Perry's Blog

Beautiful morning with the sun coming over Woy Woy! Woke early and crawled up the rocks beside the campsite for a better view: An expansive view is something wonderful.

A quick breakfast and wee drink before packing and leaving: today is our biggest day so far and we're a little nervous how we'll go. We're just about out of water, but the map says there is a creek about 4km into the day. We'll have to get water there.

Woke this morning feeling a little jaded by the constant moving, Perry wrote:

Here we are at Day Six!! The relentlessness of shifting camp each day is.. is... relentless I guess!!

7:47am Leave Camp
The track goes up beside Mt Wondabyne then runs around the Western side and down the other side. The views to the North-West are wonderful from here.

The track heads down the hill until it reaches a road, where we turn East.

After we'd been walking for about three-quarters of an hour there is a nice view back to Mt. Wondabyne, from whence we'd just come.

The track meanders along the landscape until it descends into the creek where we plan to get water.

In fact, the wee creek was a wonderful little waterfall!

9:29am Arrive Waterfall

What a beautiful spot: cool and refreshing. We stopped to have a wash as we didn't get to wash last night or this morning (because of the lack of water). The water is cool (too cool to swim), we fill our water bottles and treat them with tablets.

Perry wrote:

The water has worked out really well. We filled up at the happy little brook - all our water was essentially gone. The tablets taste a bit, but are not too bad. Seemed to have drunk a heep today, but it's not been too hot, good walking actually.

Nearly Lost
Perry wrote:

We also got lost, sort of, which ended up walking the same bit 3 times. The track on the map seemed completely different to what was on the ground. Took a couple of GPS points so we could check later.

Not exactly sure what happened here, but we must have taken the wrong track out from the waterfall. The map definitely had us ascending 70-80 metres to a ridge, but we definitely walked level and over another creek.

We backtracked at one point to a track junction but it didn't seem to be heading in the right direction either. Looking back now I think we must have missed some steps heading up the side of the valley? Not to worry, I was monitoring our progress and I thought we had to bump into the Wondabyne Station track eventually so I wasn't completely worried, although I didn't know exactly where we were.

This next series of photos tracks our progress, which are interesting to view on the map:

Sandi wrote:

One confusing part of track where very definite steps went up, but we got sorted eventually.

The walk across from Mt Wonderbyne to where the station track joins was hard going mostly I think because I kept expecting to get there. Had a lovely wash by a waterfall, very cold, almost tempting to swim.

We bumped into a couple walking the other way just before reaching the next junction: they were walking without a map and wanted to know where they were headed

But finally we climbed up to the Station track and we knew where we were!

11:00 Station Track

Stopped for morning tea on the rocks overlooking Mooney Mooney Creek. Just beautiful.

After morning tea the track takes us over Scopas and Leochare Peaks, which are prominent from many places on the track.

The views from these peaks are pretty nice, and actually gave us a look at the only bushfire we saw all walk (which we were very glad of).

After Leochare Peak we were headed down into a creek where we thought we would stop for some water and lunch.

Lunch
It wasn't as hot a day as it has been, but we were very please to get to some cool running water again. We filled our water bottles and treated them: this would probably be the last fresh water until tomorrow.

After lunch, we hunched our packs and headed off on the last leg, we were not sure which camp site we were headed for, but we remembered that the second camp site seemed a lot nicer last time we passed. But that was another 11kms.

The track heads over a wee peak then down into the dense shade of Piles Creek (a place we thought we could have camped at if the section distances worked out; which they didn't). Piles Creek is crossed on a suspension bridge (which is not as swingy as the one over the Six-Foot Track).

Perry wrote:

It's been odd walking over the track we did 3 years ago before Keren's birthday. Remembered quite a bit. Piles Creek, that we call the Turkey Place (because we saw a brush turkey there last time) is just a wonderful spot. We were sorely tempted to stop for a swim, but felt too close to camp. The water looked fresh too.

The track then follows the bank of the creek until the old Pacific Highway bridge, which is the Mooney Mooney Track Head.

Sandi wrote:

Saw even more flowers not ever seen before and a wonderful blast of orchids flowering on a couple of different rocks along Piles Creek. A predominance of mauve flowers at one stage just gorgeous. Saw asparagus growing wild and wanted to forage for our supper, but Mowbray really in no condition to cope.

2:55pm Mooney Mooney Track Head

We walked over the bridge to cross the creek, and head down the road that serves the residences along this part of the creek. I'm feeling pretty weary by now, although Sandi is still hopping along at a good pace.

Dug deep and decided why not go the extra bit to get to the Camp Site we wanted?

3:41 Mooney Mooney Rest Area
Finally, we arrived at our overnight camp. I was really done in.

While Sandi got some dinner ready I set up the tent. Deciding where to put the tent was not easy: the camp site was criss-crossed with fallen trees!

Dinner was delicious! But just after the last mouthful I had to rush into the bush and throw up.

Sandi wrote:

He was quite miserable, sore and not felling good at all. Recovered very well at camp initially, but after quite a yummy meal he rushed off and vomited the lot. Somewhat concerning. I started mentally thinking of easiest access to civilisation.

He was shivery cold afterwards and had some sweet tea, but then straight to bed by 6:30pm! Not quite dark.

Sandi wrote:

Extraordinary number of windfall trees including a very useful one that had fallen straight through the camp area. A trifle concerning particularly where to put the tent. Assumed a wind event must've caused it all. As we walked in the morning there were heaps more.

And that was the end of Day Six, although I wasn't awake to see it! We'd walked 17kms at a pretty average pace of 2.2km/h and now we were 73km into our walk: nearly halfway!!

Tomorrow we'll walk up past Somersby Falls Turn off then up to Somersby Store for another grocery stop. Our planned menu is working really well, and the previous drive through has been of great benefit.