barrier to all but authorised vehicles. These tracks were a source of continuing regret to us throughout what should be an unspoiled area. I don't know how many of them are kept open by mandatory requirements of the Snowy Mountains Authority, but in all the national parks of this country there seems to be a distressing prevalence of the "four-wheel-drive-mentality" among rangers. There must be better ways to conserva­ tion.

Of course he who casts the first stone will nearly always be found to live in a glass house ... so when I say our first call was at Round Mountain Hut, the aggrieved ranger is likely to question me as to whether we stay in huts, and how much we think they add to the wilderness character of an area. Round Mountain Hut was neat and sturdy and clearly receiving the ministrations of the Kosciusko Huts Association. We had a bite of morning tea and ambled on down to the Tumut River.

There's something curiously exciting about glaciated landscapes. Although the upper Tumut valley looks nothing like the vast landscapes of Fiordland or Glencoe, although the scale of the scenery is miniscule by comparison, nevertheless the atten­ tion immediately quickens as the eye picks up the unmistakeable signs. The ordinary

38 three-dimensional world is suddenly a world which has four; a world haunted by the memory of a vanished presence; a world to which that presence will once again return ... a world in which Time itself is visible. We forded the rushing Tumut River knee-deep.

On an open ridge with snow gums, a sunny afternoon wore on and the bulk of Jagungal - the Big Bogong - loomed ever larger ahead on our right. That, however, was tomorrow's mountain, and we dropped it out of sight by camping on the other side of the ridge at the untidy skeletal ruins of Farm Ridge Hut. The hut may be an unsightly heap of beams and rusting sheets of iron, but the old bush stockyard beside it is intact, and a joy to behold. The dust has settled and the noise has long since stilled: now there is a carpet of thick, incredibly green grass studded with yellow flowers. Soon it was dotted with tents as well, but nobody could have been so insensitive as to light a fire on it. The fire went over near the ruins.

SNOWY MOUNTAINS TOP END 1 I I

0 4 6 8 10 km

39 From Jacky's Lookout next morning there were extensive views out over Monaro, and south to the main range still liberally streaked with snow. There was also plenty of leisure to take it all in ... Debbie hadn't been out walking for months and had knocked herself out yesterday carrying a pack that must have weighed 750 kg. Now Ken was knocking himself out double-packing. We decided to distribute her load: it was like being. present at the sequestration of a supermarket. With delays such as these it was three in the afternoon before we gained the summit of Jagungal. I looked at the country spread out between us and Gungartan. I had never set foot in any of it. Clearly that was a situation that would have to be remedied, though it could not be this time. This time we would not be going any fwther south than Strawberry Hill before we would have to swing west and eventually north again back to the cars and our workplaces.

Strawberry Hill was that high ground we were looking down on not far away to the south-west. Further west the country begins to break up and become heavily tim­ bered, and then there are The Dargals. That was where we had to go, across open country and a confused series of watersheds full of surprises, so that you never knew from one moment to another as you passed along which way the country ahead would drain. One moment it would be gentle slopes to the left into the heads of creeks which joined the Geehi; the next three would be a big drop on the right into the valley of the Tooma - but just when you expected a creek to cross your path and go to join it, the creek would swing capriciously away and an unexpected view of the snow-streaked slopes of Townsend, far to the south, would be revealed. Over around Ryrie's Parlour and Jimmie's Lookout the topography is even more intricate - far more so than the bald statement of the map seems to imply. That monkey-puzzle occupied the following morning for us before at last we got down into the valley of Bulls Head Creek and things became a bit more logical again.

Almost at once, set well back from the creek on a grassy slope, Pretty Plain Hut is encountered - a big log building which immediately appealed to our imaginations. In fact by the time most of us got there, Ken was already sitting outside it like a Southern Gentleman, in a rough old armchair, with a pipe and an empty whisky bottle he had found inside, surveying his broad acres. It was that sort of place. Pretty Plains Hut actually told us its story on a later visit, but I will leave that until we come to it. We had ow lunch.

Pretty Plain Hut is not on Pretty Plain, nor yet on Pretty Plain Creek. When we left the hut to follow Bulls Head Creek down towards Pretty Plain the weather had changed for the worse. Mist had come down around the tops of the mountains, and when we climbed the curious low bare ridge on the left of the valley to look for the first time down Pretty Plain, the rain was coming up the far end and would clearly be upon us in a moment or two more. Perhaps that was the best way first to see it, and I thought once more of glaciers: not this time of Fiordland-in-Lilliput, but now of the Lilliput translation of the valleys near Mount Cook, with their steep sides plunging under a flat floor. Perhaps the effect owes as much to the pattern of vegetation as to the actual shape of the valley, for here is an inverted treeline. The floor of the valley is grassy and open. The trees only begin part way up the sides, where the frosts of cloudless May and September nights are not quite so bitter.

Glaciers? Apparently there is controversy among geologists about how far north the signs of glaciation are indisputable, and north of Jagungal one is apparently on shaky ground in speaking of them. This is no treatise on geology ... but the country certainly invites the freest romantic wanderings of the imagination, whatever it was that shaped in that way. To me it looks glaciated, both in Tumut and in Tooma; and and at least of the days of the earliest Pleistocene ice sheet one can surely ask how it could have escaped that cold remorseless hand.

Was someone spinning thinwhisperings subliminal while I was inattentive? Unaccountably I found myself organising an Easter trip to the Top End for a party (as it twned out) of seven. Now that I think very hard about it. I suppose I remember

40 Helen saying something about skiing, but of course I paid no attention to that - no attention at all. I mean I'm just not the sort of person you can con as easily as that. Er, well - well anyway, how much of a climb would it be up Everard's Flat Spur if you were carrying skis? Besides, it would be nice to get that little loop around Jagungal to join up with the other squiggly bit which ends like a question mark on the summit of Gungartan. The ink's getting a bit faded there . .. it must be eight years since I did that Gungartan trip. We hit the highway in Robyn's Kombi with Chris' Hunter coughing asthmatically two or three km in the rear. I forget what disease he said it had, but it threatened to be terminal.

Robyn had been very busy with the Honours year of a B.Sc. degree, and I was somewaht relieved to find that I was able to keep up with her on the climb up Ever­ ard's Flat Spur, because I wouldn't have been able to keep up with the others. That long steep climb, all on a fire trail so there was no problem of route-finding, really brought out their competitive spirit. Still, with a week's food and a pair of skis it might be a different story, even with the best of them. One began to hear occasional mention of the word "food dump". Sometime after lunch, on top of The Dargals at last, I looked for the best way down to Pretty Plain, having been told that the boldly­ marked track on the Kosciusko 1:100,000 sheet is non-existent. (There are many mistakes on this sheet. Even apart from that it is getting rather out-of-date: a track [very approximately] following the route indicated almost certainly once existed, and remains of its benching can be seen on the west side of the ridge separating Pretty Plain from Bulls Head Creek.) We didn't get it right - in fact we didn't get it right until the very last day of our later ski trip, having meanwhile got it wrong in every way that it was possible to get it wrong. So we spent a scratchy time thrashing around in a couple of nasty, deep, scrubby little side gullies before we broke out onto Pretty Plain. In warm late-afternoon sunshine it looked even prettier than it had last time.

4.30 p.m. saw us camped outside Pretty Plain Hut on the grassy slopes, as were two people who came from Canberra, but who, having told us that much, became rather uncommunicative. A change came in cold and blustery from the west overnight, and next morning's walk up through Ryrie's Parlour and onto the Strumbo Range at Strawberry Hill was overcast and uneventful. But now we were poised to step off into new country. Down to the Geehi River, already quite a respectable stream flowing among large boulders; boulders set close enough to allow us to cross dry-shod. Across a broad expanse of open, windswept alpine country we were now looking up at Cup and Saucer Hill. Some rather swamov tussock, and then a long steady climb.

Pretty Plain Rob Harris 41 I S1rowy Mountai11s Rob Harris Rod and Clive, all youthful enthusiasm and energy, forge ahead, making a frontal assault, keen to be first to the summit. Granddad watches them go with one eye, and carefully plots with the other the easiest possible path to the top of the ridge a little to the left where it is lower, and whence, after he has dumped his pack, and after he has had his. afternoon tea, he may climb the last thirty metres or so to the actual trig point, at his leisure and without his pack, and only because he wants to look at the view. I suppose having youthful enthusiasm once long ago was great, but sometimes I think life is much more comfortable without it!

A boisterous westerly wind buffeted our faces as we looked down on the winding serpentines of the Valentine River, but the afternoon sun shone in places through the ragged clouds with long shafts of light, and here and there the river gleamed. Some­ where down there was Mawson's Hut. We had planned to go and have a look at it, but that would mean having to climb back to the top of the Brassy Mountains next morn­ ing, and here we were already. Why not stay here? So we drifted along the ridge, looking for a place out of the tearing, chilly wind. Just below the crest of the ridge on the eastern side we found it, sheltered by gnarled and twisted snowgums whose long, despairing fingers raked towards the eastern sky as if pleading, though without hope, for their torment from the west to cease. But under the protection of the ridge, with thick woollen pullovers and a hearty fire, we were warm and watched with equani­ mity the night-shadow rise in the sky above Monaro.

Sun in the morning, but still that roaring westerly wind, and then a storm as we climbed Gungartan after a visit to the Tin Hut. We reached the trig, and in a satisfied way inside my mind a line inched across a map to join up with another line. Last time I reached this point it was from the other side. But all that was eight years ago. Was it me? It seemed more like someone else - someone who told me about it. The alumi­ nium tag that used to say "Gungartan. R.L. 6787.8 Snowy Mountains Authority" had gone, souvenired, I suppose, by vandals. A piece breaks off and is borne relent­ lessly away. The unreal past grows ever more remote. I don't know where any of the people I was there with last time are now. Perhaps I don't even remember some of them.

