A Saturday was chosen for the walk despite the less optimal weather conditions. A cloudy day with a lower temperature made it easier for a long walk without all the hot summer conditions. The group was quite diverse with some exchange students from the US and New Zealand and some international students. Most members…
Helensburgh to Stanwell Park Beach Sunday 26th February 2023. The recent run of very warm weather limited where we could go in this walk, with areas away from the coast predicted to be 30 degrees C (and even 26 C in Katoomba). This walk, with its cool tunnels and largely shady tracks (except for the beach) provided a good choice on a hot day, as the predicted temperature on the coast was 27 degrees C. So many…
Umina – Pearl Beach – Patonga Walk Sunday 4th December 2022. This walk is similar (but not exactly the same) as the one on 19th November; this one put on for people who couldn’t attend the earlier one because of exams or whatever. We all met up together at Woy Woy Station, and I decided on a small change of plan to save us some time waiting for a bus to Umina Beach. Instead of…
Stanwell Park Beach Helensburgh to Stanwell Park Beach SATURDAY 26/11/2022. Another nice day picked for this trip, with a warm sunny day but not too hot. We caught the 9.33am train from Central, this time from the open air platform 22 due to trackwork, and thus spared the incessant bombardment of noise from ads from the big screens at the normal underground platforms; a good omen for the day. And it…
Umina – Pearl Beach – Patonga Walk Saturday 19/11/22 Industrial action by train staff that weekend required a change of plan made with a day’s notice to everyone, as train services were reduced to one per hour at Woy Woy. With the walk starting half an hour later than planned, I decided that a car transfer to Umina Beach, and then a car shuffle leaving one at Pearl Beach would save us some time at the end of the walk. So I…
Hallowe’en walk: South Head & Camp Cove. Another lucky break with the weather on my walks, again! Although showers and a possible thunderstorm were forecast for the afternoon, they didn’t eventuate until about 9pm, by which time evryone was on their way home. Also, because of the forecast, the walk was cut short to start from Macquarie Lighthoues at 5.30pm, then further back to start at Watson’s Bay at the same time. This made…
Combined Hike & Bushwalk: Newcastle – Fernleigh Track and Glenrock Conservation Area. First of all, thanks to this group who took a chance with the weather to come, and got rewarded. I was concerned that I had made a mistake in changing the day of the walk to Sunday instead of the previous day, as the rain radar showed Saturday as being mostly free of rain in the Newcastle area, but a rain front was approaching overnight. And on…
Mt Victoria-Fairy Bower-Mt Piddington- Pulpit Rock tracks walk (a more accurate description of the direction we took). Most of the group got on the train at Central for the 2 hour 15 minute trip to Mount Victoria, although I got on at Strathfield. We got to Mt Victoria Station at 11.07am, which is a later start than normal for walks in this area, as the plan was to do only 5 hours including lunch. A couple…
Wondabyne to Mt Wondabyne and Woy Woy 18/9/2022. I planned this bushwalk (NOT “hike”) for early spring to take advantage of the mild weather as well as the wildflowers being out in display at present. Anyone who has done this walk in summer knows how hot and exhausting it can get then. I made…
Helensburgh to Burning Palms & Figure 8 Pool and then Otford. With the earlier weather forecast looking like a fine day, it changed just 24 hours prior to being “partly cloudy with 40% chance of showers”. The following day’s forecast had changed from showers to sunny. That’s the…
Royal National Park: Uloola Falls and Karloo Pool tracks, 28/8/2022 Because of trackwork on the Illawarra Line, the origial plan had to be reversed. Instead of starting at Loftus, we started at Heathcote and ended at Loftus. This was because trackwork would mean a 20 minute wait at Sutherland waiting for another train to go just one stop to Loftus, then another 20 minutes doing nothing waiting for the tram. That wasted…
Awe – Inspiring Cliffs Socheat Soth Sunday 14 August 2022 (T) = paragraphs by Terry, the trip leader When two cars full of hikers leave different parts of western Sydney and arrive at the destination three hours away at the same time, I know I am going to have a good day of bushwalking. Logistically, the…
Written By: Socheat Soth I visited Magdala Creek in the winter of ’22, which turned out to be a glorious day with four other outstanding individuals: Sunil Jassal (trip leader), Nicholas Whyte (Nic), Rachel Ng, and Kwun Ming Shum (Ming). I wanted to do something different that day because my life had become too repetitive. I misread…
What an eventful day! When we met at Windsor that morning, the plan was to head out in search of Clews Cave. But no plan survives contact with reality, and in this case, “reality” took the form of a deceptively deep puddle on the fire trail. Hindsight is 20/20 With a tyre deflator and a bit more right-boot failing to move the car, Ruby went to Putty Road to flag down a passing vehicle and returned mere minutes later with an F100 truck, whose driver kindly recovered us and saw us on our way. Being the…
Six of us met up at Central Station on its noisy platform 25 and set off to Helensburgh. Dila got on at Redfern and Catriona at Hurstville. All eight of us on arrival at Helenburgh had a loo break before I gave an overview of our plan before setting of with our first stop being Wilson’s Creek waterfall almost right next to the station. Crossing over…
I decided it would be a good idea to write my first ever trip report in order to give anyone who was thinking of heading to the Wild Dog Mountains or anywhere in the southern Blue Mountains an idea of the conditions. In the post bushfire landscape of the southern Blue Mountains one always expects it to be tougher going than usual. For this…
This walk was intended as an easy day out having a look around Brooklyn and doing a few short tracks in the process. It essentially replaced the intended walk along the Great North Walk which was cancelled as that track was closed. In the process I actually found a new track! The five of us met up at Hawkesbury River railway station during a short rain shower, which the radar showed seemed to be targeting Brooklyn in a narrow rain band! The shower didn’t last long so we set out for our first of 3 short walks. This walk…
A nice fairly easy walk in the Blue Mountains in almost perfect weather. The day looked very promising with Venus and Jupiter shining brightly in the pre-dawn sky when I woke up. And the weather turned out to be excellent, albeit a bit cool. Six of us met up at Leura Station after riding up in various parts of the train from Central. Then it…
In light of the recent rain, I wasn’t too keen on going far into the bush or doing an overnight walk, so I chose a long and gentle coastal walk that would be safe from the elements. I asked everyone to meet up at Circular Quay at 10 am (mentioned this about 3 times in the emails) to make sure we had enough time to catch the 10.15 ferry to Watsons Bay and was pleasantly surprised with everyone being there pretty much exactly at 10 am. Catching the…
Trip report for the SCASS X SUBW Walk of Art bush walk We had a great group of people come on the Walk of Art bush walk, with myself, Chloe (SUBW president), Angela, Danah, Peggy and Eric. After catching the train from central we had a short ride out to Hornsby station, where afterwards we walked for 10 or so minutes to the start point of the track. The track…