Walkers: Bruce, Mollie, Sophie, Dimitri, George K, Shayna, Michael M, Hayden, Tee, Emma, Jenifer, Abhisht, Sarah, Jacklyn, Eva, Isabela, Robert S, Nathan, Jali, Michael J, Anne, Ben T, Luck, Parastoo, Ankit, Katerina, Rebecca, George W. (Although, if you count the people in the photo on Otford Station there are 30 ? more about that in a minute ? read on).
When I first began bushwalking, I remember being easily amazed by almost everything I experienced. While I’m still just as passionate about nature and the Aussie bush, the reality is that experience seems to take away a little of the wonder. Even the physical excitement, the adrenalin, inevitably lessens with each dicey scramble or long abseil.
Based on the number of leeches that attacked me the last time I led a tripout to Splendor Rock, Kosta and I decided to put a leech disclaimer in the advert for the 2012 Freshers Trip. Thanks to the glorious El Nino conditions, the friendly leeches of Carlons creek have gone forth and multiplied, seemily beyond any reasonable or polite carrying capasity. Nevertheless, it did not deter all of our SUBW freshers from heading out a few weekends ago.
Pulling in to the Bendeela campground, it looked like the trip had started off poorly. The scene was reminiscent of a refugee camp, with what seemed like hundreds of people – complete with cars, caravans, tents, tarps, and camp chairs – packed into a paddock about the size of a football field.
We met up in Kanangra early on Saturday morning. Here we consolidated our gear and decided to have a crack at both Dione Dell and Middle Christys over the two days we had. I also persuaded Tony and Sharon to leave behind their stoves as we’d have a camp fire instead.
The battle plan for this trip went something along the lines of: casual stroll along part of the great north walk, followed by a few beers, some dinner… In reality, the stroll turned into an epic 30km mission, enough to force any fresher to question the fundamental basic operating principles of subw.
Ulla, Lisa and myself set off from Evan’s lookout in a misty afternoon – the only thing you could see was a white wall – Lisa and I almost managed to convince Ulla that underneath the fog there were the 3 sisters.
Often they aren’t precise, in fact many aren’t designed to be, rather they are a simple way of giving just enough rough information to someone who knows how to use it to let them find a secret spot. They leave a little room for exploration, for navigation, for bushcraft.
Driving into Mt Wilson, it felt like we’d gone through a time warp. As we drove along the road we passed antique cars from the 1920′s while dirty, depression era people casually strolled along carrying century-old tools. A roadside stall sold fruit from stacks of wooden boxes. We actually seemed more out of place than they did, given some of the spectacular old building in the area like the tree fern surrounded church and impressive Turkish bath house.
It was about 4am as we drove into Glen Davis, pulling up at the campground in town and throwing down our sleeping bags under the verandah for a few hours of much needed sleep before a big weekend of canyoning. About dawn we were joined by a healthy swarm of mosquitoes who seemed determined to drive us from our slumber.