Day 24 - Australian Alps Walking Track

It's 1:36am and I am still just laying here not sleeping.  I know I have drifted off a couple times for what seems like minutes.  I am restless and wired.  With the light day today I think that my body is now unable to turn off.  It just hasn't used the energy up that it has become used to burning off in a day.  On the other hand I know that my mind is tired.

There are plenty of people out there that would say that the effort so far has been an alright effort but nothing super athletic or amazing.  I agree.  I probably agree more now that I have been home for 7 months.  Although I trained hard for this for 2 years, I then didn't train at all for the year before my departure.  So for me, at the time, I was deep in the well and pushing hard.  Now I only wish I had trained for that year prior to my departure and had made a faster journey.

My mind is tired.  I swear i just heard my phone ring.  I check it even though I took the battery out earlier today.  Hep, the battery hasn't magically found its way back into the phone!  I hope it isn't one of those things where its a sign I should call home cause something bad has happened.  I finally get to sleep.

Morning has come November 24th.  My routine is flawless now.  I'm calm.  Today will be light and uneventful.  I leave my boots off this morning and just chuck on my water crossing shoes.  Instead of zig zagging across Black River, I  decide to walk straight down the middle.  Before the trail had been cleared this was the best way to get along the river, so why not add my name to the list of those that have walked the leach infested Black River.

As I leave the river the sun is shining through the trees.  With all the moisture around from yesterdays showers, the humidity makes trudging out of Black River a real drain.  Its all 4x4 trails really so its not that exciting no matter how I look at it.  Tim & I never took this route in the past as it was closed with tree fall.

Now I'm sure plenty of people would tell you that I often must hear crickets in my head, as there must not be a lot going on between my ears; this morning I would have to agree with them.  I am at piece with what I've done and what I'm doing.  I really am just wandering, thinking of very little.

As I get to Champion Spur junction I see an unfamiliar looking branch on the road.  On closer inspection I discover that it is in fact a Samba deer antler.  I'm not a hunter and don't enjoy guns, so finding an animal trophy to take home is pretty cool for me.  I strap it off to the pack and keep on going.



In the distance I am sure I can hear engines.  At times they are to my right, then my left, its like they are invisible and driving around me.  The trail through this area is better than 4x4 trails.  I would consider them pour quality country roads.  As I pass Mt Singleton there are a couple off-road track to my right with fresh tire tracks.  I'm thinking today is Sunday although I really haven't be keeping track of the days.  Sure enough, 1,2,3..... they just keep coming.  In groups of 2 and 3 I count about 15 or more serious off road 4x4's.  Not one of them even come close to stopping to see if I'm alright.  Thats cool.  As I near Fiddler Green I see a massive Aussie Disposals flag and these off-roaders that had shot passed me all parked of the side.  I have a chat to them and find it's an off-road orienteering course.....no wonder they didn't stop.  they are being timed.  Scored another free soda!

Apparently they changed out the axle on this 67 Willy Jeep the night before to stay in the race!

The walk along these wet and lonely roads is some of the more boring hours I have hiked.  As I leave the road and head down Victor Spur track I stop and have a feed in the rain.  I cooked up some hot soup, using the gate as a table to hold all my cooking gear.  I follow Victor Spur track to the AAWT trail entry.  I am excited to get amongst the trees again but lose the trail within 100m of leaving the road.    Once I get on track again the trail becomes really easy to follow with almost too many trail markers.  When you arrive beside a marker, you can almost always see the next marker off ahead.

The hike down to red jacket is wet but I enjoy the knowledge that I am just around from red jacket and will soon make camp, a fire and change into dry clothes.

3 years ago this cemetery sign would have been shorter than the scrub

Red Jacket has had a lot of clearing done and I am amazed that the scrub where Tim and I camped near last time through the area is in fact located directly opposite the cemetery.  Parks Victoria have done a great job to restore this area.  I am disappointed to see the no camping sign at Red Jacket and decide to press onto Blue Jacket even though I remember Allan Gamble telling me that Blue Jacket is bug infested.  I now realise that Red Jacket would have been fine to stay at as Parks Victoria allows AAWT hikers to stay.

Had to do it!

I set up camp and read the historical boards installed at Blue Jacket.  The bugs are crazy.  I haven't seen this may bugs ever.  I am losing my mind.  I am getting really pissed off with all the bugs so I decide to just pack up and keep moving.  Within 100m of leaving Blue Jacket the bugs are gone!  What is up with that place.  I follow Violet town track to Casper Creek track.  Holy!  Now that is a climb.  Photos can't describe how long and consistently steep this track is.

What you see here is probably 1/10th of the incline, there had to be 10 false summits!

