Rachel Grindlay

I’ve been a bit slack on sorting my November photos so they can just go in one post.

First up…
We had hoped to get out for an overnight canyon in Kanangra but given the catastrophic fire danger, and National Parks guidance that the public should keep out of remote areas of the parks we figured that probably wasn’t in the spirit of what they were asking. Instead we visited a canyon Tom had done many years ago, via a new tributary.

Looking canyon-y

Whatcha doing down there?

I was getting a bit nervous as this point as there had been a number of sections where Tom had said “hmm, I don’t remember this”. That’s quite out of character for him and I was beginning to wonder if we were in the right creek. And if we were in a different creek did we have enough rope!?

Hmm. I hope the rope reaches down there!

Fortunately he remembered this point and it became clear once I got to the edge we were going to be ok.

Can he get across?

Guess not!

Though apparently last time he managed to get across. Guess ageing isn’t a good thing.

Then in keeping with not being “remote” we had a lovely cliff-top camp only a few minutes from where we were able to leave the car. Though of course everything was very smokey with the Gospers Mountain Fire raging away.

Wildflowers still out

Sunset, cheese & biccies, fortified shiraz… What more could you want?

Room with a view

Flannel flower

We’d climbed up Portal Lookout many years ago but I couldn’t remember much about the route. I had planned on leading an SBW trip up to it, but after our recce I decided against that idea. Unusually, I (presumably) found this route harder than I had on our earlier trip given I have no real memory of it.

After this recce I decided not to lead this walk for SBW!

Well… we’re abseilers sometimes

On the way back down

Creek walking

The cotton fairy has been?

We had a weekend in Victoria to get some fresh air after all the smoke in Sydney. The Otways are one of the wettest parts of Australia so it was nice to see some decent water flowing – not that I’ve chosen to put up any of the photos of the many waterfalls we saw!

I wonder how old?

Cheecky lunch companion

Stunning… if in the wrong continent

Californian redwoods

Lastly we bashed around in the upper reaches of well-known canyon. This yielded some surprisingly good canyon sections.

The adventurer emerges

Canyon ledges

Canyon

Getting a bit chilly by this point!

The adventurer

We exited via another tributary – not knowing if it would go. We climbed about 8 small waterfalls. Our general technique involved me standing on Tom’s knee to get up, then bracing myself so Tom could use my foot as a handhold so he could haul himself up. It was quite fun… as long as we could continue to get up them… which we did.

Yep, another waterfall to climb up

Unfortunately our choice of route to get back onto the ridge turned out to be less than desirable. It was possibly the worst scrub I’ve had the pleasure of bashing through. I think we took an hour to cover 200m and my legs were streaming with blood from all of the sword grass cuts by the time we got into clearer territory. That part of the day is not one to be repeated!

Sadly this photo doesn’t display the full brutality of the last hour of bush-bashing (for 200m gained)

All in all a pretty good month, given that many of the National Parks in NSW are closed due to the fires.

With the combination of an injury and work deadlines it had been 6 weeks since I’d been out in the bush and boy did I need to get out. All 3 of us were nursing foot injuries so this was meant to be a chance to get out and enjoy being in the bush without being too strenuous. So of course we started our long weekend loaded up with several litres of water, ropes, harnesses and at the last minute my down jacket also made it’s way into the pack (another 800g I really didn’t need to be carrying).

Tom and Jonathan above the cloud (and in it at times)

Tom’s SLR soon got some action, to justify the weight, with lots of low lying cloud about.

Tom and Jonathan with the river of cloud

Where is everything??

Eventually we made it to the spot we planned to base camp and had lunch. The cloud continued to envelop us from time to time and it wasn’t conducive to sitting around. That said, it was still after 1:30pm when we set off to do our canyon. “How long will it take?” asks Jonathan. “A few hours”. Ok, well we have 3.5 hours till sunset….

