We've just come back from a great weekend up on Mt Stirling. We camped in an open area not far from Refuge Hut No.3, which had great
views over a valley. We arrived on Friday afternoon and set up
camp and waited for our fearless leader Crazie and his trusty navigator Kir to arrive. We settled in for a quiet evening around the
camp fire when at about 9pm a white troopy arrived it was member "Lucy" - [Ken & Deidre] so we sat up a bit longer talking about what we were going to do in the morning.
The morning was a bit foggy, and at 10am Bonz along with his dad and daughter Imogen arrived for a fun packed day of driving, and it certainly was that. We made our way along the
King River and did several river crossings, and had lunch at
Lake Cobbler, we then headed to Craigs Hut via
the Monument Track, we were delayed in getting up as a Prado was stuck on it's diff on a rocky bit, but we all made it up easily.
Craig's hut was shrouded in fog, and the weather turned bleak, so we headed back to
camp, farewelling bonz & co at the turn off to Telephone Box
Junction.
When we got to
camp, member Tonester and family were setting up, and we were a bit concerned about where their tent was, not long after Big Kidz arrived, and we all at some stage stood under the "Darby Day Marquee" that had been errected. Unfortunately for Tonester, their tent was swamped and they decided to seek drier accommodation for the night, and headed off towards Mt Buller. The rest of enjoyed a few drinks, nibblies and sausage sizzle and forgot about the wet weather, some of us, actually forgot about the entire night itself and were a bit queezy the next morning.
Sunday saw another foggy day, and we farewelled, Ken & Deidre, which left Ads and Kir, Us, and Big Kidz leaving for a drive, we met Tonester on the way back and he was going back to check on his
camp, we headed to
Bindaree Hut and Falls via the Corn
Hill Logging track, and it became a most interesting day. Part way along the drive I commented to Al that the map stated, steep, clay and impassable after rain, so to say I wasn't looking forward to what was ahead was an understatement. We hit the clay not far from the bottom and we all slid down, some of us [Jen & I] not enjoying the trip at all, once at the bottom we were faced with two
water crossings, one across a bog, the other a river. After a couple of successful recoveries, much to the amazement of the onlookers on the other side of the river, we headed to
Bindaree hut and falls. We spoke to Tonester on the way back to
camp, and they had decided to head back to Buller for the night but would see us in the morning.
Sunday evening - after the Marquee blew down, we sat in a makeshift annex attached to the trakshak and watched the sunset and enjoyed a few drinks and snacks.
Monday morning was lovely, but unfortunately Big Kidz had to head for home, Tonester and family arrived in time to check out the Tvan and say goodbye, and then the rest of us set off for a drive to sheepyard flat, where we said good bye to Tonester and family. We headed off for a drive to
Bluff Hut and then made our way home via some very interesting tracks.
We got back to
camp in time to see a beautiful sunset.
!MPG:3!
It was a fantastic weekend, we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves, thanks so much for Crazie for organising it, and to those who came along to make it so memorable, special mention to Tony, Caroline and Kids, you really were so cheery eventhough your weekend was turned upside down.
Being my first time up in that area over this weekend, I was surprised at the amount of people there were in the popular
places, but also, by the lack of vehicles in others, especially past our
campsite.
Hope everyone else had a great weekend
Lyn