 It is now about 5pm and I am tired.  The humidity of the whole day has really been draining and I had turned down my mental armour so this climb hits me like a tonne of bricks.  This whole section is ugly.  It has been cleared and turned over by large machinery.  The trail is not really that easy to follow and I take a couple wrong turns which really piss me off at this time in the evening.  None the less I make make camp at the bottom of Mt Little Easton, just beside the Thomson River.  The bugs here are as bad as Blue Jacket but I can't go any more.  Its about 8:30pm when I clean up my dinner bowl and get to bed.  I last photo first.

What do my eyes say? After 24 days!

Day 2 - Hills, Views & an Alpine Tiger Snake

We started our day a little wet as mentioned in 'Come on Honey its only a 2 hour drive!" Tim had his powdered milk & 4 WheatBix and I got stuck into 2 hot cinnamon and brown sugar oatmeal.  We packed up and were on our way by 8am.  There was little point hanging around camp with the sun rising at 6:30am and well, we were damp so it wasn't that relaxing anyways.

I must say though that despite all the nights drama's we both seemed to get an okay sleep.  I found packing on this morning to be exciting.  We were about to do our first full day hiking together and really get stuck into the Australian Alps walking Track, very exciting.  I knew we would be climbing first thing this morning as track notes from John Chapman's book indicated so I really wanted my pack to be compact and packed well.  I still couldn't fit my tent inside so it was still tied to my pack, I hope to resolve this before our end to end adventure.



We made good time out of Red Jacket and headed North/east towards Mt Victor and then onto Mount Singleton.  We took a couple a breaks along the way to test out our morning snacks which included Mixed nuts and a dehydrated fruit mix of Kiwi, Banana, Strawberries, and Apples.  We will definitely continue to bring those items on the main trip.  The fruit is so light and full of energy, I'd bring less mixed nuts next time mind you as they are heavy and dry, salty so it really made me thirsty.
On our way we passed the Historical Survey sign which everyone gets a photo with, too bad some desecrated the original behind it on the tree.  The climb from Red Jacket to Mt Singleton was a healthy mix of visible walking tracks and gravel roads with a couple 4x4 tracks thrown in to give some relief to the feet.

As we approached the summit of Mt Singleton the locals must have heard we were coming an they sent out the welcome party.  He was a 3 foot Alpine Tiger snake and as we were talking away I just didn't see it there and as I was stepping down with my right foot, on a small incline I just saw it.  I hadn't the time to stop myself from stepping down, but thankfully missed stepping on its tail by about a inch!  With 23.1kilos on my back I jumped like a wild man with rabies about 3 feet off the ground and yelled out "SNAKE!"... "TIM SNAKE!"  

We avoided this little fella with Tim having to do some bush bashing to get around him as he wasn't moving.  Ends up being lucky for tim as the trail hairpins about 100 metres up the trail and comes out on the open field where Tim was standing anyways.....should have followed.  Sounded like a nice place to have lunch, so we took out the offcuts of under floor insulation we had brought to give some comfort between us and the grass and chowed down.  We had about 60grams of Pepperini Salami, 60grams of American (orange) cheddar cheese with an assortment of crackers.  Doesn't sound like much but what a pick me up.  In the bush, hiking, mostly with my mouth open.... huffing and puffing up the hills, your taste buds are stale so the taste of salami, cheese and crackers is so exciting.  Its a real energy hit and motivator.  I'm gonna need to try different crackers on the big hike as these ones weren't my thing!

We made or way for a couple km's along Mt Selma Rd until it had a road closed sign so had to take an alternate route along Champion Spur Track.  Its an old Jeep track which took us from an altitude of about 1200m down to about 500m.  There came a time where Tim and I were just thinking the fastest way to camp would be to just fall.  let gravity do its thing.

Looking back up at Tim

It will all be worth wild at the bottom as Black River, our destination for camp tonight is at the bottom which we reached around 5pm.  We just need to cross the river, find the track, find the camp site.  It took us about 45-55 minutes to find our way 300m down the river and confirm the track entry on that side of the river.  We kept jumping in the river, dressed in our jocks, finding the river was too deep not to get our packs wet, bush bash till we could get to shallow water again, jump back in and repeat!  Bush bashing in my jocks was not very exciting..... some deep cuts in places we won't mention.  

Now we have been climbing for about 10 minutes and Tim says "this doesn't look flat enough for a camp site, you sure its on this side of the river"  I proceeded to get John Chapman's book out which we had not looked at for a while and figured out the camp is back past where we arrived at the river....tears..... almost, more jocks only bush bashing through the scrub and river which was easier as we were on the trail longer this time.  Back in the camp.  Set up tents at about 7:30pm and had a great bath in the Black River.  Ate dinner and were in bed at 9pm.  What a day, without checking my notes it was about 21km not including our 2km of searching for the river exit.

Our camp site on Black River