Then it is quite a different afternoon. Clouds and sun, and ever more sun. A barely perceptible breeze from the west, and not even a hint that there had so recently been a storm. We string out in ones and twos along the track towards Grey Mare Hut, and I am walking alone. Up ahead Rod is driving himself, still trying to break some record or other, but Clive has slackened his pace and is walking with Gary and Chris. The girls are somewhere behind, taking it easy. Nothing much registers. A funny little hut - telephone-box red, and not much bigger. Valentine Hut, it says over the door. Somewhere after the Valentine River there is a tiny little plain with no trees on it, protected by a low ridge on the weather side, and I briefly come back to reality and wonder what it would be like to camp on in the snow. How beautiful it must be on a cloudless winter morning, with not a mark upon its whiteness. I wonder if I will ever see it that way. Few in all history will have seen it so - not that particular little isolated plain. I ramble off again until the long drop to the Geehi River jolts me back to reality, and I curse and wonder how much of this precious height we are losing will have to be made up again on the other side. The map is no help - this is one of the places where, when it comes to "cultural" details like the track, fiction takes over from truth. You'd be much better off with Tim Lambie's map* if you want to know what's actually going on.

Grey Mare Hut is a tin building dating from the last time there was any activity at the Grey Mare Mine, just up behind it, around 1949-50. A potted history of the gold mine's chequered career can be found in the Geehi Club's "Snowy Mountains Walks". Four bright-eyed lads from Sydney were in possession of the hut, so we put up our tents outside. We had little time to look much at the remains of old rusty steam

*1975. "Mt Jagungal and the Brassy Mountains". 14 Bon Accord Avenue, Bondi Junction, NSW. Distributors include Paddy Pallin.

44 engines and other machinery as we fossicked for wood - it was clearly going to be a very cold night, and in such a heavily-frequented place wood was very hard to find. Jagungal, looming up beyond the nearer, darkened countryside, blood-red as it caught the last rays of the sun, demanded our hard-pressed attention however, and only the persistent seeping chill of gathering darkness brought us back to the problem of getting the fire going. By eight in the evening the waterbuckets were already crackling with frost.

The Geehi Club describes the country behind Grey Mare as "a weird landscape somewhere between that of the earth and of the moon". That was in a normal year. When we were there it had an even stranger aspect, though it is slowly beginning to lose it. For then the woods were silver, mile upon leafless mile, across the western slopes. A huge fire four summers earlier had left it dead. Four years of weather had polished it silver grey. In snow the naked skeletons lent it a Siberian quality, and you expected to hear not the dingo but the wolf. But the new growth is coming and soon it will be snowgum forest again, all trace of spurious resemblance to some northern hemisphere winter landscape vanished, no matter how deep the snows. Now of course it was only early autumn, and from our last lunch spot on a high point on The Dargals Range we looked across at a cloudless perfection of mountains, from Jagungal to Kosciusko, spread out across our eastern horizon. We would be back when the snow came.

Hah! You don't catch me a second time! Robert it was who arranged the planning and purchase of provisions for a party (as it turned out) of six for seven days. On a weekend when the mountain valleys were drowning in floods of late-autumn sunshine we slipped in from Tooma Dam and placed a food-dump at Pretty Plain Hut. In the morning the frost outside was thick as snow, and water in a billy which had been standing on the hearth as the embers died had a plate of ice half an inch thick on top of it. Small wonder no tree will grow in those valleys ... how indeed does grass survive?

Then it was August, and we were climbing Everard's Flat Spur with our skis. The weather was kind, and there was plenty of snow, even if it had got a little soft in the afternoon sun by the time we reached the top of the spur and started down onto Pretty Plain. Perhaps it was a little patchy down by the creek where we had to cross, but maybe more would fall. Our provisions were safe, and by the logbook there had been no more than two parties visit since we had left them there sixteen weeks before. We found the Scrabble board and settled in, socks drying before a bright fire, and a moonless alpine night closing around outside. Tomorrow we would go down the valley of the Tooma and see what it looked like under snow.

Alas, it was not under snow. Not under skiable snow, anyway. It soon became clear that the hut was at about the lower limit of reasonably complete snow cover. So, after a little while we headed back up in the other direction, and took a big loop out to the Dargals Range again, and saw the mountains from Jagungal to Kosciusko, now under a mantle of white, from the lunch spot of our Easter farewell. Behind us, in the sky over Victoria, it was clear that a change was on the way. Back to the hut in the later afternoon after a splendid day's skiing - and a twinge of annoyance to see two pairs of skis outside. Intruders. Were they going to stay in the hut? Our hut? This late in the day they must be. Reluctantly the mental adjustment to the unexpected begins, and by the time you have your skis off and get inside it is possible to be affable, if still somewhat guarded until you find out what the stranges are like.

Phil and Bronwyn were students from Canberra, although Phil explained that he was in voluntary retirement for the rest of the current academic year. It wasn't clear whether his Faculty was yet aware of the fact. We got on well, and felt the same resistance to change, but now because of a reduction in numbers, when they finally left to go over to Grey Mare two days later. To our dismay the bad weather brought not snow, but rain, and we were confined to the hut while it poured down outside all next day. Every time we looked out more of our precious, if soggy, snow cover had dissolved away leaving ever larger patches of wet brown grass showing through. We played Scrabble, and heard of Phil and Bronwyn's extensive peregrinations from one

45 end of the snow country to the other over several winters - they knew it well. The ever-restless Ken constructed a rather weird but surprisingly comfortable stool out of pieces of firewood, burning holes with the red-hot end of the poker to take the legs and wiring the whole product together afterwards. Perhaps it is still there.

In the logbook I had found something interesting. I began to copy it out. It was signed J.M. & O.M. 7.5.76. Phil saw what I was doing. "They'll be pleased to know you were interested," he said. "Do you know who they are, then?" I asked. "John Mitchell and Olaf Moon," he said. "John Mitchell is the son of Tom Mitchell."

The entry in the logbook read:

DID YOU KNOW? A little piece of history: 1. This hut was built in 1934 by Colin Chisolm. 2. The area surrounding was on a cattle lease run by Chisolm. 3. The adjoining lease, "C3" (to the east) was run by Tom Mitchell until just after the war. The area was approx. 500 acres. 4. Leases were held at minimal cost. Then the price was suddenly increased to dis­ courage cattlemen. Now leases are not permitted above 4500' and none in the Nat. Park. 5. The access route was via Bradney's Gap and Broadway Top. 6. Puglisitc Point (and Ck) are so called because of a fight there between Tommy Batson and George McGinnity. One of them, so the story goes, was grogged up so the other would win. Both men were stockmen working on one of the leases. 7. Salt was used by stockmen, to encourage cattle to remain in the area. 8. The logs which the hut is built from, are mountain ash and come from Shingle Creek, west of Tooma Reservoir. 9. The first vehicle to be driven right across the Snowys (Bradney's Gap-Pretty Plain Mawson's-East Twynam-Chalet) were a Willys Jeep and a Ford Jeep. The drivers: Bill Littlejohn, Tom Mitchell, Ossy Rickson and Elyene Mitchell. It was an epic trip taking far longer than it would take to walk. To get up hills, one jeep was un­ loaded and driven backwards uphill. At the top, a pulley was lashed to a tree and a cable threaded. The jeep at the top then proceeded rapidly downhill towing the cable and the other fully loaded jeep! Up!

When Tom Mitchell was taken on a tour of the Alpine Way (just completed in 1955) the S.M.A. apologised for the rough road. His reply "Don't worry, I drove over these mountains long before you were thought of." 10. The Ford Jeep is now in the museum at Corryong. J.M. & O.M. 7.5.76

(A further entry, signed Good luck. O.M. & J.M. 7.5.76 details corrections to the 1:100,000 sheet, all of which are stated to have been made in Tim Lambie's map.)

Months later, looking in the LaTrobe Library for something else entirely, I came across the original story of the motorised tour of the trackless wilderness: "Through the Australian Alps in a Jeep" by Elyne Mitchell, Walkabout 15(4) 29 (1949). Oddly enough the spellings of two names do not agree with the logbook. Elyne Mitchell has also written a book Australia's Alps (Angus & Robertson 1942, 1946 and a new edition with a Foreword on modern conditions, 1962) which, unfortunately, at the time of going to press I have not had a chance to read.

There is a thumbnail sketch of Colin Chisholm in George Farwell's Rejoice in Freedom [Nelson (Australia), 1976).

46 THE PROM. BY SEA

A variation on a Familiar Walking Theme

Marian Siseman

Seven o'clock on a March morning. Down a mangrove channel a small fishing boat chugs smoothly, laden with nine adults, three children and a great conglomeration of gear necessary for four days fishing, swimming and skin diving around Wilson's Promontory. Egrets, ibis and herons wading in the mud shallows of the surrounding swamps flap lazily into the new day. Corner Inlet is like a millpond and the Prom. mountains beckon in the distance.

Hardly have we left the "shore", if that is what one calls the last mangrove stand­ ing stiffly on its roots paddling its toes in the low tide, and left the waders behind, than the next lot of wildlife arrives. Three porpoises play under the bow of the boat, swimming at exactly the same speed. Showing off, they swap sides with one another, and swim on their backs, almost laughing up at the three children and equally fas­ cinated adults.