Getting scrambly

This is meant to be dry canyoning! (As Jonathan bravely abseils into a pool of unknown depth)

Climbing pagodas

The cloud still about as the sunsets

We stumbled into camp well after dark, fortunately no one going over a cliff edge in the dark. Despite our 5am wake-up and a solid day of activity we didn’t go to bed till after 10pm. I slept like a log. Tom was up early to photograph sunrise but I enjoyed a sleep in. We knew we had the luxury of more time today, but also a longer canyon. I suggested we should get going and save any relaxing for when we got back to camp (hopefully in the light) later in the day. Even so we weren’t away much before 10am.

Next morning still plenty of low cloud

Tom and Jonathan checking out another river of cloud

Getting slotty

The man in nature

Despite both Tom & I having done this canyon previously there were many abseils, some awkward, some requiring particular care with rope placement, others needing to be doubled-up, so we didn’t make any speed records getting through the canyon.

Slightly awkward abseil

Another awkward abseil

The others started on lunch at 2pm in the feeble sun in the creak bed while I went to look for some water. We’d picked some up the day before but not in a spot we could get to today, I went a long way downstream and didn’t find any. Oh well, we’d have to make the 7L we had back at camp do. I scoffed my lunch on my return and then we were off. Detouring off from the exit I found a couple of pools – not the most attractive looking but definitely good for putting out the fire, and probably fine for drinking if you didn’t mind heavily tannined water.

Camp

Bliss. Happy hour, quiz and sunset.

We made it back to camp in the light – but only with half an hour to spare. The sun was already lighting up the cliffs opposite camp with magnificent colours so we settled in for cheese & biccies and Good Weekend Quiz. (For the record a respectable 18/25).

Sunrise from the comfort of my sleeping bag – some advantages to sleeping under a fly!

Our final day I decided to stay at camp with the Good Weekend while the others went to explore another small creek. Then it was just a matter of retracing our steps back to the car – easier said than done when we were all feeling the impact of a much harder weekend than planned! Relieved to be back at the cars we then had a slow drive home in the long weekend traffic – broken up by apple pie at our usual stop on Bells Line. A great weekend in the bush – though maybe next time we need something a little easier after a 6 week lay off!

We didn’t have any plans for the weekend, and Emmanuelle had suggested an overnight camp. Tom came up with a different route in and out which worked well with the weather – a cool, drizzly Saturday followed by a sunny, warm Sunday. Saturday was spent on the ridges, paying attention to navigating.

Tom enjoying the views at lunch

We met up with the others, who had all managed to take slightly different routes in, for a fun evening in a cave.

A welcome fire on a drizzly evening

What are you guys doing here? This is our cave!

After Tom’s previous trip covering this route got his party back to the car at 11pm I was keen for an early start! We had slightly modified the route, plus the 2 of us probably move a bit quicker than his previous party.

Early start on a clear sunny day

The bush, and everything in it, was saturated

The first half hour or so was a bit miserable pushing through saturated scrub at a very slow pace. But after that we had clearer route before hitting the Wollangambe River.

Beautiful Wollangambe

Travelling down the Wollangambe was fairly slow initially and where Tom had been talking up a 9 hour day the night before, suddenly it turned into a 10 hour one (still nothing on the 14 hour earlier trip). But then we hit the sandy sections and our pace picked up considerably.

Tom negotiating a small drop

Tom on the go

Still going

And still going! (or is he?)

In the end we made it back to the cars in just over 8 hours, in time for apple pie at Pie in the Sky on the way home.

