Jamieson Woods Point area

We (our Mitsi and a mates GU) just spent all of last week down around Jamieson / Woods Point area doing some tracks and introducing some new club members to these tracks for a couple of the days. As our local club does mainly desert driving this was a whole new experience for them, which after the initial worry of the steepness they were all grins.

Ex EO member Warfer (Yota Dual-Cab) met up with us at Skipworth Camping Reserve, where we were based for the week.
Day 1/ we decided to do Granny’s Flat up to Stony Creek Track and then down Mitchells Track and through to Wren Flat. This was a fairly steep run with only a few rough rocky area’s to negotiate, having done this area 2 weeks prior to the 2006 bush fires in the area, it was great to see the regrowth in the area. The tracks themselves looked in fairly good condition and seem to have handled the Easter break quite well all be it that they were very dusty.

Once we reached the Jamieson/Licola Road, Warfer decided to do a different road back to camp than us and he headed off to do the Snake Edwards Divide Track, which he informed us, was a very easy drive as usual.
Day /2 was an easy day with us being joined by 7 Vehicles of the Riverland 4X4 Club, we had a full mixture of vehicles with another GU, a Mazda Bravo, a new and an old LUX, a 100 series and 2 Paj’s, one diesel the other on ULP. Firstly we got them all to lower their tyre pressures and then it was off to the man made tunnel at Tunnel Bend, of all the times for it to rain this was it, but we surely can’t complain about the wet stuff. All members were amazed at how much work was done to divert the river for Gold Mining, from here we decided to head back a little and do Flourbag Track (named after the horse of Fred Fry a prolific hut builder of the area), this track joins into Moonlight Spur Track and then onto Mount Terrible Track and the Mount Terrible Hut/Lookout, Flourbag is a very pretty little track with lots of tree ferns and shaded areas to be seen, the next two tracks can at times be quite rough but we were pleased to find them very smooth and this suited the club member who were new at this style of driving. We did find a couple of fairly steep rough climbs with chicken tracks, all but 2 of the vehicles did the climbs and all arrived at the top with beaming smiles.
Day 3/ was a look at the Old Star of the West Goldmine, this was a day really enjoyed by all getting to see some of the local history, a few of us went down in the mines with torches and this was a real insight in to the hard work put in by these pioneers. Later we all headed down to Woods Point (a town with a great character about it), for a drive and lunch. Here we split up with the club members heading back to Jamieson and doing the touristy thing.
The three of us decided that the Old Coach Road, Webber Spur and Black River Track to Lazarini Spur and back to camp. We turned off onto the Old Coach track and had one vehicle stopped within 100mtrs, this was sorted with him winching off the back of me up and over the gnarly bit, 2 hours later we came to the Black River Track and this was totally impassable without some major track repairs, most vehicles that had done the track lately must have had 35” or 37” tyres as we bellied out 2mtrs up into this 30mtr bad section, if we had time on our side we could have filled the tyre tracks and got one vehicle up and then winched the others, but the sun was against us so we back tracked and still didn’t get back to camp till nearly 7pm, but at least we were on the main road before sunset. Now after checking Google Earth we did the right thing as none of the other tracks would have got us out in anywhere near that time span.
Day 4/ The club left us early in the morning and we decided to do the little piece of Stony Creek Track that we missed, this track starts straight off the black top from the Woods Point Road, with low range having to be engaged as soon as you turn, we did this track until we got to Steiners Road and then onto Howqua Hills Track, Tobacco Flat and Sheepyard including Frys Hut. After a look around this area we headed back to Mansfield and Warfer left us here. One more night at Skipworth and it was back home via Sheparton, Swanhill etc. A Great Trip was had by all.

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