Corner Inlet is a very large body of water and it takes two hours to reach the entrance, a channel about 25 km wide between the low mangroves of Snake Island and the hills and swamps of the northeast point of the Promontory. The millpond disappears and we are out in the chop of Bass Strait and chugging down the coast past the unspectacular wooded hills and long sandy beaches of the top end - perhaps the best way to visit this area as it is a long walk in from the main road.

Islands appear on the horizon standing high in the mirage - the Seal Island. Rabbit Island is closer, about 2 km off Monkey Point. We sail into the gently shelving bay, launch the dinghy into the blue green water and the slight swell rushes us onto the yellow sand. After lazing around all morning we feel the need for exercise and

Refuge Cove Hugh Duncan

47 make haste for the top of the tussocky hill forming the bulk of the island. But it's hasten slowly as the ground collapses at nearly every step sending us more than ankle deep into the black smelly sand of mutton bird burrows. The whole island, indeed all the islands off the Prom., are riddled with the nests of mutton birds and fairy pen­ guins. Luckily for the baby birds not all the nests are inhabited and we manage to reach the top without hurting any of them. From November to April the baby mutton birds are there, the parents spending all day at sea fishing and we later see great flocks of the plump black birds gliding a few em above the ocean engaged in this activity. At last light the sky is black for minutes with the continuous stream of returning parents laden with the day's catch. The penguin parents also spend from before daylight till just after dark fishing to feed themselves and their young. But of course they cannot fly and what a fascinating sight it is to see them swimming miles from land, their tiny bodies coping effortlessly with the heaving ocean.

We do some fishing too and every day catch enough for tea and breakfast, mainly flathead. This is plenty for us. We do not want to catch a lot more than we can eat. Reg catches a shark, only half a metre long, but nevertheless snapping an impressive array of teeth, and to the children it is the highlight of the catch. Our trusty boatman knows all the good spots and is very obliging. He puts some of us ashore on rocky points for rock fishing and skin diving and takes others to the middle of bays to the flathead grounds. At Waterloo Bay the surf is calm enough for him to row me ashore and leave me for a couple of hours beachcombing. It is the first time I have wandered on this long, long beach and visited the southern end of it. Today it is all mine. I am com­ pletely alone for a couple of hours to wander at will in the sun. Bliss! I find it littered with many-legged orange brittle stars - dead and dying. What law of nature is casting them up in such quantities?

We camp at Refuge Cove, a beautiful spot if one ignores the vandalism of the painted rocks. The deep water of the cove provides skin diving close inshore and hidden among the seaweeds is the anchor and wreckage of a burnt ship. Other boats are here too and one crew sail off to a nearby beach and come back with a hundred salmon they have caught by wading through the shallows with a large net.

The southern end of the Prom. is the most spectacular of course. From Waterloo Bay round to Oberon Bay it is a formidable wall of high granite cliffs and huge boul­ ders topped with thick and often impenetrable coastal scrub. The lighthouse on South-east Point must be a welcome sight to shipping. Apart from the inhospitable looking mainland there are islands, some only rocks, poking up in all directions. We can even see the Hogan Group at least 40 km away. The most interesting is Rodondo about 11 km directly south of the tip of the Promontory. A circular wall of cliffs a hundred or so metres high topped by a conical hill rising to about 340 m. There is only one place where one can jump from a boat to the rocks and scale the cliffs and then the sea has to be dead calm. Only two or three times a year is this possible and consequently few people have ever been on it. The Melbourne Bushwalkers tried to run a trip there once but the weather and the sea did not permit a landing. Botanically it must be a fascinating place as some species do not occur on the Prom. at all but are found in Western Australia. We sail around it and find it most impressive. The sea sucks a couple of metres up and down at the base of the huge granite blocks and into deep fissures and the ocean really is only slightly choppy.

The Anser Group has some interesting inhabitants. The Anderson Islets are the home of a colony of fur seals who are not at all perturbed by the appearance of our boat in their midst. In fact they seem to enjoy our visit and we have a front stalls view of life in the colony, including two bulls fighting and the majority of the popu­ lation enjoying a slide down a large slope into the sea.

Cleft Island is ahead now, or Skull Rock some know it by, that great lump of granite with dark hollows visible on the horizon from Tidal River. The largest hollow is now revealed to be an enormous cave. The floor, about 50 m above the sea and over­ hanging it, is a wide grassy ledge measuring about 75 m by 40 m. Two Cape Barren 48 geese which are nesting there stare down at us from their remarkable home which has been eroded out of this huge sheer granite block. Again there is no landing place for man.

This certainly is the way to see some of the Promontory wildlife and a lazy and enjoyable way to do it. A real holiday. As we make our way back along the south coast and sail close to that long low chain of flat rocks running into the ocean off South Point I am reminded of the land approach to this southernmost point of the Australian mainland, hours of struggling through the coastal flora, at times impene­ trable. There is no sense of achievement in the seaweed approach but the boat trip is so much more enjoyable that I know which way I shall choose to come next time ­ providing the sea is calm.

ECLIPSED ON THE HIGH PLAINS

The expedition to the Club's hut on the Bogong High Plains to view the solar eclipse was organized about six months before the big event. The weeks before were wet and miserable, as only October can be, with drizzly rain falling from overcast skies, but a few days before the 23rd the weather began to clear. By the day before, however, the forecast was for cloud cover on the Saturday, and so was established a pattern of unpredictability which was to last the whole weekend.

Eclipse Viewing Hugh Duncan

49 Rob and Shelley had a long, cold walk from Rocky Valley Dam, but the rest of the party, arriving only a few hours later, after dark, found the road passable and completed the journey in comfort.

In the morning the sun was shining after a clear cold night, but as the day pro­ gressed the clouds returned and grew thicker and thicker. According to the Astro­ nomical Society of Victoria, "Quirks of the weather at this season frequently result in the cloud ceiling lying below the higher mountain tops and plateau." Our clouds had obviously read the same article, and they followed it to the letter.

Nevertheless, with the abandon of all true bushwalkers watching bad weather from inside a warm refuge, we checked our cameras, built up the fire and set out with tripods and hopes held high, for our selected vantage point near Mount Cope. Out came the cameras, tripods, raincoats and portable television, and soon with cameras aligned and aerial hung from an obliging snow gum, we were ready for the show to begin. The television was working well, and the snow on the screen blended perfectly with the drifts beside the road.

As the air grew colder, and our fingers slowly froze into immobility, we caught fleeting glimpses of a moth-eaten sun peeking through the clouds. Suddenly a bril­ liantly clear image of the total eclipse appeared on the television screen. In Ballarat, (where to casual observers like us, it is always raining) the sun was shining, or rather not shining, out of a cloudless sky.

There followed a mad scramble between television and cameras during each microscopic break in the clouds. Rob, in desperation, took some photos of the T.V. screen, while Hugh found the clouds an excellent substitute for a neutral density filter.

"We're on the wrong mountain," said Hugh, "Look over there!" We turned and looked across to Mount Nelse, and saw a large patch of watery sunshine only a few kilometres away. To an uninformed observer, we must have appeared even more crazy than the Average Bushwalker, huddling amongst the snow drifts intently watching the television, in the middle of nowhere and with nightfall rapidly approaching.

A thin crescent of sun reappeared at Ballarat, and we were expecting the shroud of totality to descend upon us at any second, but it wouldn't come. What if we had miscalculated and carefully positioned ourselves outside the path of totality? Just then waves of darkness came sweeping up over the plains through the stormclouds and misting rain, and engulfed us in a cold and silent blackness.

It was eerie standing there in the darkness in the freezing wind and rain, with the greenish tinge of a wan sunset encircling the horizon. It would be serious indeed to be alone here in these conditions without the security of the hut and car nearby - a cheerful fire to brighten the darkness, no tent or warm sleeping bag to climb into. A confused owl flew silently past, heightening the mournful and desolate atmosphere. The temperature seemed to fall, but it may have been our imaginations sending a chill down our spines as we witnessed the awe-inspiring sight.

After about two minutes the sun reappeared. The light returned in waves after third contact was made, as if layer after layer of cloud were being rolled back before its renewed radiance. Then at last the clouds did part, to reveal a thin rind of silver encircled by a brilliant, frosty halo. And with the sun restored to its rightful position as the dominating celestial influence on our emotions, we returned to the hut, and the fire, and the toboggan, and everyday life.

R.H.& H.D.

50 Australian Conservation Foundation

Your Countryside Needs You

Some of the Australian Conservation Foundation's most concerned and effec­ tive members are those actively involved in environmental pursuits ... people like bushwalkers, canoeists, national park enthusiasts, cave explorers, moun­ taineers. If you have special insights into the environment or have seen enough of our natural heritage to want to help protect it for future generations, the A CF would welcome your membership. You will be joining a national group concerned with the entire range of conservation. The A CF works for long-term conservation policies. It seeks to uphold con­ servation principles whether on a local, regional, state or national basis. It strives to have conservation safeguards built into legislation and to extend public participation in decision-making.

If you would like to be part of the A CF's fight for the future, fill in the coupon below: ------...... ------~_...... I would like to know more ebout the ACF. Pie•• aend me memberahlp detella. Neme ...... •...... Addr811 ......

Poatcode ...... Send to Membership Department, ACF, 364 Albert Street, East Melbourne, 3002. Phone: 419 3366.

