An absolutely straightforward trip through Fortress. We met for breakfast in Leura at a leisurely 9.30 and hit the trail about 10.45. The weather was perfect – low 20s and bright sunshine, and the water in the creek was a decent temperature. There is a clear track, as described in Tom Brennan’s notes, all the way to the creek, which took about an hour, where we donned wetsuits and harnesses. After a…
Jack and I carried my 40m & 60m ropes for the trip. We down climbed the first optional abseil and I setup the second abseil that has a bit of an awkward start towards the edge where there are two boulders wedged together to make a narrow overhang abseil or you can use the rocks either side to step your way down. Our next…
https://youtu.be/dpEuvhnYnxM We made it to the mountains early enough to score a prime park and buy three books from some guy selling them out of a trailer near the fire shed, which international students might be interested to know is the Australian retail equivalent of Amazon’s ‘Black Friday’ sale. I’d been…
On the drive home we compared our experience to what I had written in the invitation – while I got the “5+ hours of walking each day” correct, I’d left out “It’s unorthodox at this time of the year” at the start and made no mention of “substantial off-track walking”, no “navigational challenges” and no “I haven’t ever been there or read really detailed trip reports so can only make a guess at a few particulars”… After leaving…
We met at Katoomba train station a bit after 9.30am already being a very hot day. The staff from Mountain Design (Sydney) predicted the afternoon thunderstorms at 3pm, luckily it hit Katoomba at 7.30pm. The trip was going to have a few challenges, the first one was the use of rope protectors as much as possible. The second…
Having evenly distributed ourselves across every carpark in Wentworth Falls that could be interpreted as “near the station” we re-organised into a couple of cars, dropped one at our exit point and drove out onto Tablelands Rd. The walk in was open and uneventful and we reached the creek proper via a ~20m abseil. At the…
We all met up at Woy Woy Station and then proceeded in Matthew’s car and my car for the 15 minute trip to the south end of Umina Beach. At the parking spot we were greeted by a male Bush Turkey. As it was becoming a nice day there were already plenty of people at the beach. Then it…
We met at Richmond McDonalds just after 6:30am. Clint arrived after me followed by Mani who recognised me from the usual canyon attire I was wearing of thermals that had holes everywhere on them from the amount of off track walking on canyon trips. Saskia and Tony came with Meridy. We carpooled…
This trip was fruitful, with two routes being confirmed as worthwhile, multi-pitch gorge routes with nice waterfalls and refreshing pools to swim in. No-one else signed up so I shortened it to two days. On Monday morning I checked out an old track near Hindmarsh Lookout at Belmore Falls. The track…
This was the 2nd attempt for Saul and I, as we tried this in Feb but baulked at crossing a very dodgy looking gap on an exposed and sloping ledge. My main memories of that first attempt were the panic at the thought of crossing that chasm, and the relentless scratchy ti tree and banksia scrub on the ridge out from the road. As it…