After donning our Daniel Boone coonskin caps and packing the banjos it was time to head east in search of adventure late Friday afternoon. And it didn't take long to realise we were further out in the sticks than planned.
Don't go to Warburton if you want Fish and Chips for grub - no Fish and Chip shop........ So pizza it was.
Anyway, after chow Pauly and I heaed up to Comet Flat in convoy, striking heavy fog around The Springs on the Warburton-Woods point road. High beam, no good, too much reflection, low beam no good, just can't see. So over the UHF comes the call from Pauly "Why don't you try your fog lights?" Me: 'I dont have any'. Pauly: 'Why not ?' Me: 'I don't drive in fog'. Pauly: 'Well what do you call this?' Me: "Abnormal atmosperic conditions'. That sort of set the tone for the weekend, sort of like the old 'It's only 10 minutes until lunch...' I'm sure those of you who know me are groaning already..... It was a weekend full of 'Abnormal atmospehric condtions' from that point . I'm sure that bad smell after the duck quacking noise around the fire was attributed to 'Abnormal atmposhepric conditions'.
As was any other cloud, rain, or even sunshine.
Alex and Scotty had grabbed a spot for us and had the fire going by the time we got there well after dark, the fog (sorry, abnormal atmospheric condition) having slowed us a bit over the last few kays. And watching out for deer. Eli arrived soon after so it was just a matter of introductions around the fire, rolling out the swags and having a yarn while watching the bush TV.
Saturday morning a lazy roll out of bed around 8.00am sees us having a brekky under grey skies, a few small drop of rain in the night but not even enough to call a shower.... So it's through the main drag of Woods Point about 9.30am, nope, no signs of life its as quiet as a morgue at that hour. I note some fool has smashed one of the glass bowls in the old bowsers out front of the old servo, hope they got a thrill out of that. We turned right up the Old Coach ride and just bumped our way to the top and turned right along Webber Spur. Dodging some of that fog stuff, no real view out to the side, but then the cloud breaks and we can see Abbot Link track below us on the right - brings back memories of that time we had 4 or 5 cars all go 'pop' in the space of 5 minutes once when we wwre down in that valley. Some merriment over the radio remembering that one..... Hopefully not a sign of things to come.
Past Webber Creek track on the left, nope not going down that one, its a dead end anyway unless you are walking or on a motorbike, in which case you can sneak all the way along the Goulburn and come out at Lazarini Spur its al nold miners track that parallels the river, some locals took us along it once back in out biking days. By now we're getting closer to the (optional) left hand turn that takes the old original Webber Spur track straight down the spur, not the newer bypass that winds its way down. Out of the 5 of us 4 elect to go down, Eli's Triton would be hampered by rear overhang on the ledges so the smart option is for him to take the bypass and meet us at the Goulburn crossing at the bottom.
A great track to go down is the old spur track, a couple of rock shelves no choice but to bump over them, I'm watching Scotty's Hilix in the rear view mirror and as soon as the front wheels go over it's on the sliders and bang bang bang over the ledge as the rears can't hold it back. I reckon that would have been a pucker up moment, but he take it in his stride and then Pauly flattens the Prado exhaust in the same spot. My exhaust starts rattling at the same time, damn, broken a rubber mount. But we all make it to the bottom. Eli is coming in from the side track just as we emerge from the bush, good timing, so after a quick raising of the river level, probably in relief we are down, its cross the river and up the bank on the other side. I go first and lumber up, as you do, bugger me there's a couple of English blokes coming down the other side one in a Toyota Fortuner the other in an old shorty Landrover. Those Fortuners leave me cold, might be a capable vehicle but they hit every ugly stick on the way down. No mind, they had track condittion info having just come down Champion Spur and according to them apart from a couple of steep sections its in good nick. Well that sounds promising as we were prepared for overgrown and chainsaws, maybe we're getting out of it for cheap.