51 FOR A GOOD NIGHT'S SLEEP BUY A PURADOWN SLEEPING BAG

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52

SURVIVAL FOR THE BEGINNER

"We're going to dig a snow cave," they said. I took another luxurious slurp of the foaming amber and stretched my feet towards the bla1ing logs, "Have a good time," I said innocently. "Wearegoingtodiga snow cave," they said. "But my feet get cold," I protested. It's true. Only one member of the family goes barefoot in the snow. Great Aunt Ursula Yeti. And she's mad. She once got left in a snowdrift overnight and everything inside her dear old neanderthal skull got turned into a sort of damp felt. It doesn't help the cerebral processes, that sort of thing. Distinctly deleterious. She became such an embarrassment to the family that we had to pack her off to Patagonia. In Patagonia she pursues missionary clergymen (who are there to bring spiritual sal­ vation and bedsocks to the primitive Yahgans) across the windswept tundra, emitting amorous little cries like "Yip yip yip yip yip," or in more soulful moments "Moooooo." All the other Yetis are notable for three things: their poor circulation, their tendency to cold feet, and their common sense. Snow caves? Never! Ridiculous idea!

"Oooooooooh!" I groaned. "Me back, and knees, and ears." "Shut up and keep digging," they said. "Besides, what have your ears got to do with it?" They had more or less vanished from view, leaving me to kick lumps of snow disconsolately down the slope as they threw them out of the cave. And grumble. There was plenty to grumble about. Like cold feet. But if I grumbled too much the lumps of snow would get ahead of me. Then I couldn't kick them down the slope and had to use the shovel. Which was another grumble. Like me cold feet. And me sore back. And knees. And ears. No body's ears should have to put up with that much grumbling. Not even Yeti-ears. A muffled voice came from somewhere deep inside the snowdrift. "Jeez mate, shift some of that bloody snow will yer? We can't move in here!" I looked down. Lumps of snow had piled up knee-deep. I couldn't move. And me feet were cold. And some idiot had let the shovel get buried. What a stupid way to wait for Guy Fawkes Night.

"The ceiling drips," I grumbled. "Well if you will light your choofer under the only bulge in the entire roof you can expect it to drip," they said. "Anyway, what do you want all that hot water for?" "I'm going to shave," I said sulkily. "Shave?!!" they howled incredulously. "In here?!!" "Of course I'm going to shave. All the Yetis shave. Even Great Aunt Ursula shaves. She might be mad, but she's not degenerate." "Oh," they said. There was no further discussion. I had a shave.

It was quite big. You had to admit that. I stretched out full length in my sleeping bag on my foam mat and looked at the sparkling ice crystals as the light of the candles played on the ceiling. It didn't drip. Even the bulge stopped dripping after I turned the choofer off. I wriggled my toes. "How are your feet?" they asked. "You haven't mentioned them in the last five minutes." "Er ..."I could see the cat was out of the bag, as surely as I was in it. "Nice and warm, eh? Not going anywhere tonight then? Safely trussed up?" I nodded. "Well, we have a little surprise for you," they said. "Only you mustn't have too much. We don't want you getting over-excited, or getting up in the middle of the night. Even that motheaten Persian rug you cliam is pure Yetihide, shaved or otherwise, won't stop icicles forming on your platelets if you do anything silly." One of them lit his choofer, boiled up some water and produced a packet of Lemon Refresh. The other brought out a small flask of Bacardi. The result was (gurgle ..... smack!) DELICIOUS!!!!

Yeti

54 INCIDENT

Michael Griffin

The log's centre lies almost a metre from the fire and it stretches out at either end towards thicker vegetation. It appears rotten, but still solid, a substantial mass of wood dividing a cluster of tents from the evening fire. Nearby is the river, flowing deeply and silently in the starry night. It has gained life from recent rain, but the day's sun­ shine has already dried off the vegetation. Wood on the fire burns vigorously.

The evening meal is nearly a memory before someone spots the smoke rising from the log. Flames are noticed soon after and the log's hidden fibres transmute into incandescent coals. The glowing centre seems to slowly extend its domain until, near bedtime, smoke rises from crevices at points several feet apart. Water bags are emptied into hissing steam as the eyes of fire wink out. Sleeping bags receive their grateful owners and peace descends on the river's tented banks.

Four hours later, some awake, sensing. Tent flaps frame a mass of smoke and flame, and the log appears consumed for half its length by fiery tongues that rise up high in windless air. Water bags are filled five times at the patient river and once again the lights of fire snuff out. Tents settle down to await the dawn.

The sun's early rays are no match for the burning log. It greets the day with renewed fingers of flame, turning the night's disturbance into a dream, condemning the river's water to impotence. The log cooks someone's breakfast on its bed of coals, gathering strength. The grassy vegetation is scarcely at arm's length from its fiery interface, and beyond is the forest of trees and scrub. Imagine the possibilities on a windy night in drier conditions: decaying trees with fuel that leaps into flame along the river's silent course.

We leave only after the remains of log have been carried to the bank and dropped into the mud and water below. Black coals remain in a scarred patch of earth.

HIMALAYAN WALKING Walking in the Himalayas is the logical extension of bushwalking in Australia. Over the past four years, we have earned a name as specialists in arranging walking and climbing trips to all parts of the Himalayas. We only ever take small groups, and grade our trips to suit different levels of experience. Everest summiteers Sherpa Ang Tshering, and Shambu Llama are our leading guides for our Nepal treks. For details of our walks this year please contact: Goronwy Price AUSTRALIAN HIMALAYAN EXPEDITIONS 3rd Floor, 28·34 O'Connell Street, SYDNEY, N.S.W. 2000 OR Phone: (02) 231 6050

55 WILSONS PROMONTORY. Text: John Bechervaise, photographs: Jocelyn Burt. Rigby. 1976. $5.95. 56pp.

This excellent volume is as far removed from the run-of-the-mill guidebook as the Mona Lisa is from jam-tin labels. Here we find, not so much a physical description of the place, but a complete perspective of the past, present and future of "the Prom". John Bechervaise runs true to form and gives us the essential feeling of the hills, valleys and sheltered coves in a way which betrays him as a master craftsman with words. The colour photographs fit the text so perfectly that one is left with a pro­ found respect for the capabilities of Jocelyn .8urt. The book traces the European his­ tory of the Prom. from its first sighting by Surgeon George Bass in 1798 up to the present day "crowded with bathers in surf and sun". Modesty forbids that the author mention his part in leading the first recorded landing on Rodondo Island, visible from the Promontory lighthouse apart from a small quotation from "Wildlife 194 7" but his involvement with the Prom. is there between the lines for any who care to read. Above all else the lasting impression is of a solitary journey, taking time to see and appreciate the natural assets of the Prom. Read it and your eyes will be opened. D.O. RECREATION, WILDERNESS AND THE PUBLIC, by Keith McKenry. Department of Youth, Sport and Recreation, Marland House, Melbourne. (December, 1975). 214 pp. $5.00

Apparently more than 80% of bushwalkers do not belong to bushwalking clubs. Is there any difference between those who do belong to a club and that much larger number who prefer to be independent?

Club walkers, it can confidently (99% confidence) be stated, are much more likely to have camped in a tent in the past twelve months than non-club walkers. (91% of club respondents had done so; only 35% of independent walkers). It is also fairly certain that skiing is more popular with club walkers (43%) than with independent walkers (13%); that more club walkers will belong to at least one conservation body (34%) than independent walkers (14%); and that club walkers will disagree strongly with the statement "Economic development is essential to Australia: wilderness areas are not" while the reaction of independent walkers, taken overall, is wishy-washy with a slight tendency to agree with the statement.* Neither group is very enthusiastic about wasting the weekend visiting relatives or friends, but it's 99% certain that this is even more unpopular with club walkers (6%) than with independents (18%).

Feathertop Ridge Bob Douglas

56 These are just a few of the conclusions which can be drawn from p.87 of this survey report. The corresponding data on p.89 will tell you how bushwalkers differ in these and many other respects from the population of Victoria in general. To those who wish to advance the interests of bushwalking a knowledge of the political and social realities is clearly essential, and McKeruy's work throws light in areas where previously only guesswork was available.

Essential reading though it may be for the serious student of the natural recreation scene, this extremely complex document is quite definitely not recommended for the general or the careless reader. The author cautions strongly against misinterpretation, a caution which cannot be too strongly repeated. After hours of study this reviewer is by no means confident of having fully mastered the interpretational difficulties: proper assimilation of the actual findings will require a great deal of work. The format of the report is perhaps one of the best and most constant warnings to proceed with care. I cannot remember ever handling a more difficult volume: the only method that seems to work is to place it on an ironing board and read it while standing up!

Thos who wish to enter the fray armed with the facts will need this report, despite its many difficulties.

G. W-J.

*CAUTION: the result could mean that there is a strong, but self-cancelling, polarisa­ tion of opinion among independent walkers. Despite a search of p.157, it does not appear that this question can be settleed by reference to the report alone.

WALK THE TIMELESS LAND, by GraemeWheeler. Lansdowne Press. 1977.116 pp. $12.95

Graeme Wheeler's book is essentially a series of articles describing walking and climbing trips he has made to various parts of Australia since 1949. Although Vic­ toria is the best represented, the places visited range from Tasmania to Arnhem Land. Each one has some special meaning for the author, and readers can share his growing awareness of the value of wilderness and natural beauty. A comprehensive knowledge of the natural world shows in the writing, and the places visited are more than just described - they are experienced by the reader.

Over a period of 30 years he has seen many of his favourite places spoiled as "progress" and easier access take their toll. The book ends with an angry, yet restrained, indictment of Man's shabby treatment of his natural heritage.

Except for the bibliography, the book is not a practical guide to bushwalking or climbing. It is a personal story that shows how one man came to appreciate the world around him, from which others may draw inspiration. It is illustrated with many excellent photos, although the impact of many of them is reduced by their small size.

