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This page covers 5 days in Victorian State Forest and Alpine/High Country. We started our offroad segment at Loch Valley and continued north through the Upper Yarra Ranges and then onto Woods Point where we plotted a "short-cut" north through some exciting high-country tracks to meet up with the Bluff Track at Lovicks Hut. We then spent another 2 days in the High Country visiting Howitts Hut and the Wongangatta Valley before heading further north via the Hummfrays and Harts Spur Trks to meet up with the Great Alpine Highway near Bright where we parted company with the Jacka's who returned to Sydney whilst we would turn west to begin our trip back to Perth.

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Legend

Day 21
Sunday 16^th January

Disembarking Spirit 11, Port Melbourne, Philip Island

We arrived by ferry in Port Melbourne at 6.30am but we were the last car off the ferry around 7.30am. We are still travelling with the Jacka's so we rejoined at the terminal exit, refitted UHF aerials and once more hit the road. Breakfast was the first priority, and being a Sunday morning we thought we'd treat ourselves to a trendy cafe on the beachfront. Although David and my father both travel to Melbourne frequently for work by plane, neither had actually been let loose in a car here for quite some years and so none of us were totally confident about how to get anywhere. Driving big 4WDs around the city isn't terribly easy and we suspected that to use the motorways you needed a tag, which we didn't have so we just followed our noses along the coast until we came to a trendy cafe at Brighton beach called North Rd Pavilion. And then an ironic thing happened - we got out of our fully equipped camping vehicles and went into the trendy cafe, whilst an elderly couple in their family sedan arrived and began setting up a portable barbeque to cook themselves bacon and eggs in the park outside the trendy cafe. We stopped to chat and laughed how they thought it was a great treat to come out and pretend they were camping, and we had come to the same location to get away from camp cooking. Anyway, we spent $96 on breakfast and theirs cost about $3. 

Mum had a friend living on Phillip Island, and so our next stop was to visit them today. We drove out of Melbourne on the Nepean Hwy, taking the South Gippsland Hwy to Phillip Island. It was quite a lengthy slow drive through the traffic lights and the only action was when our passenger window visor flew off. I radioed back to Colin to keep an eye out for it and he said "Don't worry about it, it's gone now." Meaning he had just run over it. At $50 from Toyota, it was not going to be replaced this trip.

"The Poplars", Bridge, driving through mountain ash forest

Mum's friends have a gorgeous property on Phillip Island and we enjoyed a few hours with them. We still have a lot of driving yet to do and rather than spend time exploring here we moved on up towards the High Country after lunch. We retraced our tracks along the South Gippsland Hwy to Lang Lang and turned off here to reach Drouin where we stopped to stock up on food supplies. There was a bit of a misunderstanding about what range we needed to stock up for, and I felt it was necessary to do a major stock up and took, what I was later told, an "excessive" amount of time buying the groceries. David stayed in the carpark with the kids and was totally beside himself when Sandy returned quickly with a small amount of supplies but I didn't appear until more than an hour later with an overflowing trolley. A polite version of the story is that he was jumping up and down and I was "in trouble", but I was adamant that I was in the right and that they would all thank me for the food in a few days time. Actually, I did end up being thanked when not only did we find a great campsite well before dark, but in a few days time I ended up feeding the Jacka's a meal when they ran out of food!

So after shopping (and arguing) in Drouin, we headed to Warragul, Nerrim, Noojee, and then up Toorongo Rd (signed to Loch Valley). This road then becomes Nine Mile Rd. We found free campsites at The Poplars Reserve that were great. Running creek, large trees, lots of firewood, and toilets. The only downside was that we weren't the only campers and had to share the area with a family of kids on peewee 50's. Leah befriended the young boys and together they were soon absorbed throwing stones into the creek.

Day 22
Monday 17th January

We slept out in swags last night but we had more rain in the morning. The Melbourne sun didn't appear until 9.30am, so this made yet another late departure at 10.30am.

We continued north on the track we'd come in on, which winds through the Goulburn State Forest and becomes the Nine Mile Road. The scenery is just magnificent, and crimson rosellas seem prolific in this particular area. We had quite a scary moment in the middle of driving through the most beautiful mountain ash forest when we stopped to get out of the vehicles for a look around. We had not seen another vehicle all day, so we simply stopped the vehicle by the side of the track without serious thought about possible traffic. We were looking at wildflowers in the ditch on the other side of the road when a speeding logging truck came around a blind corner and was suddenly upon us. Everything happened so quick but the driver would have been challenged to negotiate the tight corner with his oversize truck at such speed, and then somehow try to avoid us. From where we were standing it looked like he managed to avoid us, but in doing so had to aim his truck straight towards my parents vehicle with them still inside it. We all believed they were going to be hit. I watched in horror as my parents tried to open their doors to escape at the last second but then somehow the truck corrected itself and thundered on past without hitting anything. We were all left shaking in disbelief and were a lot more cautious from here on.

