20080307

Drove into the Sydney CBD from my mate Andrew’s place out in the western suburbs of Sydney (Winston Hills) in the morning and it took ages to find a parking station that would take the height of DSCVRY (2.3m), but i finally found one and it was right around the corner from The Blacket hotel where i was staying for the night.

After checking in and attending the AIMIA board meeting (I’m a national board member) i wandered into Strand Hatters and checked out some Akubra hats that i have been looking at for a while now…the Akubra Adventurer, the Akubra International, the Akubra Swing and the Akubra Henry Lawson. I was thinking about picking up an Akubra Adventurer, which is a Fedore (Indiana Jones) style hat that was originally made for sale only in the old Gowings Store in Sydney…which i used to love shopping at. The didn’t have an Adventurer in black, so i thought i would pop back in later after working out if i really needed another Akubra hat ;)

Went back to The Blacket and got ready for the 14th Annual AIMIA Awards (which was being held at the NIDA theatre) and then caught a cab down there. It was a great night and all of the winners were of a high standard…as one would expect.

It’s 3am and i’m finally back at The Blacket, so i figure i can get about five hours sleep before heading back out to Winston Hills to meet up with Andrew and his family and then head out to the Blue Mountains :)

20080306 1100hrs – Melbourne
One hour after leaving the ExpeditionOz Melbourne HQ i reach the outer edge of Melbourne…this short part of the trip takes longer everytime i do it :(

20080306 1400hrs – Albury / Wodonga
Just crossed over the Murray River near the towns of Albury (NSW) and Wodonga (Vic) which marks the State border between Victoria and New South Wales.

20080306 1900hrs – Sydney
After a nine hour drive, i have finally reached the outer edge of Sydney. There was lots of roadwork on the Hume Highway as they are finally trying to finish the work which will make the Highway a freeway-grade dual carriage-way (two lanes or more both ways) all the way from Albury to Sydney. The Melbourne to Wodonga part of this work was finished a while ago and the plan is that the NSW side will all be finished by the end of 2009…its a huge project, but i can’t believe it has taken this long…

Of course in amongst all this “work stuff”, a long time buddy (from my 10 years in Sydney) and I are also planning to do a two-day 4wd expedition through the Kanangra-Boyd National Park and Blue Mountains National Park…it will probably follow a similar path to the one I did in September of 2002

The equipment is all packed and loaded into DSCVRY (my 2001 Land Rover Discovery) and an Expedition diary, photos and videos are all planned…now i just need to finish my keynote presentation so I can get my head into expedition mode :)

After a five hour drive I finally made it back to HQ. It was pretty uneventfull drive, though just as i was leaving The General at Mt Hotham a CFA ute and firetruck went screaming though the village heading west. I spoke to someone outside the CFA fire station and they told me that the truck was heading down to a possible fire on the Dargo High Plains.

It was pretty busy in the Ovens Valley and every caravan park or motel i drove past was full, so I made the dash for the Upper Yarra Valley and after seeing one kangaroo on the road between Seymour and Yea, here i am safe and sound at ExpeditionOz HQ.

The speedometer on DSCVRY is reading 119,254 km, so i managed to clock up 1,092 km of driving on this expedition…all in all it was a good expedition and on top of these logs, which i will enter into the blog on my return to connectivity, i’ll try and get around to doing some equipment reviews as quickly as possible…though…i do need to start planning the next expedition ;)

Check out this Windows Live map for locations.

View Photo Album

I’ve just had a nice dinner and a well deserved ale at The General in Mt Hotham, and its time to head down the mountain.

I’m not sure if i’ll make it back to the ExpeditionOZ Upper Yarra Valley HQ tonight as it’s about a five hour drive and i’m pretty buggered, but i’ll see how i go.

I’m absolutely buggered…the walk back was really hot and i ran out of water with about 2km to go which wasn’t exactly a smart thing to do with this heat. I was going to fill up my 2.1 litre water bladder that sits in the back of the pack near the base of the Mt Feathertop ascent, but thought that i had enough left over which was a silly mistake. You would think i would have learnt by now that you always fill up on water whenever you get the opportunity.

