Kiandra - Thredbo, March 2007

Who? - Me, Godfrey Fryar, Charles Oliver, Andrew Blake, Michael Jowett, Tim Hackney, Artie Seewald, PeterNixon, Bob Platteel.

A party that started off as six became eight, which, as I hope to show, should never have exceeded four.

We started at Kiandra on March 10th, 2007. I picked up a newcomer, Michael Jowett, from his house a few hundred meters from my place, just before 6 am. It was dark, and I should have done a recce the day before, because I couldn't see street numbers. Eventually I spied movement amongst the bushes beside the road, and with a quick introduction through the window, Michael stowed his pack in the back seat.

I've been making an effort over the past few years to lighten my pack, and many of my walking mates had asked me about how I had reduced my base weight for a prolonged walk to around 8 kg... often scoffingly, I might add. So Michael had received by email much of this material, and I found him apologising profusely that he hadn't managed to get his load below 30 kg.

30kg? it didn't look it to me... hardly bigger than mine. In fact maybe even smaller.

Anyway, we got under way and we talked madly all the way. This was fine up to a point, except that I was driving really badly because I was more interested in the talk than I was in the driving... I was missing gear-changes, not concentrating on speed and all that. When we arrived at Selwyn I said that I hoped I hadn't frightened him to death, but he just smiled and denied he had noticed..

The car-park at Selwyn was empty. We parked and chatted. There were European wasps there... I believe that they were first seen in the mountains last year, 2006. These were the first wasps I've seen since we left England in 1997.

Tim, Artie and Pete arrived at 8.45, Tim with a spring scale that proved my pack at 11 kilos (5 days' food but no water), and Michael's at 15kg with 2 litres water.

9.30 and still no others: Charles and Andrew were supposed to pick Godfrey up from Tumut and be at Selwyn by nine am. They eventually turned up at 9.45, and then they messed around for another half hour or something.

Anyway, we eventually got away and headed up the hill to the radio mast, and swung on towards Four Mile hut. The rails of Yan's stock yard have been partly burned in the fires... a great shame, but they are still there.

Four Mile creek was running abut the same as always, and we stupidly didn't fill up there... we were to regret it later.

9 Mile creek was not running, green and algae ridden, and though I drank a cupful, I don't think most did.

That was the last water we saw until Arsenic creek at the end of the day.

It was getting hotter and hotter, and we were feeling tired and hot, and worried about water. We stopped on the flanks of Tabletop Mountain for lunch. Much discussion about rations, and it seems most at least read my stuff about food, and several actually had exactly the same as me - Csabai, cheese and light bread.

The trouble there, and for much of the walk, was that the trees had been burned and therefore there was no shade.

I was navigating mostly by gps, though not actively, as I know the way: no-one was paying too much attention.

However, Charles was keen to go via Brooks hut, which meant going cross-country; I had marked a waypoint at the spot we had to leave the track. Suddenly my gps told me that we were going AWAY from the turn-off waypoint. So we turned back despite Andrew complaining about 'never go back'. We had passed a track with the signpost 'Bolton Hill trail' on it, and as it appeared to be more-or-less going the right way, we followed it.

I have no idea why but there was much discussion about the right route, and people were making wild suggestions about which direction we should be taking, but as I had Brooks hut entered in my gps, I was confident that I could lead them there with ease.

However, we hadn't started out from the right spot, so we weren't sure what we were going to go through, so I simply headed in a straight line through trees and scrub.

Very thirsty, we staggered on. Eventually we got to the edge of the plain and found a small creek, probably the head of Arsenic creek, and drank and drank for nearly half an hour.

We then had a couple of kms to go along the tree-line, but still Andrew was claiming we were all wrong and we should be in the next valley etc, so in the end I suggested he go ahead and run back to tell us, but he declined with a bit of a scowl.

As we approached the right area, a shout went up 'Pig!', and a family of porkers charged towards us, mum and dad huge and black, eight multicoloured piglets. They ran across our path and off into the trees on Arsenic ridge.

Shortly after, we came to the immediate area of the hut, but at first couldn't find it. Of course, I had plotted the position from a 1:100,000 map, so I didn't expect too much accuracy.