Geoff Mattingley

57 COCOPARRA NATIONAL PARK

Graham Mascas

Just under 500 km due north of Melbourne a rugged series of hills rise 300 m above the surrounding plain. This is the Cocoparra Range which provides a very good venue for a winter long weekend. From Melbourne the most direct approach is via Shepparton, Finley, the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area and Griffith, the area of interest being approximately 30 km northeast of Griffith. The range is divided into two parts, the northern one being a wild life nature reserve while the southern part is a National Park. You are requested to camp at Woolshed Flat which makes for a good base from which to explore both parts. The camping area is situated approximately half way down the 25 km length of the range. While there are effectively no facilities and no water is available except for rain water tanks at the old woolshed approxi­ mately 2 km away, the campsite is very attractive, positioned at the head of the Woolshed Flat. The roads into the Park and camping area are good though tend to be a bit slippery on those rare wet days. The creeks seldom flow.

The whole area is quite rugged with a rock strata of conglomerates, sandstones and shales locally folded by massive earth movements and then eroded into a hog back formation which is now the Cocoparra Range. Time and weather has rounded the hills but formed deep scenic gullies. One of the most spectacular of these is Lady Smith Glen, a narrow gorge some 35 metres deep about 1 km long. The slopes and ridges of the Range are covered in dry screrophyll forest interspersed with stands of cypress pine and narrow leafed ironbark. The forest is reasonably open for walking, though there are some quite dense patches of tea trees to add variety (and agony). A large grey kangaroo population finds shelter in the fine cypress pine forest in the wide but enclosed valleys like Woolshed Flat. We came across two large (and smelly) herds of feral goats, during our exploration, which must be replacing some of the expected natural species like euros. In spring the Cocoparra Range would come alive with colour as a great number and variety of wildflowers, especially Acacias are present.

Historically the area of the Park was first discovered by Oxley in his explorations of 1817. He saw little of interest and described the whole area as a desert abandoned by every living creature capable of getting away from it. His party are reported to have planted several trees under Mount Brogden at the southern end of the Park to celebrate the King's birthday and commemorate the situation. Oxley thought there would be little probability of the area ever being visited again by civilised man. To stand today on the highest of the peaks in the Park, Mount Bingar (455 m), and look out over the boundaries to the vast Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area (having a production value of approximately $70 million per year) certainly conflicts with that opinion.

Graham Mascas

58 COCO PARRA NATIONAL PARK

NATURE

lOCATION MAP

j ril ~ 1

YENDA GRIFFITH

- Rood Track

~ Cliff

p Picnic area

/ Waterfall

,. Trig station ~ GRIFFITH 0 2 km

59 We explore Nepal in many different ways:- Easy graded walks to demanding high altitude treks; Annapurna Sanctuary; Langtang Himal; Manang and Kali Gandaki Valleys; Rowaling Himal; Everest Base Camp.

We also operate White Water Raft trips on the Kali Gandaki and Sun Kosi Rivers, with a more relaxing alternative on the Trisuli River. Our holidays all include a four day stay in the lowland jungles, where we use Elephants to search for Tiger, Rhino, etc. We propose to operate a similar operation in Pakistan. For information about our slide nights and a brochure, contact:-

Walkln 149 Kerferd Road, Albert Park (l;JmJJJ Melbourne, 3206. Australia. Cable: Walkexplor. Phone: (03) 6995915

Walkin Explorer is the exclusive agent in Australia and New Zealand for Manaslu Trekking Ltd., Nepal (Trekking), and International Trekkers Ltd., Nepal (White· water Rafting). Also agents for Gaida Wildlife Camp, Nepal.

60 For walking the opportunities are many. We planned, during our visit on Queen's Birthday weekend 1977, to walk both halves of the range. The first day we set off with good intentions to "do" the southern part as far as Mount Caley or Mount Brogden and return. To do this we followed the track from the campsite east to the saddle overlooking Pleasant Valley H.S. Leaving the road here we headed south along the ridge towards the towers on Mount Bingar arriving by lunch time. Whether this slowness (7 km for the morning) was due to lethargy after a late arrival- we drove up from Melbourne the previous evening - or the going rougher than expected, I don't know but we aborted our trip further south. After lunch we descended into Duncan's Creek then skirted round Woolshed Range to return to camp. En route we passed evidence of the old Whitton Stock route along the western boundary of the Park which had been used extensively by Cobb and Co. coaches travelling between Melbourne and Queensland in the late nineteenth century. The remains of a bridge built during coaching days over the dry Steamboat Creek was examined by us all. Much discussion as to how the creek got its name ensued.

The following day we headed north climbing up onto the range via a long spur and thus avoiding the steep Woolshed Bluff behind the camping area. At the top of the ridge we headed north around the heads of several creeks before crossing to the eastern side of the range. As before the open forest was very attractive with the occasional areas of scrub being quite unattractive. After a long and lethargic lunch break soaking up the winter sun we headed south down the range, circled the head of Woolshed Creek after visiting Eagle Falls (dry) to approach the campsite from the south. Again a pleasant day's walking but not covering anything like the distance planned. Perhaps the errors were in the planning.

The third day we packed up and drove down to the very impressive Lady Smith Glen then continued on to Pleasant Valley and lunched in the Binya State Forest. We left for our return trip feeling slightly disappointed that so much remained to be seen but we promised ourselves a return trip with more time for exploration and not such ambitious walking plans. Though the Park offers good hard walking opportuni­ ties, it seemed more attractive to the pottering type visit. We were psychologically compensated by the opportunity to visit some (surely not all!) of Griffiths' eighteen wineries before our return to the wet, cold south.

Map: Griffith 1:100,000

MOUNTAIN MUSTER

Enthusiasm over what should have been the most important event of the Victorian bushwalking year, the appearance of the LCC Alpine Area Study Report, cannot but be severely tempered by reflecting that the endless years of delay have been well used by the FCV in prosecuting a very successful "search and destroy" mission into our remotest bushwalking resources to such an extent that many will feel that the situation has been totally pre-empted anyway, and that in any case the FCV and other bureau­ cracies now wield such heavy direct influence over the LCC that the call for sub­ missions from the public is nothing more than a piece of window-dressing. Sub­ missions closed on 30 September 1977.

Remember Precipitous Bluff? The ponderous machine of Justice, having chewed the matter over for several years, finally spat out the results on 22 June 1977, when the High Court of Australia dismissed an appeal against the 1973 decision of the

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62 Tasmanian Supreme Court. Malcolm Turnbull (The Bulletin, 2 July 1977) commented that an American court would almost certainly have upheld the right of appeal to the courts by conservationists, but the Australian view is that such matters must remain firmly in the political, riot the legal, sphere, and that final recourse is to the Minister concerned.

Readers of "Walk 1978" who are also secondary students aged between 16 and 19 may be interested in the formation of the Australasian Schools Exploring Society under the Presidency of Dr Philip Law, with the object of running expeditions in wild and trackless country, entailing the carrying out of scientific field work in arduous conditions. Further information can be obtained by writing to Mr R. Win­ wood, Scotch College, Swanbourne, Western Australia, 6010.

The first stage of the reconstruction of the Hotham-to-Bogong pole line, which has been under planning since 1971, was completed in the summer of 1976/7, from Mt Loch carpark to Langford's Gap. 675 poles, each 3 m in length and weighing 25 kg, had to be got into position despite Soil Conservation Authority prohibition of vehicles on other than existing roads. The contractors solved this problem by bor­ rowing two sturdy steeds from local resident John Lorimer. The horses were found to manage the poles four at a time (slung two on either side) quite adequately. The work is to be continued this summer to Roper's Hut.

A serious contender for the first ascent of Federation Peak in the late forties was Jack Thwaites (Hobart Walking Club), for whom Thwaites Plateau is named. Eight days of atrocious weather frustrated the attempt, and the first ascent was made in 1949 by another party. His second attempt in 1960 suffered a similar result. Success came in February 1977 - at the age of 75 years. The Melbourne Bush walkers salute you, sir! Jack Thwaites was awarded the O.A.M. in the 1977 Birthday Honours list.

MAPPING Barry Short

The following maps have become available in the past year - 1:100,000 full colour - Bairnsdale, Benambra, Howitt, Maffra, Om eo, Orbost, Sale, Stratford and Tallangatta. 1:50,000 - none printed. 1:25,000 full colour- Cope, Fainter, Feathertop, Mt Beauty, Nelse, Trappers Creek. These maps issued at a very useful scale, have, since their initial printing, been over­ printed with the following statement "Warning - many foot tracks, roads, huts, snow poles, and other cultural features have been taken from old information and may not be correctly placed". The warning should be heeded and the cultural detail checked against other maps for verification. The maps also carry the statement found on some 1:250,000 sheets regarding incomplete examination on the ground.

Snowy Creek and Mt Wills 1:25,000 have also been printed. As they belong to the same series they should be treated with similar care to the six already mentioned.

All the above maps are available from the Lands Department.

Forests Commission - the Macalister River Watershed map has been revised and reprinted.

Tawong:a I :63,360 has been partly revised (Mt Bogong and approaches area).

Wellington I :63,360 has also been revised.

For anyone interested in which F.C.V. roads have been closed to vehicular traffic, the map sales counter at the Forests Commission will give you small foolscap sized maps showing road closures.

63 RELIABLE TRANSPORT- Business or Pleasure GRONOW'S FURNITURE REMOVERS and STORERS

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Mayford-Dargo River Bob Douglas

64 TRACK NOTES

AT THE HEAD OF THE DARGO

43 km west-north-west of Omeo and 11 km southeast of Mount Hotham on the Alpine road is Dinner Plain. A C.R.B. Hut on the North side signifies the location of Dinner Plain.