Nine Mile Road eventually pops out at the junction of C511 on the edge of the Yarra Ranges NP directly opposite a camp/picnic area called The Triangle. Turning right we continued on a good dirt road and started to climb the Dividng Range through the tiny settlements of Matlock and then into historic Woods Point (worth a good look around).

Delightful historic buildings at Woods Point

The pictures above show some of the buildings in the main street, standing empty but there is a small local community, a general store, pub and the servo above actually sells fuel! Colin's Patrol needed additional fuel to make the range we were expecting until our next refuelling opportunity but the servo wouldn't sell him enough - said she needed it for others who had emergencies but he did manage to take 30L. We thought it would be an emergency if he ran out of fuel in the middle of an little-used 4WD track, but there was no arguing with her and Dad was just happy to get what he could. He also knew that our tanks held a ridiculous range of fuel so we promised not to leave him stranded if he ran dry.

Using Natmap on our laptops we had roughly worked out a route from Woods Point through to the Bluff Track near Lovicks Hut but once we visited the Woods Point general store and spoke to the locals we decided to buy a paper map of 1: 100,000 scale published by a mapping publisher we'd never heard of called Rooftop Maps for better detail. The descriptions on the map were great for what we were about to do and so we bought one for the area we were planning (about $9). We sat in the town reserve, eating lunch and devising our precise route then headed off about an hour later. The route seemed a straight line shortcut directly NE of Woods Point to Lovicks Hut bypassing Mansfield (through the Goulburn and Macalister State Forests) as we'd become bored with the easy tracks we'd been on and wanted to get into some real 4wding action immediately. Well, we got it!

The main road here continues in a northerly direction to Jamieson, but we turned off just out of Woods Point up a very steep rocky hill on the right, called the Brewery Track. This certainly prepared us for what lay ahead, with extreme hill climbs, sheer drop offs, and a narrow track but the scenery was wonderful. Our route then followed the Old Coach Rd and Webber Spur Trk, before we took a steep descent to a small campsite at a junction of the Goulburn and Black Rivers where we planned to stop. We were a little surprised to find another vehicle here, but he told us 4 cars had passed through the day before. He was staying put - panning for gold in the river with what appeared to be some success. So, although it was 4pm, we decided to drive on as the camp site was really too tight to fit us all comfortably. The river crossing here was straightforward, even though the exit climbed a steep hill. From here on however, the track became more challenging. Just a few hundred metres along we came to a confusing junction even though we had OziExplorer, topo 250K maps on computer and the Rooftop Map - the sign confused us and we soon found ourselves climbing the Champion Spur Track but heading in a southerly direction which was not right. It took some time to find a place to be able to turnaround and take the other track from this junction. We believe this is still called the Champion Spur Track but the Rooftop maps indicates it is called the Black River Track (the reason this confused us was that the signs never call it Black River Trk). Eventually, after massive hill climbs and descents, we reached a helipad (seen in the distance it seemed impossible) but the camping options were not good so we continued on further.

We came to another small and easy creek crossing over the Black River but found we couldn't climb the exit. The previous group of vehicles had made a mess of the track and we found it was severely rutted and narrow. The ruts, and muddy base of the hill climb exiting the creek forced us to hit the side wall of the track and therefore lose momentum. See pics below where we had to cut away some of the road wall and fill the ruts to get some traction on all wheels. It took about an hour to get both vehicles through. 

Road building

At this point, we had been travelling for 2hrs since leaving Woods Point and had only travelled about 11km. It was all low range 2nd. If we weren't looking for a camp and didn't have the little kids with us, we could have really been enjoying a great drive but we were starting to feel as if we might take many hours yet to come to a clearing suitable for camping. In fact, not more than 150m on from here we came to a very steep hill climb with some bends that had deep, wide ruts. David took the hill first but used the "drive in the ruts" approach since the track was dry. But inside the ruts (3 foot deep) was loose, small rubble. This terrain is certainly one where having double diff locks would be a distinct advantage but we have never found we've needed them before. I guess if you had this kind of terrain on your back doorstep you would make the effort to install them. We found we couldn't get enough traction so we reversed back to redo the hill climb using the "on top of the ruts" method. David reached the top of the climb and signalled for Colin to come up but coming around a bend one of his wheels slipped off the ridge of a rut and was in the air so he had no traction (also without double diff locks). The boys agreed that rather than more road building to fix the situation they should hook up Colin's power winch to the back of David's vehicle sitting at the top of the hill. The winch cable did not have a direct straight path and there were no trees but the banks of the ruts were about 4 feet high on the bend and very solid so that's how they managed it. (ie. using the bank for purchase to support the bend in the winch cable).