When we eventually found the remains of the hut (it was burned in the 2003 fires), all that was left was the hearth, mostly of concrete.

We hummed and hawed about where to camp - in the clear by the river (such as it was, no more than the slightest trickle) but where the cold air would settle; or beside the hut which is beside the trees. The higher site was chosen.

For myself I was buggered; the five kms of cross-country had taken its toll.

We pitched our tents and cooked. I had to force myself to eat, though after that and a cup of soup and some coffee I did feel better, and joined the others beside the hearth for general chat. However, we all very soon went to bed, where I, for one, slept well. I was camped on a slope, so pushed my boots wedge-ways under my lower side and all was well.

Now, the error- because we were looking at the very top edge of the map, we (I) mistook the road we were on for the east-west Boltons Hill road. After we stopped for a brief rest, we were heading south, not east, though there was only a millimetre of the N-S road showing on the map. So when the GPS showed us going AWAY from the waypoint, we had, in fact, only just started to do so, the waypoint being also on the E-W road (proof that we had made the same mistake when sitting at home to set the waypoint on the electronic version of the map).

Mistakes due to assumptions on the edges, and particularly the corners, of maps, are common, and so should be guarded against by experienced navigators. They are still made all too often.

Eventually all maps will be electronic and contiguous, so that at all times the point of attention can be in the middle of a screen... voila, no further problems.

Sunday

Cold and clear. All up late, around 7 am, I suppose. Beautiful morning, sun coming over the ridge to the east lovely and warm. So had breakfast and packed up fairly slowly, marvelling at the dulcet morning, looking for contrails (missing, though the morning planes were there... presumably because there were high temperatures at that altitude?).

Though we had another four or five kms of cross-country walk to deal with, the moor-like country was relatively easy to walk over, with a few simple boots-on crossings of Arsenic creek and Happy Jacks creek.

Then on over McKeahnies creek and on to Mackey's Hut for lunch. Some of us bathed and washed clothes, some of us sat supine, some of us cooked beautiful mushrooms picked by Michael on route... Many years ago I had been poisoned by wild mushrooms in England, and I've always been shy of eating wild ones since then. So I took just a tiny corner of one, and didn't react.

The original plan had been to reach Dershko's, but it seemed unlikely. We headed for the less-ambitious O’Keefe’s instead. We were still relatively short of water, though the creek before Doubtful creek had had enough running to fill our water containers, and the weather was hot and dry.

We were clearly tiring, and after a while Peter started limping, complaining of sharp pain just below the outside of his right knee, worst when travelling downhill. There was general concern at this, and he was loaned two walking sticks, one from Andrew and one from Godfrey.

The walk from Doubtful creek isn't too bad, rolling along and twisting a little, with a few short, sharp rises and falls. In general we moved along quite quickly, and arrived at Farm ridge before too long. We took a spell there, Andrew discovering a telephone signal, and therefore spending a characteristic twenty minutes on the phone talking, it seemed, to everyone in his address book.

Farm ridge, of course, is a beautiful spot, the only downfall being the lack of water. There is a small creek at the bottom of the hill, but who wants to keep going up and down twenty metres to get water? We would have camped there otherwise, the grassy lawns around the ruin of the farmhouse very inviting.

So on we went to O'Keefe's, arriving there at around 4.30, hot and tired.

You know how it is when one person has been described as a snorer? Everyone tries to pitch their tent as far from the snorer as possible, jokes build to the point of discrimination, and, from the snorer's point of view, things sometimes become rather more than a joke.

I snore. I used to share a tent with anyone, but now I ensure that I sleep alone. I try, as much as possible, to camp at a distance from the others.

So at O'Keefe's I found myself pitching my tent at some remove from the others, on a sloping, tussocky strip above the general camping area, which is more-or-less flat and smooth. I felt slightly resentful as I struggled to set my tent amongst the tussocks, as I watched the others setting up luxuriously on the sward below.

Nevertheless, with a few jokes I joined them and cooked my dinner along with the others beside the logs of the camp-fire spot... we couldn't light fires on this trip as it was still rated a fire-risk period.