150 metres down the plain on the same side, a large dam covered with water weeds collects water from bogs near the hut. A stream issuing below the dam has deeper holes containing reasonable drinking water - once it has been boiled.

This plain makes a suitable centre for walks near the head of the Dargo.

Transport: By car to the junction of the Alpine road and the Dar go High Plains Road, 8 km southwest of Hotham.

THREE DAY WALK

MOUNT FREEZEOUT -LOUISVILLE-BOILER PLAIN-MOUNT TABLETOP­ MAY FORD-KING SPUR-LANKEYS ROAD

Transport: Private (Vehicles left at Mount Freezeout and Lankey's Plain)

Best Season: Summer and early Autumn.

Map Reference: Dargo, F.C.V., 1:63,360

Total Distance: 32 kilometres

FIRST DAY Drive along the Alpine Highway from Harrietville to Mount St Bernard, and follow the Dargo High Plains Road to the south. Leave cars at Lankey's Plain, at the start of the King Spur, and return to Mount Freezeout for the start of the walk.

From Freezeout, walk due east Uust less than 1.5 km) to a high point with spec­ tacular views north, east and south. From here, two ridges run east, one on the north and one on the south. Follow the southern spur. After about 2.5 km (4 km) look for the spur running southeast to Louisville. This is clear on the map. It commences in a saddle on the spur you have been following, after a steep descent. Follow this spur, which is sharp and narrow in places, to Freezeout Creek, and thence down the creelt to Louisville for lunch (5 km).

From Louisville, climb due east to the spur (6 km) which runs southwest away from Boiler Plain. Follow this northeast towards the Plain. (8.5 km). Near the top there are good views over Maraposa Spur in the general northwest direction. Cross the 4WD track (not marked on the map) and camp in the vicinity of the word 'Plain' on the map. (9 km)

Water can be found in the creek running due south, but you may have to follow it some way before it runs cleanly. For us, it was a 30 minute round trip from camp to water.

65 King Spur Sue Oldfield

SECOND DAY From the camp, walk northwest one or two hundred metres till you strike the 4WD track. Follow this northeast to Paw Paw Plain till you reach the Alpine Road. Follow this east to the sign 'Mount Tabletop' pointing south. (5 km)

Leave the road at this point. Now, taking care not to cross any creeks or head­ waters, follow this ridge (you may find the remnants of an old track). You will need to watch the map carefully to make sure you stay on the ridge, as it does not run consistently south all the way. Have lunch on Mount Tabletop (9 km) and enjoy the views from whichever side you have stopped.

Having left Tabletop, examine the map closely to study the direction of the main spur, generally leading southeast to Mayford. You will have to travel southwest for a time, to get around the headwaters of the creeks running east from the spur. On occasion, the spur flattens out but it becomes obvious again after a short while. When you have threaded your way around the creeks, follow the spur due east to Precipice Creek.

You will get good views of the river t1ats at Mayford near the end of this section. Follow Precipice Creek south to Mayford and a beautiful campsite. (14 km)

THIRD DAY Climb due south from Mayford towards King Spur. Aim for the high point where Jacksons Spur, Treasures Spur and Cooleys Spur meet. This is about a two hour climb. Having reached the road (3 km) follow it due west along King Spur towards Lankey's Plain and the cars, which are reached about lunch time. (9 km)

R.D./M.G. March 1977

66

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TABLETOP SIGNPOST-PAW PAW CREEK-BOILER PLAIN-MARAPOSA SPUR -PAW PAW PLAIN-BRANDY CREEK MINE TURNOFF

Transport: By car to Mount Tabletop signpost 3 km west of Dinner Plain. By car from Brandy Creek Mine turnoff 5.5 km west of Dinner Plain, or walk back along Alpine road to car at Tabletop signpost.

Availability of water: Only in Paw Paw Creek, or in certain parts of Paw Paw Plain.

Best Season: Summer, particularly early January.

Features: Several good views of the upper Dargo, many good alpine high plains.

Walk west for 400 metres along cattle pad on the south side of road. Turn left, climb along cattle pad a short distance to the ridge top. Turn right, follow another cattle pad along the ridge through snow gums and scrub to a jeep track coming up from the Alpine road. Turn along the jeep track, walk west to the Paw Paw Plain (2 km)

The track continues west across the plain, turns left, crosses the creek, then the faint track wanders southwest down through snow gum forest. Facing down along Paw Paw Plain, from flat rocks to the right of the creek there's a good view down the Dargo Valley past Mount Tabletop.

Passing through several lush grassy flats on the way down southwest, there are some good views from the edge of rocky outcrops. One from a rough cliff top to the left about a kilometre down, provides yet another aspect of Tabletop across the Paw Paw Creek Valley.

The downward grade lessens, becoming nearly level, then a steep uphill climb to the edge of Boiler Plain, with Maraposa Spur going out to the west. The track now tends to follow Maraposa Spur. From the rocky edge on the north side of Boiler Plain (5.5 km) there's a good view of the Upper Dargo, but an even better view from the very rocky edge - north side of Maraposa Spur. (6 km) Cross bearings to the promi­ nent peaks of The Twins and Mount Hotharn confirms that this is indeed part of the Maraposa Spur.

Not so many metres off to the left, there is still the track, sometimes a trifle obscure, but on it wanders along the level spur southwest and south, then drops down along the left (east) side of the spur.

But from the rocky edge among the twisted snow gums, what a superb view of the depths of the Upper Dargo, and the Morning Star Spur plunging to its river junction, in the vicinity of the old gold town of Brocket. One of the best views in this part of the country, ranges from the Twins dominating in the west, across to the Alpine Way near Mount Hotham, a wilderness of Dargo forests in the deep valleys between.

What was once the destination of this often faint track along a spur south to Maraposa Spur? It is my belief that it must have originally been the connecting link between Brandy Creek Mine, Brocket, Louisville, Homeward Bound Mine, Verdon and the Dargo High Plains; by way of the Homeward Bound and Maraposa Spurs.

During 1865, near Mount Blue Rag, a supply depot named Verdon probably supplied several of the reefer's towns of the Upper Dargo, namely Louisville, Brocket, the Homeward Bound Mine and the alluvial centre of Mayford.

68 When last seen this track was heading south-southwest downhill, in the general direction of the old Homeward Bound Mine.

In 1866, there were at least 16 reefs in the vicinity of Maraposa Spur. Gold was also found at Tabletop and Boiler Plain, during 1870.

From the spur directly above the sites of Louisville and Brocket, deep down on the Dargo River; return uphill to Paw Paw Plain. (12 km)

At Paw Paw Plain, turn left and follow Paw Paw Creek up along the verdant green of the high plain country, through thick green grass, the springy softness of deep sphagnum moss and the sheltering snow gums.

At the head of the plain (13.5 km) turn right, walk northeast down the Great Divide through snow gums, back to the Alpine Way. Distance 14 km. Walk back to car at Tabletop signpost. (16.5 km)

DAY WALK

DINNER PLAIN-PRECIPICE PLAIN-PRECIPICE PLAIN WATERFALLS-BULL PLAIN-VICTORIA RIVER-MALCOLM PLAIN-RED BANK PLAIN

Distance: 13 km

Transport: Car left at Red Bank Plain 7 km east of Dinner Plain on the Alpine road.

Best Season: Summer

No shortage of water.

100 metres west of Dinner Plain Hut a signpost reads "Dinner Plain Track". Pass through the fence, follow another fence south and southeast across a high plain. Grassy flats, sheltering snow gums and tiny creeks 400 metres south make a splendid camp site.

Continue south and southeast, slowly downhill through snow gum forest, then through a gap in a dog-leg fence. After a time, the old fence that you have been following disappears.

From a point about 3.5 km from the start, occasionally views can be seen through thinning trees out to the right, indicating the cliff edge. If you wander out in that direction, you will find a broken cliff scarp. Further out right look for a couple of broken brown volcanic outcrops, where J.B. Creek tumbles away down to Precipice Creek.

If you wish you can follow the broken edge left (south), but watch out for snakes sunning on the rocks; with here and there good views over Precipice Creek valley, and out past cliff-edged Mount Tabletop. Continue south along the broken cliff edge.

At 4.5 km, from a more southerly rocky tower, during late afternoon, there's a magnificent view of the purple wilderness at the head of the Dargo. A sun-shot valley with the winl)-coloured gum tips of a million forest trees. And the total area of the Upper Dargo Watershed is about 11,600 hectares, throughout all that region there seemed not a sign of human habitation, track or roading.

Turn left (east) walk out on to Precipice Plain. On its lush, wide open spaces, tiny creeklets meander through the deep, verdant grass. Southeast over the plain, these tiny streams combine to form a couple of the heads of the Victoria River, with water­ falls tumbling from the broken edges of Precipice Plain. (6 km) Once more watch out for snakes in this broken country. A beautiful high plain surrounded by shady snow gums. 69 A MUST IN THE MOUNTAINS

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70 Return to the northern end of the plain. Continue along the eastern side of the plain, reaching a tiny creek head running northeast. (7 km) Follow that downstream, crossingto the left (or northwest) bank, through dense young forest.

Follow the cattle pad to a junction, 7.5 km with a main creek, which is then followed east along the south bank. Avoid several morasses along the main stream. A large morass is crossed on a side creek, at the point where the main creek takes a south-east turn. For some of the past 1-1.5 km the route has been steeply down- in places, through dense young forest.