Steep, rutted hill climbs, views of the track ahead!

Once we were on the go again, the track started to meander through rainforest terrain and became increasingly easier and travel become significantly faster. We finally reached the end of the Champion Spur Tk (or Black River Tk according to the Rooftop map) and turned right onto the Lazarini Tk. By this stage we were getting pretty desperate to find any patch of semi-flat ground where we could set-up camp before finding the next obstacle, however as luck would have it we spotted a great camp on the left side of road just past the junction - phew! 

Happy campers at last!

Poor Mum has had it. It's been a long trip for her with osteoarthritis, and various other "itis" complaints but I fear today we have reached the limit of her interest in 4WDing. She's been on many of Australia's remote tracks but it would be fair to say that you just don't see this sort of rugged terrain in the outback - she described it as "extreme". I do agree that it was hard work just being a passenger, but David assures me that Dad is just loving it, and I admit I was too. Even our little kids were giggling and laughing as their seatbelts pulled hard against their bodies supporting them from falling forward as the car plummeted downhill on what feels like extreme angles. On some hills, I was asking what degree the vehicle could hold and I was amazed at how much further they can apparently go. This is one sport where you really have to feel it - videos and photos just don't it justice.

Day 23
Tuesday 18th January

We set off this morning with some trepidation as to what might lie ahead (by "we", I am referring to all except for David who was simply loving it). We were now so far into this "great shortcut" that we didn't want to have to backtrack if things got more extreme, however today took us along comparatively easy tracks with a great diversity of flora to keep One Eye so preoccupied that she didn't mind where she was. We drove along Lazarini Spur Tk, turned onto the very easy Heyfield Jamieson Rd via Mt Skene lookouts, saw a red belly blacksnake, turned off at Mt Sunday Rd, which is a steep, dusty, narrow and winding track - on which Colin and Sandy had their second episode with a logging truck. They were forced to do a fast reverse for about a kilometre with Sandy complaining to Colin "you should have pulled over at that place we saw before!" Of course, she has a photo - taken from inside the windscreen in hast, which is all dust and the truck driver's hand waving from the cabin.

We stopped for lunch besides a creek at Wrens Flat at the bottom of this hill (and yes, Sandy had a swim), there is a hut (rather foul due to vandals) and a large flat grassy area for camping. We then continued on the main track, which loops around an old mining camp, then swings right onto the Mt Sunday Trk. This track is clay based with large drainage runoffs. We found the first few sections had large amounts of water, with one or two a little slippery. Low range 2 used for most of first section then these ruts became dry and less frequent. Further along, we came across a young couple driving in the opposite direction and they said there was a big bog-hole ahead and they had turned back. There was no way David was going to take this person's view that there was any concern for us and so we continued ahead. We found the "bog hole" (puddle) right on the junction of the Low Saddle Road (near the National Walking Trail) and just an hour's drive further along was where we camped for the night on the Jamieson River. 

Mt Skene lookout, Jamieson River off Low Saddle Rd

The campsite was reached by what I felt was a very tricky track. It was steep, heavily overgrown, and the soil was soft and thick with deep ruts. It was the kind of track that if it rained, you'd be lucky to get out. It was only possible for one vehicle at a time to come down, so David took the lead and once at the bottom found a very lush campsite but it was extremely small and we could see that flat sites for tents were almost impossible. However, there was a short walking trail through thick ferns that looked inviting so we called for Colin to comes down and join us. David sent us all down to enjoy the river while he setup the camp and we let Charade continue sleeping in her carseat with the door open. By the time I returned I found Chardae had been bitten all over her face by mossies, and I had boots full of leeches. David really wanted us to enjoy this special spot we'd driven all day to find so he trimmed back the overgrown ferns to clear the path so that I might go down again. Whilst he was doing the gardening, I cooked dinner - Chinese lemon chicken stir-fry and nasi goreng with added prawns (from a tin). Probably the best part of the day was having a hot shower (water brought up in buckets from river).

Day 24
Wednesday 19th January

Driving back up the track as we left camp I remembered how you would not want to be doing this in the wet. Back at the Low Saddle Road we continued along using mostly low range 3 and 4. A landslide near the bridge had resulted in lots of fresh soil across the track which we found had been freshly graded so it wasn't long before we were travelling faster. We came up to a grader and followed a smooth widened track all the way to the next bridge over the north branch of the Jamieson River (many nice campsites here along the river bank). Once over the bridge we turned right onto Brocks Rd then left at a sign to King Billy 1 + 2, then veered left onto Cairn Crk Trk - not "seriously steep" as noted on the Rooftop map, in fact, easy. This tracks joins up with the Bluff Tk just before Lovicks Hut. So there you have it - a great 2 day shortcut through to the Bluff Tk from Woods Point.