My Trangia struggled to heat my food in a squally wind, and though I did my best to shelter the flame, I had to be careful not to set the grass alight. I used a small sheet of bent and twisted roofing iron to guard against the wind, and to serve as a hearth beneath the stove. O’Keefe’s, too, was burned down in the 2003 fires.

Once I was finished cooking, the Trangia was hard to put out, hot gas spurting from the sides of the simmer-ring, even though it was closed tight. I put a flat stone on the burner, and still it burned. I guess it burned on for five minutes before I could blow it out.

While Trangias are, on the whole, my favourite stove on the grounds of compactness, lightness, safety and efficiency, they are hard to control in a wind, especially the smallest of the kits, which have virtually no wind-guard. I feel an effective miniaturisation of the full Trangia could be achieved at only a few grams weight and very little increase in size, and this would be counterbalanced by the fuel saving - a wind-driven Trangia clearly used up to double the fuel of one run in calm conditions. Extra fuel = extra weight and space.

Andrew Blake uses an MSR shellite stove, and on that evening at O'Keefe's we had a demonstration of the superiority of the simplicity of the Trangia: Andrew's stove cast a leather washer, the pressure-producing washer, in the barrel of the pump, and try as he might he couldn’t retrieve it. No cooker for Andrew and Charles. Unfortunately that meant we were a bit low on metho to fuel the remaining stoves, all Trangias of different sizes.

Well, no matter: we got by to the end of the trip by sharing.

Anyway, as usual we went to sleep at dusk, and faced the wettest night I can remember in the mountains. No, not rain, but humidity that left us saturated. It felt like being in a sauna, very unpleasant.

During the night we were wakened by what Michael claimed was a Barking Owl.

When the morning finally came we were wreathed in fog, the tents dripping wet. Well, it happens. So we cleared up and prepared to move on, with Schlink Hilton our aiming point.

Andrew had another go at retrieving the leather washer from his cooker pump, but to no avail once more. We started walking at around 8.45 am.

From O’Keefe’s, of course, you have a very much up-and-down route around the base of Jagungal, with plenty of mobile phone coverage as it is line-of-sight with the tower on Mt Selwyn. So at around 10.30 we were in touch with Bob Platteel, who was going to walk in from Guthega Power Station with wine etc, and spend the night with us. We promised to try and make Schlink, though it was a long way, given our wounds. On around the mountain base we went, then out onto the plain and southwards towards Grey Mare.

It was at about that time that my left knee started troubling me, in almost exactly the same way as Pete was reporting. Pete was still hobbling along with two sticks.

There was no doubt that most of us were suffering. Artie complaining, Pete hobbling, Godfrey clearly suffering from his feet, Tim looking buggered, and now me, too, with an increasingly sore knee. Only Charles, Michael and Andrew were still reasonably fit.

Charles had done a lot to keep his pack weight down, though in at least one factor he had gone too far: his sleeping bag, rated at +10°C, was far too lightweight, and he was suffering freezing nights. Andrew refused to have his pack weighed, but it looked huge, probably at least 20kg; throughout the walk he kept producing comestible tid-bits of a gourmet standard, mostly heavy with oil and in bulky containers. He had two warm hats, and little inflatable earth mat as a seat.

So we went on across the plain, over the Tooma a few times, and up the lower slopes of Strawberry hill. This one was, as usual, a bit of a bugger, short but steep. Following that was the long ridge around Smiths Lookout leading to Grey Mare hut and the first crossing of Back Flat Creek. We dropped wearily off the ridge to the creek, crossed, and stopped for lunch.

The first task was to get our tents out, turn them inside out and dry them. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a tent so wet on the inside.

The last time I was here, in October ’06, I had crossed all rivers with boots on until I arrived at Back Flat creek, and from there on it was boots off: Flat Back creek and its numerous crossings, Geehi creek, and Valentines. Now, in March ’07, we crossed all creeks with boots on, without getting our feet wet, nor any chance of it. Five years of drought are taking their toll. What are the big rivers going to do for water if we don’t get heavy rains this winter?