Shortly after (8.5 km) turn south away from the main creek, at the point where the beautiful flats of Bull Plain are first reached. Wander through these verdant flats, surrounded by tall forest, along the course of Bull Plain Creek. Then on through unspoiled sphagnum bog morasses, past old paddock fences, down through a narrow­ ing valley, northeast to its junction with the upper reaches of Victoria River. (Victoria Creek)(lO km)

Leave the packs, turn right and follow the clear river downstream to the point, where rocky outcrops cause cascading waters to surge down along the river course. The purpose of this short side trip is to appreciate the quality of the winding river head. Return to the packs. (11 km) For the past 3 km a feature of the walk has been the unspoiled excellence of the watershed. Walk north (upstream) to Malcolm Plain. (12 km)

Duirng that last kilometre you will probably have noticed the deterioration in the condition of the high plain, so marked in comparison with the excellence of the Bull Plain area. There was damage in the sphagnum bogs, erosion along some tracks, scouring along the banks, etc. possibly due to increased cattle usage.

Turn right (northeast) and climb uphill along a jeep track, or ascend grassy flats parallel to the track, back to transport parked near the Alpine road at Red Bank Plain. Total13 kilometres.

Map Reference: Dargo, F.C.V. 1:63,360

F.W.H. 19/6/77

MOUNT ST BERNARD-TWINS-MOUNT MURRAY

One or Two Day Trip depending on the time available.

Best Season: Summer, particularly early January.

Walk southwest along the bush road around the southwest slopes of Mount St Bernard, then down into the range gap (Great Dividing Range) east of The Twins. Continue slightly uphill along Twins Road, crossing a strongly flowing head of Buck­ land River, East branch. (2.5 km) There are several good views of the upper Buckland between the forest trees, while climbing around the northern spurs of The Twins.

At 3.5-4 km look for the Twins Track on to the northwest spur. Turn left and climb steeply southeast up the rough track. After a few hundred metres the grade lessens, then once more becomes much steeper over the last two hundred metres up to The Twins Trig. point. (5.5 km)

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72 The climb southeast up the long northwest spur track, provides the best approach to the Twins Trig. point, so much easier than the breakneck loose surfaces of The Twins eastern spur.

From this splendid viewpoint the ridge of the Barry Mountains - The Great Dividing Range - may be seen snaking away westerly towards the distant blue cliffs of Cobbler crouching low on the far horizon.

The finest view in the Eastern Barries encompasses the scene from mighty Feather­ top, to the pale blue serried peaks of The Crosscut Saw, from the fresh green forests of the Upper Buckland to the ragged heights of the Blue Rag Range. Western Twins Trig. Point, at an elevation of about 1, 750 m is situated right in the midst of it all.

But apart from the superb view, during January there will be the beautiful Alpine Garden with its myriad Silver Daisies, Purple Eyebrights, Azure Daisies and the light green bunches of Alpine Celery waving in the slight breeze.

From this point, the two alternatives are: A two day return walk out to Mount Murray, or a short one day walk returning to St Bernard, via the very steep eastern spur of The Twins.

The steep west spur plunges down to a range gap southwest of the mountain. On the two day walk continue southwest from The Twins Trig. About 1 km southwest (6.5 km) the track reaches a range gap. From there, descend a short distance on to Twins Road, turn left, walk west to the range top, where the Twins Road comes up from below, at 7.5 km another range gap is reached.

Continue west along The Alpine Track to the Rocky Nobs (9 km) and the Grassy Knoll (10.5 km). There are very fine views from all these high spots, and particularly near the Grassy Knoll.

Care must be taken to avoid cattle pads leaving the ridge, especially in the vicinity of Grassy Knoll. Then down southwest from the Grassy Knoll (c.1,550 m) to a second saddle near the Murray Hut. There is water in the deep fully below the hut, 120m below the saddle. Camp for the night in Murray Hut Saddle. 12 km for the day.

Next day, with light packs leave camp in the saddle, turn south on track towards Mount Murray track junction. (1 km) Continue south along Mount Murray Track to the summit. Fine views. (3 km) Return to camp at Murray Hut Saddle. (6 km)

Continue northeast and east along the range top avoiding Twins Road at 11 km, returning to The Twins along the main range and Twins southwest spur. (12.5 km) Return to St Bernard via Twins eastern spur.

A faint track skirts the hilltop eastwards, towards the slightly lower Eastern Twin. Another good view from this point, particularly to the steep Wongungarra country to the south. (13 km) Continue following the track (Alpine Track) down the very steep eastern spur, the track now marked by coloured plastic ribbons and metal markers.

The track often zig-zags down in wide turns to miss the worst of the steeply loose sections. Carefully follow the various markers - the yellow plastic ribbons and yellow metal markers. This may prevent you from having to traverse some rather awkward terrain. After a long descent, once again reach the range gap east of The Twins. (15.5 km) Climb uphill along Alpine Track back to the Darga Road junction. Part of the way up from the eastern range gap, towards St Bernard, pause and look back to see the steeply plunging spur over which you have just descended. Distance for the day, 17 km. Total distance 29 km.

For the day walk, after reaching Twins Trig. via northwest spur, return via the Eastern Twin and eastern spur. Distance for the day, 10 km.

73 SHORT WEEKEND

SNOB'S GAP-BILL'S HEAD-THE PARK-CONN GAP-CONN HILL-CABBAGE TREE GAP-MOUNT TORBRECK-BARNEWALL PLAINS-CONN GAP ROAD

Transport: Private to Snob's Gap, 15 km south of Snob's Creek Falls, From Conn Gap Road 6 km north of Snob's Gap.

Features: Good though hard, challenging walk through fine untracked forests of Shining Gum, Mountain Ash, Alpine Ash and Snow Gum. Good walking through grassy parklike groves of Woollybutt (Alpine Ash) with occasional good views from rocky knolls and Snow Gum Forests.

Best Season: November to April.

Availability of water: Dry terrain, carry water during walk.

Map Reference: Taggerty F.C.V. Map or Thornton Map.

Distance: 15 km

Type of terrain: Mountainous. Climb 730 metres. Descent 870 metres.

Leaving the city early on Saturday afternoon, the arrival at Snob's Gap should allow plenty of time before nightfall, for the pitching of tents, and preparation of the evening meal Water can be obtained from a creek crossing the road 40-50 metres north of the camp site.

An overnight camp at this spot should enable an early start the next morning, thus allowing a full day to complete this walk.

Next morning, walk north 50 metres to the more northerly and smaller Bill Head Road, leaving in a southeast direction. The other, larger road is the Snob's Link Road. Follow Bill Head Road southeast and east along the timbers of an old train track, to the southern spur of Torbreck Range.

Leave Bill Head Road, climb northwest and north up the steepening spur through nettles tangled amid some thick scrub. After a kilometre the grade slackens, the ridge broadens to the rocky top of Bill's Head. 1,360 metres. (4 km) Follow the ridge N.N.W. slightly downhill to the flat woollybutt parklands of The Park. (1 ,280 metres) (5.5 km) The serene deep grassy flats of this beautiful parkland makes splendid walk­ ing. Northwards downhill from The Park, then northeast down to Conn Gap (7 km). Good lunch spot. If necessary, any of the party that now may not be going so well, may return to the transport, situated at the road junction 3 km downhill northwest.

From Conn Gap, climb steeply north up the log-strewn spur to Conn Hill (1,400 metres), a rocky knob amid snow gums. (No view) (8 km). Then steeply down north­ west to Cabbage Tree Gap, a shallow saddle in Torbreck Range, just prior to the last steep climb up to Torbreck.

Follow the ridge north and northwest to a high boulder-strewn knoll. Cross the deep clefts and from the crest of the highest boulders (9.5 km) there is a splendid view over Torbreck Range, along the route that you have travelled all day, also of Federation Range, Royston Range and the Snob's Creek Valley.

74 SNOBS GAP - MT TORBRECK

0 2 km

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76 Ahead, to the north can be seen the cliffy ramparts and rocky outcrops of Tor­ breck's summit. From this point, a faint track leads north through a forest of twisting snow gums to the high cairn on the crest of Torbreck. (1,520 metres) (10.5 km)

There are several fine views in this section, from the edge just over to the left; and from the rocky cairn can be seen the distant waters of Eildon Reservoir. Look for the triangular yellow marker indicating the line of the track.

Retrace your steps a short distance, follow the track from the rugged crest, west down along steep passes through narrow chimneys. In places, the surface is loose; the way beset with logs, holes in the deep grass and the sprawling canes of wild raspberry.

Lower down, the obscure track joins a more defined track coming in from the left, later angling down through good forest of Alpine Ash and Shining Gum, joining the Barnewall Plains - Blue Gum Saddle Track, at the deeply grassed flats of Barnewall Plains. (12 km) Turn left and follow the Barnewall Plains Road winding down around the heads of Mill Creek through beautiful forests of Mountain Ash, Shining Gum and Blue Gum. 1.5 km after leaving Barnewall Plains reach the Conn Gap Road. Turn right (west) and in a further 1.5 km rejoin transport at Snob's Creek Road.

A very good walk, but allow eight hours walking time for the journey, of medium­ hard category.

An alternative, although longer day walk, would be to turn right at Barnewall Plains and follow the bush road down along the north branch of Corduroy Creek to tran:sport situated near Blue Gum Saddle, on the Eildon-Jamieson Road. Distance 19 km. This would make the walk a slightly harder category.

F.W.H. 11/3/77

TWO DAY WALK

GOULBURN RIVER-JAMIESON RIVER-HOWOUA RIVER

Transport: Private. Best road access is via Mansfield, although the Eildon-Jamieson road provides a scenic alternative if you don't mind windy roads.

Features: Wading and walking beside three of Victoria's most picturesque rivers, ridge walking mainly along tracks, good fishing and swimming in season.

Distance: 32 km.

Map Reference: Jamieson 1:50,000 Department of National Development Mansfield 1:63,360 F.C.V.