In Jan 2018 I finally had a successful descent of Morong Falls after 2 failed attempts in 2008 and 2010. Sadly Tom hadn’t been able to make that trip so I was keen to do it again so he could come along. I optimistically put it on the SBW Program for him…. Only to find he was still injured 🙁

I’d had a lot of interest in the trip, and a waiting list. But was the weather going to come to the party? I spent the weeks leading in studying the Kowmung River levels. I knew that for our successful trip last year the Cedar Creek level had been around 0.25. I had been told that up to about 0.35 was still fun and up to 0.4 was doable… it had taken several weeks for the level to get down to 0.36 a few days out from the trip. Great! Except then the days leading up had storms forecast. Shooters Hill had 28mm on Thursday but it didn’t seem to impact the river levels. (NB. Cedar Ford is >45km downstream of Morong Deep so not a perfect indicator of conditions)

Water levels up to the Friday (11th) before the trip

Not dissimilar to my Colo River walk I lost participants as the week progressed. I gave everyone the options on Thursday – should we proceed knowing that we might have to bail out? I got positive responses so we were on. Water levels were holding in the 0.35-0.40 range, forecast for Saturday was great. Fingers-crossed!

It rained heavily the whole way to Glenbrook on Friday evening. This wasn’t really consistent with the forecast. While picking up Clive & Will in Glenbrook I have a look at the radar – there’s widespread rain everywhere. Hmm. The rain continues most of the way up the mountains. We get fuel in Mt Vic and I have another look at the river levels – still sitting at 0.38, the rain gauges in the areas surrounding the Kowmung catchment haven’t had more than 10mm (compared to Goulburn and some parts of the main mountains getting >50mm that afternoon).

We get to Boyd River campground at 10:15pm. “@#&*!” I hear as we’re getting gear out the car. “What’s up?” “My shoes are in my car in Glenbrook, I only have thongs”. “oh”.

The rain starts pouring just as I’ve put my fly on the tent. I’m sitting in the tent, listening to the rain, looking at all the maps I’ve brought trying to come up with an alternative plan since Morong Deep is clearly out of the picture. And what am I going to do with shoeless Will?

I didn’t sleep well.

Woken by what sounded like hundreds of kookaburras at 5am my thoughts click back to the alternatives.

I finally meet Nic, the 4^th and final member of the party. Part of the reason the trip is on the program is because Nic suggested it – but under club rules as he is still a prospective member he can’t lead trips yet. We’ve been exchanging emails for weeks but we haven’t met before. “Great day to go and have a look” he says. “Oh” I think.

Somewhat later than planned Nic, Clive & I set off for the locked gate (“giving us time for the river to go down”). It’s a beautiful day. We get to Morong Creek “that’s quite a lot of water” says Nic. Indeed. Not so much we couldn’t cross so we cross and head down to the Kowmung.

Upper Morong Falls

Upper Morong Falls

After a bit of faffing above bluffs we find our way down. A brown, frothy river meets us. Crossing looks a little challenging. If my mind hadn’t already been made up, it was made up then. We would be heading back out shortly.

Our first view of the Kowmung looking downstream

We put a marker in place to see whether the river was rising or falling and had morning tea. Nic and I managed to get across the river dry and went for a bit of a scout. After half an hour I don’t think the marker had moved, though Nic more optimistic than me thought it might have dropped very slightly.

Nic using the only dry crossing near the bottom of the spur

Savage Cataract

Nic exploring downstream on the true-right. We exit up the spur on the left. (for comparison see this photo from last year – the big boulders are the same, but the river is barely visible)

For something to do we decided to cross the river, make our way downstream a few hundred metres, cross back and head up the next spur. That was relatively straight-forward though there were very few safe places to cross the river.

My camera also decided it’d had enough, so that’s the end of my photos for the day.

More river

It was a fun, if humid and hot climb up the spur through a few granite outcrops. We had lunch at a lovely cliff-edge spot at the top with good views. It was the perfect weather for doing the trip – just the wrong water levels.

After lunch we headed back to the cars, and were a little surprised to find my car parked there as well as Nic’s. We’d left my car with shoeless Will so he could at least go somewhere from the campground. Shortly after he arrived back with a family he’d met – they’d been swimming at Morong Falls so we must have only just missed them after lunch.