Charles, Artie, Pete and Andrew stripped off for a bath. I had had my usual strip wash in the morning, so gave it a miss while I rested my knee.

All too soon we moved on, over the crossings of Back Flat, then on up the hill to the high ground, then down again to cross the Geehi, up again and down to the Valentine, then up to Valentine’s hut.

It was there that I revealed the extent of my injury, the last down-hill having been a slow-moving agony. We had a quick pow-wow.

For myself I knew that I could not go on over the main range the following day: it would have been agony, and stupid, too, and it would have put everyone else in danger if, for instance, the weather had turned bad.

I had stressed all along that I was not the leader of this trip; nevertheless, I felt that it was important for me to state my condition honestly, to give the others the opportunity of confessing their ills without feeling silly.

So I stated quite clearly that my knee was going to make me change my plans: I would walk on to Schlink Hilton, with the hope that Platteel could drive me out from Guthega on the following day.

There was much muttering that we should stay there at Valentines Hut, and walk on the following day; But I reasoned that if Bob Platteel then left Schlink early to go home, we, the lame, would have lost our only real chance of a lift out.

In the end, everyone agreed, and we walked on, tireder and tireder.

Charles and Michael stayed back with the weakest (myself and Pete), and the party straggled on until at last Schlink Hilton loomed up.

As we turned the bend that brought it into sight, we could see someone else arriving, just going into the hut… Bob Platteel. Good timing.

Everyone claimed a bed in the hut except Michael, who pitched a tent outside. Now, that morning Michael had claimed that the night must have been quiet because though I pitched my ten 50 metres from him, he still heard me snoring quite loudly; I was a bit incensed, because nearly everyone else in the party had been between he and I, yet he still decided that it was me snoring.

So that night I told everyone that I wasn’t going to apologise for any snoring I might do, that they could like it or lump it. I claimed a bed with a mattress over Artie, and we settled in for the night, cooking and washing and generally messing about and pulling each others’ legs. Bob brought out a couple of litres of port, which we sipped conservatively (shows how bad we felt: we only drank about half of it!).

Then bed. Half an hour later Artie started snoring, and just to make things clear, I said quite loudly ‘The snoring you are hearing is not coming from Michel!’ By morning it was established that Artie, Godfrey, Tim and Andrew had all snored, and that I had probably not.

Next morning was once again beautiful, and final plans were made. Artie wanted to pull out too, leaving five to walk to Guthega and three to go over the top; But I did the maths and realised that Bob’s 4x4 could only take five, so I challenged Artie’s fitness to keep walking, and he backed down and decided to go over the top too. I was surprised, but anyway, it was the only sensible thing.

So off we went to Schlink Pass, then goodbye to the summit party and on down the long hill to the Power station way below.

Half way down all the pain suddenly disappeared from my knee. I went some way like that, and all continued to go well. Hang on, I thought, I don’t have to go home after all. The original plan was that I would leave the others at Thredbo, get a lift to the Geehi dam track, and walk back to Mt Selwyn via Pinnacle mountain, Grey Mare, Mawsons, Mailbox, Happy’s and four mile hut, and now that my knee seemed to have miraculously recovered, I started making plans to do just that. After half an hour of this I told Bob, and then Godfrey; but a little while later the pains returned, and I was gloomily forced to accept that I was going nowhere after Thredbo.

We wobbled onwards until at around 11am we reached the power station and Bob’s car, which was surrounded by European wasps. We squeezed in with all our gear, and headed for Jindabyne, and what Bob called the all-day breakfast.

We had 24 hours before the arrival of the four over-the-toppers, so after a noon breakfast we booked in to the YHA, washed and dried our clothes in the laundrette and generally got ourselves squared away.

Lach Wilson, friend of Charles Oliver, had volunteered to come down from Wagga to help with getting us back to Wagga, so we called him and suggested he join us in the YHA, and he arrived just before dinner. Clean and reasonably un-smelly, we dined in the pub – Pepper & Salt Squid all round, a fairly riotous evening with religion and politics going at it hammer and tongs.