Walk Description Leave a car, or arrange to be picked up at the Howquadale Road-Mansfield Road junction. The walk starts where Baines Bridge once spanned the Goulburn and camp sites are abundant near the road. Wading the Goulburn River can be hazardous and in planning the walk use can be made of the Telemark river level recorder operated by the State Rivers and Water Supply Commission on the Goulburn at Doherty's Bridge, about 8 km downstream of Baines Bridge. To obtain the coded river level in metres, the number to ring is (057) 77 0558. When these track notes were compiled in October 1976 the reading was 0.80 metres, and the river was waded with ease about thigh deep.

77 OUTDOOR SCENE 729 7787 A.H. 842 1793 IS THE SPECIALIST BUSH WALKING SHOPOFTHEEASTERNSUBURBS for PACKS - Karrimor, Bergans, Hallmark, Flinders Ranges, Paddymade, Mountain Mule. TENTS - Bushgear, Paddymade, Freetime, Walkabout, Flinders Ranges. SLEEPING BAGS - Duradown, Paddymade, Point 5, Hallmark, Fairydown. CLOTHING - Japaras, Cagjaes, Woollen Shirts, Jumpers, Socks, A Large Range of Boots. Gaiters, etc. FOOD- Dehydrated, Freeze Dried, Ration Packs. MAPS & BOOKS - Algona, V.M.T.C., Forest Commission and Topographical Maps. SKIS - Nordic & Downhill Water should be carried for morning tea, and the walk commences with a steep climb along a 4WD Track toward the main ridge leading to Jamieson Lookout Tower.

The ridge offers magnificent views on both sides and very pleasant walking. The tower site is reached after 2% hours and the Jamieson-Licola Road is reached in another 1V.. hours. Then descending the steep 4WD to the Jamieson River, camp can be made on an elevated terrace on the north side of the Jamieson at Grid 205006. Jamieson Township lies 8 km to the west and makes a nice side trip via the meandering Jamieson River, passing some popular fishing spots on the way.

From the camp spot, start climbing until a track is reached on the spur running northeast from Hoskins Creek. The track continues until a hill is passed at Grid 214028 where it branches, the left going to the Wild Dog Creek Track, the right is signposted "Mitchells". Take the right track which swings east until another signpost is reached marked "Symes" at Grid 225030, which marks the track N-N.N.W. to the Howqua River at Howquadale.

From this point the Howqua is about 1% hours away; if instead, you plan on an extended walk, then the main track towards Mitchell's can be taken, which opens up access to the Governor-Bluff-Howitt Region.

Back on the Howqua, the river fronts numerous residential retreats and meanders its way through weeping willows until the Mansfield Road and the car is reached after 5.5 km. G.C.

TWO DAY WALK

DAY ONE: HORSE HILL RANGE, BALD HILL SPUR, KENDALL FLAT DAY TWO: THE CRINOLINE, BRUNI'S NOB, TAMBORITHA ROAD

Transport: Private

Best Season: Not in winter or snow thaw.

Features: Good views of the Barkly, Macalister and Wellington River Valleys from Horse Hill Range, Bald Hill, The Crinoline and Sugarloaf.

Map: Wellington 1 inch to 1 mile F.C.V.

Camp overnight at the "windmill" campsite Grid Reg. 614623, the junction of Wellington and Macalister Rivers.

Day One. Follow the spur west from this junction to the top of the Horse Hill Range climbing about 300 m. (2 km) Then northwest along the top of the ridge, walk­ ing through occasional clumps of Box, Stringybark and Peppermint, to top of hill at Grid. Ref. 593638, then W.S.W. to pick up a track along the top of the ridge north­ west to the hill at Grid Ref. 559670. (7 .5 km) Good views of the surrounding country­ side all along the top of the Horse Hill Range.

Walk Mag. north steeply down a gully to cross the Barkly River, walking down stream on the opposite bank to Lyndon Flat for lunch. (9 km) After lunch, take the spur W.N.W. on to Bald Hill Spur through open Peppermint and Box forest northwest and north to Bald Hill (13.5 km), with good views overlooking the Macalister River and the ranges opposite to The Crinoline. Walk steeply down ridge to the saddle and read at Grid Ref. 543729.

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80 Follow road off the ridges to the Macalister River, cross to the opposite bank and walk downstream (south) to the bend of the river to camp at Kendall Flat. Grid Ref. 551726 (16.5 km)

Day Two. Carry water for lunch. Walk at approx. 40° Mag. to pick up spur to the top of the ridge. Grid Ref. 574 740. (3 km) Over 300 m to this point through Box, Peppermint and Stringybark forest with occasionally thick undergrowth of wattles, grevilleas and heaths.

Without packs, follow the track along the ridge north to northeast to reach the summit of The Crinoline. There are excellent views from the top. (5 km) Return to the packs for lunch. (7 km)

Then proceed south along the ridge to Sugarloaf hill; along the unmarked track, good views from its stunted treed crown. (8.5 km) Then on to Bruni's Nob (10 km), being careful not to be diverted from the main ridge, by tracks leaving the ridge for the Macalister and Wellington Rivers respectively.

After making sure that you are on the correct knob, that is at Grid Ref. 5 74 708 (10.5 km), proceed S.S.E. along the ridge to 601659. (16 km) Descend very steep spur northeast to Grid Ref. 603662, then east crossing the Wellington River to the Tam­ boritha Road. Good views overlooking the Wellington River.

Total Distance: 33 kilometres

G.T.

MOUNT ENTERPRISE-LAKE EILDON

Transport: Private, to a point 6 km west past Gough's Bay.

Features: Good views over Eildon.

Season: Spring and Summer.

Standard: Medium. 33 or 44 km depending on the route followed.

Maps: Eildon 1:50,000 and Mansfield 1:63,360

Day One. Start at Grid Ref. 125842 and follow S.E.C.V. Road along the powerlines for approximately 6.5 km. A seep track to the top will be seen on the right, heading northwest. After approximately 2 km you will come to a junction, signposted as Highett Point and Stillman's Track. (14 km)

Follow Stillman's Track over Mount Enterprise, where there is a steep ridge going north, which can be followed into camp. Or stay on the track and after 3 km another junction will be met. Turn right, follow for approximately 5 km and make camp. (16.5 or 24 km)

Day Two. Follow the same road over Woolshed Creek and climb up to Woolshed Saddle, where there is a track seen going east up the ridge. Follow this track to the top and then turn right. (Southeast) Follow for 4.5 km where a track to the left (east) is sign posted Sheep Dip Gully; follow it down to the main road (approximately 3 km) and turn right, follow it back to the cars. (16.5 km)

Instead of going down Sheep Dip Gully Track, stay on the ridge track back to the same Powerline road, and follow it back to the cars. (20 km)

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•camera is only 12 x 5 x 3 em K61/5095 82 BELGRAVE-KALLISTA-FERN TREE TRACK-BEAGLEY'S BRIDGE-BAYNES PICNIC GROUND-HALLS TRACK-BELGRAVE

Distance: 15 km

Maps: Monbulk 1 :50,000, Military Sherbrooke Forest Park, Forests Commission Victoria

Note: The distance may be shortened by 6 km if the walk starts and terminates at Kallista.

Description of route From Belgrave station walk down the Kallista road for 1 km. Here, opposite Highwood Inn, take the FCV walking track, sidling the hillside above the road for a further 2 km into Kallista.

From the picnic ground on the west side of the road enter Sherbrooke Forest by the entrance near the signboard. Follow the Fern Tree Track down to the bridge over Clematis Creek where, on the far bank, the track forks. Keep to the right, climbing out of the gully, the track ending at a gate opening on to a sharp bend of a surfaced road. Turn right and walk down the road for 50 metres, looking out for a gate to a patrol track on the left. This track, a bit overgrown at the time of compiling these notes, will be found to lead to the northern boundary of the park- the old Sher­ brooke Road, now open only to foot traffic. Walk east downhill to go through gate and turn north into Owen Street, the latter branching two or three times; but the correct route is found by following the power lines. The road soon becomes unfenced and drops steeply to make a sharp bend to the right. A few paces around the corner and a foot track will be seen on the left. This is followed northwards to sidle a scrubby hillside, then descends to Beagley Street. On reaching the signpost it will be seen that the road branches; either route may be taken down to Sassafras Creek valley. Turn right and follow a walking track through a picnic ground and on to the road over Beagley's Bridge.

On the southeast corner of the bridge the walking track recommences and is then followed downstream along the banks of the creek for the next 3 km to where the Monbulk road crosses. Pick the track up again on the far side of the road at the first white post. The track, now a narrow pad, leads directly into Baynes caravan park and picnic ground. Lunch could be had here. There is also a swimming pool.

From the picnic ground follow the motor road back to Monbulk road. However, before reaching that intersection, climb out of Sassafras Creek valley by turning left into Masches Hill Road. After crossing Camms Road the road forks. Take the right hand unsurfaced road (Murray Road) to the next intersection. Turn right and climb O'Connors Road - it is designated 4WD track at its far end where it meets Cleghorn Road. However, take a lower, unsurfaced road (old Patch road) on the left for 1 km to turn left into Clarkson Road. The latter rises up to where there is a northeasterly view of the Yarra Valley and Mounts Donna Buang, Little Joe and Bride. Further on the road swings right, becoming the boundary of Sherbrooke Forest Park. Follow power lines west to the corner of Norton Road from where Halls Track is descended back into Kallista. The return trip to Belgrave may be varied by following Coles Ridge, starting south of the kiosk at Grant's picnic ground.

A.S. Notes compiled June 1977

83 SEE PADDY PALLIN -MELBOURNE

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