I had a nap, then we prevaricated about what do the next day. There wasn’t a lot of enthusiasm for any of the options on the table. We went for a swim in the pool above Kalang Falls which was wonderful and refreshing. We then came to the democratic decision of going home that night.

Back home at 10:30pm I had a look at the river levels. Wow.

Water levels including Sat/Sun! Peaked at 0.57

Rainfall in the 24 hours before the trip

With Friday off work I was keen to make use of my three day weekend however I didn’t get any takers for a full three days of activities. On Friday afternoon we hatched a plan with Toni & Smiffy to go out to Red Rocks for the weekend. I was all packed to go and then Tom & I headed into Blackheath about 6pm. Two minutes out of the car to go to the grocery store had me doubting the sense in our plan! The wind was bitterly cold, I think the BOM had the apparent temperature at -5°C and that was only the early evening. I’m not sure how much convincing Toni & Smiffy needed but it didn’t take that long to get agreement via text message to convert plans into day trips.

I’d been wanting to do Orang-Utan Pass for a while but Tom had been resisting my suggestions. It seemed like a good option for the day as it was on the East side of the ridge keeping us out of the 50-60km/h westerly wind. Unfortunately Toni’s gaiters ended up at our house instead of in the car so she bravely forged on with bare legs despite knowing we were likely to encounter a fair bit of lawyer vine. I didn’t take a heap of photos as the bulk of the day was either bush-bashing or else on the Grose Valley track to Perrys Lookdown which we’d walked several times recently.

Smiffy photographing Tom crossing the crux of the route

Tom carefully easing his way across the small ledge

The logbook. A bit more traffic in 2018 compared to previous years (average seemed to be about 1 trip per year since it was placed in 1990)

There was still plenty of route-finding to come

Toni at the one spot we used the tape

We were happy to get back to the house and get the fire roaring. Sparkling red, cheese, and later on a delicious chocolate mud cake made for a pleasant evening inside out of the wind.

The next day the incentives for getting moving weren’t high as we could hear the wind buffeting the house. Eventually we settled on Jugglers Canyon since Toni hadn’t done it, and Tom thought it would be out of the wind.

Toni on abseil

For the record Juggler still gets plenty of wind.

The snaparazzi!

Toni abseiling

We took a different route out from our usual one. I was quite surprised to find some handrails!

Tom handrailing 🙂

Toni coming up the handrail section

Since we’d started quite late it was unsurprising that it was well and truly lunchtime by the time we got back to the cars. We had lunch in Katoomba, the enthusiasm for post-lunch activities was limited so we called it a weekend at that. A satisfying one despite the bout of softitis that kept us inside overnight 🙂

As mentioned in my recent post about a trip to Morong Deep it was the third time I’d attempted the trip. It was interesting to compare the water levels between the three trips.

Jan 2018 Trip	2008/2010 Trips
These first 2 were taken where you cross Morong Falls from the Morong Falls Firetrail. The photo on the right was from 2010 when we decided the Kowmung level was too high to proceed.
Upper Morong Falls Jan 2018	Upper Morong Falls Dec 2010
These were taken on the Kowmung looking back at the base of Morong Falls (Savage Cataract)
Savage Cataract Jan 2018	Savage Cataract Dec 2008
These ones are in a section on the Kowmung. They have quite distinctive rock features and it’s interesting to see where the water is flowing (or not).
Kowmung Jan 2018	Kowmung Dec 2008
At first glance these two may not appear to be the same spot. I think this is the most interesting comparison set – the water level in the Kowmung is about 1.5m different. The rock which the guys are standing on in the right-hand photo is the largest boulder in the left hand shot. The large boulder next to the swimmer is almost entirely under water in the 2008 photo. It’s perhaps not surprising that we didn’t find a way through the pinch point shortly after this in 2008 (ended up traversing high on the true left).
Kowmung Jan 2018	Kowmung Dec 2008