This was followed by a visit to the huge car-park where, in the dark, Bob set up a 20cm telescope, a recent hobby of his, and took Tim, Godfrey and I for a tour of the heavens. Quite fascinating, especially seeing Saturn and its rings – the first time I can remember seeing it, and seeming so huge, too.

With stiff neck from gazing upwards for so long, we returned to the YHA for a reasonably early night, and next morning went in search of decent breakfast and coffee. The bakery had been pretty good the year before, but was a disaster that morning, with poor coffee and burned croissants. Anyway, at eleven am we went up the mountain on the ski-lift (scoring a $17 seniors ticket though I said I wasn’t officially a senior – normal price $26). At the top, my knee still very painful, we waited in the Eagles Nest café, reading papers, good coffee etc, with the expectation that the over-the-top boys would arrive soon. They did so, at around noon.

We had been hopeful that the YHA would let them shower and clean-up, and despite the fact that they were hanging around and not getting on with it, Nadia, the manager that day, was very patient and didn’t complain at all.

At 2 pm we headed off. Bob had one of those car-navigating GPS thingos in his car, and it suggested, in a very cultured English/Teutonic voice, that we should take the Dead Horse Gap/ Khancoban route, rather than the Jindabyne/Adaminaby route; Lach, though, decided on the latter, so the cars separated.

Well, it turned out that Bob wanted to look at the re-built Geehi hut at Swampy Plains, to look at the dried up Tooma river below Tooma dam, and at a few other things on the way, so that we finally arrived back at Mount Selwyn three quarters of an hour later than Lach, who had already left.

So the trip ended, cut sadly short for me, but good fun despite everything.

So what went wrong?
Three things went wrong, I think:

1. setting a deadline to meet Bob Platteel at Schlink Hilton. This meant that we really stressed ourselves to reach it on time. Deadlines are fine if there is a lot of slack in the program, but if not, as in the H&H walk of the year before, they put added stress and turn a fun day into a race to get there.

2. In a large party, there is always someone feeling tops who wants to race ahead. Testosterone does lousy things to males. Even if you think you are immune to pressure of that sort, you can’t help either competing or at least doing that bit extra so as not to hold the group back. In other words, extra stress to go faster, further etc.

I tried to keep saying that there was no program, that we could camp where we wanted when we wanted; but the incentive to get to Schlink Hilton in time so as not to let Platteel down was always there.

3. There was difficulty with a lack of water. I was guilty of this too. We should have started with full water bottles – three litres. Instead, we all reduced the load to around one litre, and suffered because of it. The only good water we found on the first day was at Four Mile Creek early in the day (where we should have taken 3 litres), and then none until Arsenic Creek at the very end of the day.

As a consequence we went without enough water for all of the first day, and I have a feeling that we didn’t really recover from that. We would have in time, but again five days is too short a walk to get really fit.

Michel Dignand
20.03.07

The untold story….Schlink Pass to Thredbo (Michael Jowett)

The decisions had been made and there was no turning back: after a long farewell Charles, Andrew, Arthur and I turned off Schlink Pass and headed cross country up the escarpment and onto Dicky Cooper Bogong – the gaiters came in handy as we pushed through the low scrubby trees and bushes to get some height trying to follow any goat track that continued for more than 100 M. Enthusiasm was high and like young billy goats we climbed in and around the Granite Peaks to get the best views out over the Rolling Ground – time for a stretch and a well earned rest break. Andrew always has a few extra treats in that voluminous bag and I can honestly say I was eternally grateful on this section of the walk as these little surprises added some variety to my meagre weight conscious pack food.

Shouldering our loads once more we set off crossing the gently undulating plains. Charles was confident but the rest of us were unsure of the location of Consett Stephen Pass until we settled into a rhythm and followed some pads through the very dry alpine moss, lichen and peat sections which took us directly there. We found few soaks of water to fill up our water reservoirs with. I’ve walked a lot up here and have never seen these pads this dry – it really highlighted the extent of the drought. Any rain or snow would have to rejuvenate and replenish these massive vegetative reservoirs before the irrigators downstream would see any runoff. Water was going to continue to be an issue that day.