After a few days in the High Country, and noting various huts on the map that we were so near, yet so far from being able to see, we were really looking forward to seeing Lovicks Hut. You can imagine our disappointment to find it had been demolished for rebuilding and there were March flies everywhere making sitting out with the kids on the picnic rug almost impossible to enjoy.

Lovicks Hut Replacement Works

I need to comment here that if you are running OziExplorer, you'll find that by keeping your eye on the altitude readings that the Snow Gums and wildflowers appear at precisely 1500m, whilst at lower altitudes you'll see ferns. This is a glorious piece of Australia - with an abundance of wildflowers and changing flora at every corner. 

The Bluff Track is an easy, but very pretty path through to Howitts Plain. We overshot the Zeka Spur Track to enable us to camp at the nearby Howitts Hut even though we expected it to be full of travellers because it is accessible by 2WDs. Fortunately, the site was totally empty on our arrival at 5pm but by 7pm great hoards of campers had arrived. We had chosen the most remote camp at the top of the hill so we didn't really hear them - but it was a noisy night due to a massive storm. We managed to cook a huge lamb roast in the camp oven with pumpkin, potatoes, served with gravy and snow peas and red wine just before the first rain started at dusk. 

Howitts Hut and Campsite

Day 25
Thursday 20th January

After a very wet night, we backtracked a little up the Howitts Road to the Zeka Spur Trk. Our maps indicated it would be quite steep but we didn't really have a clear idea of the degree of difficulty (our frame of reference being affected by the Webber Spur and Champion Spur Tks). We were thinking that if it was as extreme as that, then after all the rain last night we might not want to do it. However, we found this to be a very straightforward track and although low range 4WD is required for the relatively steep ascents and descents, none of it is challenging or even rutted. It was actually raining quite heavily throughout our drive but the track has large runoffs drains and stays in pretty good condition. The track ends on flat plains of Wonangatta Valley however and this was indeed quite wet and actually flooded in sections. 

Zeka Spur Tk, Wonangatta Valley and Hut

It was only midday when we arrived at Wonangatta and we enjoyed a leisurely afternoon alone in the valley. As this would be our last night of the trip together with the Jacka's before we went our separate ways after 5 weeks together, we decided that there would probably be no better last camp than here. Poor Mum was ready to get home as fast as possible but I think once she got to spend half a day out of the vehicle she had a good time and in fact none of us wanted to leave this wonderful spot. 

Inside the hut, our camp and valley views

There are literally hundreds of wonderful campsites in the valley - but due to the rain, the river front was flooded and out of the question, however the camps under the False Acacia trees (South African imports) just across the creek from the hut is the most ideal campsite of the area in our opinion. This really is a perfect campsite with a gorgeous canopy of trees, water taps, firewood (which was wet), and grass for tents. However, just as we finished setting up our camp, a group of Victorian Land Rovers arrived. The leader of their group was a member of the "Friends of Wonangatta Valley" and apparently we were camped in "his spot". We like to keep to ourselves, so although he wanted to talk, we made it clear that we were here for a quiet night. One of the group had a young girl - 7 year old Jade who quickly made friends with Leah. It's just wonderful when the kids find someone to play with and they ran around all night. Although the wood was wet, we managed enough of a fire to cook corn cobs, and pork and leek sausages with broccoli topped with a packet sauce I've never used (and probably never will again).

David downloaded all Mum's photos onto our computer so we could have a copy - an amazing 6.4Gig - we have therefore dubbed changed her nickname from One Eye, to "President MegaPixel".

Day 26
Friday 21st January

The Land Rover group packed up and departed a little before us - they had neither come in the way we had, nor were they headed out our way. Anyway, we headed south through flooded tracks, lots of blackberry bush, and passed weed sprayers from Parks Vic, and through some flowing river crossings onto Hummfrays Trk.

We then took Harts Spur Trk (a very steep incline over long distance but not rutted or complicated) which then leads onto easy tracks with views to Mt Selwyn. At the Tea Tree Tk we came to easy flat travelling that took us all the way out to Beverage National Park, and Buckland which eventually comes to a roundabout on the Great Alpine Rd.

It was only early afternoon so sadly we parted company with the Jacka's to travel for a few hours more in our separate directions. East towards Sydney for the Jacka's, and west towards Perth for the Martin's.

Good bye pic at Beveridge Station
Sandy & Colin Jacka - Nissan Patrol
David Martin, Michelle Jacka - Martin, Leah and Chardae

To be continued...Part 5: Yarrawonga - Port Augusta (via the Murray River).