Well we aren't quite "post" the fires just yet - at 5:50am this morning several lines of fire are still visible from our property.
They are south of Eildon on tracks above the old Rubicon power station area.
Co-incidently near Morris
lookout right on the track adopted by our
Alexandra 4wd club.
Murrindindi shire holds many of the prime 4wding areas northeast of
Melbourne from Kinglake past Toolangi and over the Black range to
Buxton and on to the Catherdral ranges and Marysville.
Saturday the main Melba highway opened and we drove it north from Yarra Glen to our property in
Yarck to investigate
how some of our favourite 4wd and camping areas faired.
Essentially the forest area is burnt out but its appears not to have been burnt with the intensity of the firestorm that destroyed nearby Kinglake and other towns.
4wding and camping is still possible today if you don't mind smoke-smell and there are some
bright points.
We thought it wise to stay away from the burnt out towns and just
check out the forests.
There was almost no traffic on the roads as we went thru and none at all in the bush.
From South to North along the Melba highway ->
The fire has burnt some areas from south of Yarra Glen, right thru to the
Yea river north of Glenburn and appeared particularly intense in the forest drive up to Mt Slide north of Dixons creek.
The intensity seemed to level off by about where Marginal road starts (Marginal Rd not closed).
As a guide most of the houses along the Melba highway were scarred but survived.
A typical fight was fought by the owner of Dixon creek kennels where we board our dog.
The aging owner held off the fire with hoses although the whole north wall of their brick house is blackened but he saved around 90% of his kennels.
Just past the Kinglake turn off at Mt Slide is a burnt out pipeline excavator.
Glenburn hotel - a favourite haunt for 4wders and its fully burnt out (photo).
Glenburn Roadhouse - is ok and started serving petrol sunday, but the food side of business is still closed.
We are still anixous about the girls that served food and the best of cappicino's there.
We meet someone there who got out of Kinglake during the fires but had his car
breakdown at the roadhouse, he left it parked right next to the big gas tank expecting to never see it again but the fires stopped just short of the roadhouse and he was a bit dissapointed that his wreck of a car wasn't burnt out.
We entered the burnt out forest via
Two Hills road and there was no fire damage until you actually enter the
state forest at Pines track.
Pines track is no longer a tricky little bog holed track that you could always count on to catch someone out, its been bulldozed into a wide firebreak, and this stopped the fire before it broke out into adjacent private property.
Near there is the Kalatha Creek group of tracks bounded by Marginal Rd and the powerlines, its all burnt but the fire wasn't that intense.
There are many unoffical
camp sites in this area and I noted that where ever they were their appeared to be less fire damage.
No doubt because campers used much of the readily acessible wood for campfires and areas are relatively clear.
We stopped for a coffee at the edge of Luke creek and many of the trees their still had unburnt bark and even some of the ferns along the creek still had the occasional green fond (Photo).
In this area ash was not covering the ground and generally they was no more
debris on the tracks than after a typical big wind.
This area will recover
well, indeed its a popular bike area and with all the undergrowth gone it probably safter to ride there now as you can see other bikes coming around previously blind corners.
The fire more or less stopped south of the
Yea river in this area and in an unexpected twist, the controversial new water pipeline that is under construction which require a 30m cleared area right along the Melba highway has obviously acted as a very effective firebreak in some
places.
Further north we drove thru the
Cheviot railway tunnel which is a great refuge from the fires.
The tunnel area is unburnt and there is no more fire damage until east of
Molesworth near
Scrubby creek road.
(
Scrubby creek road was open).
Much rushed work has been done throughout the shire, as an example just up the road from our place is a
communications tower in amongst the trees. Its always been low priority but now its got a massive and very rushed firebreak bulldozed around it(Photo).
Often I have read comments on the subject of 4wdrives damaging the bush, but that damage is invisible compared to what
a fire and a rushed response by teams of bulldozers has done to this forest in a few short days.
As we passed through
Yea the ABC "Australia all Over" program was being broadcast".
I was very tempted to say a few words along the lines of a previous post but the glare from my wife out-shone the fires and we kept on driving.
Photos in Member Page
1/ Comms tower Instant firebreak
2/ Luke
Creek Camp area
3/ Burnt Glenburn Pub.