We followed the contour line around the summit of Mt. Tate with the party of four splitting up to graze across the valley and across the ridge line. Arthur was hitting his straps leading up the valley out to the West while the rest of us wandered out towards Gills Knob before drifting back to the ridge line. Arthur continued leading out past Mt. Anderson before we could look out over the Geehi Gorge and onwards towards the intimidating face of Mt. Twynam. The crew was looking good but our water was getting low again. Coming around Mt. Anton and sidling up the face of Twynam we desperately searched for water along the track before we discovered a miserly trickle. Arthur set about engineering a funnel to get some into his bottle while Andrew, Charles and I headed down into the headwaters of Pound Creek to access some deep, slowly flowing pools of crystal clear water. All bottles filled we all felt a lot more comfortable as we tackled the contours onwards and upwards. I think it took almost as long for Arthur to fill his bottles from his funnel and drip as it took for us to climb down, fill up and climb back up. We didn’t see a lot more water until we came out onto the summit area of Twynam and rejoiced in the historical soil conservation works and a much clearer trail.

By the time we cruised down the flank of Mt. Twynam onto the ledge above Blue Lake we were all well and truly stuffed. Tent sites were chosen for the views and dinner was a high priority. Water was plentiful close by and the grass was soft. The weather was very kind to us with a mild, wind free evening. I managed to lose my torch filling Godfreys’ camera with images at dusk. Charles pointed out the Sentinel and Watsons Crags as we watched the last of the sun that had taken it’s toll on us that day.

I was about to find out that Michel hadn’t been pulling our leg at O’Keefes hut and that there was indeed another culprit responsible for the snoring on the trip. Despite my efforts to reduce the weight of my pack I reckon I could’ve fitted a couple of foam earplugs in. Charles tucked himself warmly into his nylon sheets next to Andrew in the Taj while Arthur settled in next to me in the Salewa Micro. I know I was tired an I know I slept well eventually but not before listening to both CD 1 and CD 2 of all of Arthurs’ compilation greatest buzz saw hits of the 70’s. Come back Michel – all is forgiven!

The first glint of reflection on the lakes below and the lightening sky started the next day. I quietly stalked all over the ridge madly taking photos in my bare feet before I found my torch again and rejoined the group for brekky. It was a gloriously clear morning and everyone though a little footsore was up for the final fling towards Thredbo. We packed up with dry tents and lighter loads and swapped the lead along the path to Carruthers Peak and around Mt. Lee. The walk around Albina Lake is always a favourite and Charles filled me in on his years skiing and walking in this area.

As we got closer to Kosciusko it seemed that the consensus of the group was that we wouldn’t go to the summit. I always like to finish what I’ve started so with the general agreement that I was mad as a hatter I set off at a run to get ahead of the troupe, dump my pack at the track junction and sprint for the summit. My boots had been bothering me the whole trip but either my feet were numb or I’d adjusted to them finally as I pushed on up to the top of our continent. The few walkers I met or ran past all thought I was rather balmy for sure. I think the fellow that I said “G’day” to on the summit thought I was very special as I was only there long enough to get two photos, take a pee and bugger off again.

I met up with Charles, Andrew and Arthur at the very busy Rawson Pass. Lots of revegetation and track work. I’m sure those buggers ran to get there ahead of me. Time for a short break before we entered the relative insanity of the worlds longest lightening rod walking track. As we picked up the enthusiasm again along the walkway Andrew and I had a great time amusing ourselves endlessly asking passing tourists to mention politely to Charles and Arthur how much they smelled. As we got bolder and some of the punters got younger we asked them to be less polite and got some great support – it’s good to know that humour at someone else’s expense is an International currency.

Before too long we could see the extended lens of Bob Plateel projecting towards us and not far behind him Michel and the rest of the crew. The restaurant at the end of the universe was upon us – time for warm chocolates and food before the chairlift took us back to civilisation and the last footsore steps up to the bakery to replenish our carbohydrate stores and organise the rides back to Selwyn.

I still find it hard to believe that the group covered so much distance each day – and was relatively unscathed despite that. True warriors and a great bunch to walk with – plenty of experience and stories (most of them probably lies but I think that only adds to the mystery of them all). Thanks all for taking me with you back into one of my favourite places.