Other than the heat and the lack of water near the end, the walk back was pretty good. I had to stop a few times and recoup, but it just meant i got to check out some amazing views :)

When i finally arrived back at Diamantina Hut and DSCVRY, i threw down a couple of cups of water, drenched myself with about 500ml of water to cool down and changed out of my walking clothes into a clean shirt, some shorts and replaced the walking boots with my Teva sandals.

I’ve packed DSCVRY and now I’m heading up to The General at Mt Hotham for some dinner and a well deserved ale…or two :)

View Photo Album

All rested and recovered and now its time to hit the Razorback and re-trace my journey the 8.5km back to Diamantina Hut and DSCVRY.

After reaching the spur at the end of the steep walk down from Mt Feathertop, i decided to dump the pack next to a snow gum and walk up the hill to the top of Little Mt Feathertop at 1,785m.

The views back to Mt Feathertop from the top of it slightly smaller neighbour are spectacular…I would recommend the quick walk up to the top of Little Mt Feathertop to anyone doing the main walk..and don’t forget your camera :)

View Photo Album

Around four hours of walking through some spectacular terrain and here i finally sit, on the top of Victoria’s second highest mountain, Mt Feathertop at 1,922m.

The walk on the Razorback track crosses over so many highpoints and traverses rocky terrain, snow gum forest, alpine grass and some really steep sections. I took it pretty easy walking in and stopped quite often to take photos. I also crossed paths a few time with an  “older” group of around six walkers heading in the same direction along with a number of people heading back to Diamantina Hut who had spent New Years eve camped out at the Federation Hut site, including a Park Ranger.

I took the “longer” way in at the start and crossed over Bon Accord before falling into the rhythm of going down hillsides, then around hillsides, then up hillsides before starting the process all over again. It started to warm up about an hour into the walk and I packed my North Face Blackhawk windwall and reverted to a trusty Polypro thermal. It’s a little bit warmer with the polypro on in the sun, but as you can round a corner and run headfirst into a strong cool breeze at any moment up in the alpine region, i find that i don’t mind a bit of extra warmth especially as the polypro material wicks the sweat away pretty quickly. I remember visiting the Swiss Alps in 1992 and climbing /walking around the Great St Bernard Pass and up to around 3,000m on the Matterhorn and my trusty polypros of the time worked like a dream.

I’d also loaded up new Mammut Flight 35 litre pack to see how it would handle the trip as a bit of a road test for a longer (and higher) walk I intend to do soon. The other major new piece of equipment i was wearing was my Frillneck Urban Turban which worked really well at keeping the sun of but probably kept me a bit to warm. I won’t go into to much detail about equipment as i’ll get around to doing an equipment review after the expedition.

After doing the last long and steep climb from the ridge up to the top of Mt Feathertop, and taking in the joy of having reached the peak, I took a bundle a photos of all the glorious mountains you can see from up here which include major peaks such as; Mt Bogong and the Bogong Massif, Mt Fainter, Mt Fainter South, The Niggerhead, Mt McKay, Mt Cope, Mt Loch, Mt Hotham, Mt Saint Bernard (not the one in Switzerland), the Blue Rag Trip point and Mt Buffalo. You can also see right over onto the Dargo and Howitt High Plains areas as well.

While i was sitting down and having some lunch the next thing you really notice is the insect life going absolutely crazy up here…there were so many varieties (and since i’m not really an insect expert) it’s to hard to name them all.

1221 hrs – While the breeze up here is quite nice, it’s also very hot as the sun is beating down so i might start heading down the track.

View Photo Album

So i had a few more beers at The General and then retired for what turned into a pretty restless night trying to get some sleep in the back of DSCVRY, but…i did manage to see the fireworks welcoming in 2008 going off at midnight down the bottom of the mountains at Harrietville.

When i woke up the view was just what i needed to get me in the mood,  as right in front of the car i had a view of the Razorback from Diamantina Hut all the way to Mt Feathertop :)

I’ve had some breakfast and I’m all packed and ready to head out onto the Razorback track and the 10 km walk to the peak of Mt Feathertop at 1,922m. The weather is also pretty strange at the moment with clouds over Mt Hotham and the Bogong High Plains and blue sky over Mt Buffalo and further west, so i’m not sure if its going to rain or of the sun is going to some out and really warm the day up.

Anyway…enough writing…time to hit the trail :)

View Photo Album