Over the radio I can hear one of the guys is having to have a few goes at getting out of the river crossing behind me, silly me offers a recovery if necessary as I'm already high and dry chatting to these 2 English blokes on the other side. Never, I repeat, never, offer to give someone a tug over the radio. I got more offers than there are drunks in a Dan Murphy shop..... A few guffaws later and with some guidance on line choice I think from Alex, our team member appears in the rear view mirror and its happy days, eveyone is up. The Engilsh guys were going to head over to Jambo via Lazarini Spur, I suggested up Webber Spur and down German Spur might be a nicer drive, they had maps so we squeezed passed and began our Champion Chellenge and left them to their own devices.
Hopes were high, uncharted terrain for me and the promise of steep sections ahead had me rubbing my hands together. Well, what a let down that was... Did we just do the steep section ? Was that it ? Is it steeper further up ? Nope.
Champion Spur in my rating book is Easy with a capital E. So while it was a nice drive and enjoyable in its own right I sort of felt like I'd mistitled the trip, but there you go when it's unknown tracks and all youve got is a you tube video that made it look challenging and the opposite turns out to be the case. Alex had spotted a track off to the left I think might have been an offshoot, might have had more promise I missed it didn't even see it at the time. Also spotted the Burnt Camp track turn out, from what I know of that it's a straight up the creek drive so might warrant going back one day for a squiz. At least higher up Champion Spur the abnormal atmopshere decsended again and with reduced visiblity it had that eerie feel to it that you only get in the high country !
We passed the turnoffs to Swinglers and Royal Standard tracks, both dead ends, according to the maps they bound a Woods Point Historic area if anyone has done these and it leads to some old relics it would be great to know if worthwile going down for a look and photograph. We checekd out the Historic point at Fiddlers Green, a sad tale about a young chap who died recoverting a leather belt drive back in the day, then it was over the main road to the Thompson catchment side and down Violet Town track, getting the nibblies by now so at the bottom river crossing we pulled up a pew and had lunch. Very pleasent spot to stop only disturbed by a group of bikers staying at the Richmond Retrat cabins as we later found out.
Now we met these guys 3-4 times, a big group of them. We'd move order, or indicate which side to pass on, or stop to let them past every time. Our 'reward' was to get the front of our cars sprayed with stones and grit every time as these knob throttle jockeys passed us - couldn't even wait until they were clear of our cars before hitting the 'look at me' button on the bike and roosting us. FU$^$RS.
Next time I'll wait until they are next to me and then move over - towards them ASSH^)*#@
A visit to the historic cemetary at the RJ Track leaves me scratching my head- it would be so much easier to move a deceased person to a cemetary rather than lug in a headstone to what would have been a million miles away from Melbourne back in the day. Lots of families never made it out of that valley. We then stopped at the diversion tunnel if it was hot I'd jump in for a swim. The old rope swing and picnic tables/toilets are looong gone as camping is no longer 'approved' in the Thompson valley above the catchment area a shame as that was a great spot to while awayt a few days. Done it many times before these new rules and regs !
We then meandered up to the Walhalla Road and finally Noble Spur track isn't on fire or blocked or spirited away by aliens so a nice descent back to comet flat had us around the campfire by about 4.00pm, perfect. Anfd thanks to Alex, Scotty and Pauly for remembering to grab firewood on the way down, around Comet Flat its a scare resource but back up the hill there's plenty of fuel load lying around.
I don't remeber much after grub, a different type of fog descended.... But waking up in my swag and not finding it moved intto the river was nice....
We all went back up Noble Spur Track Sunday morning, Scooty to head home via Aberfeldy / Walhalla and Alex via Matlock and Warburton. Eli Pauly and myself went the slightly longer way back down through Jerico a very nice drive on a Sunday morning, dappled sunlight and fresh air all the way along the valley until thoe FU@%#N motorbikes again !!! I deliberately parked on the right hand side of the track on a right hand bend hahahahhhahha can't get me this time fellas. After they went past we truned right up Casper Creek track, which climbs straight out of the valley heading west right at the tip of the Thompson dam. Nice continual climb and we pass a couple of old biddys HIKING up the same track... They must have been 90 not out lugging packs bigget than my swag.... Good luck to them but geez its a long walk out of the valley ladies. I reckon next time we go back that way they'll still be lugging it up the hill !
We stopped at the logging coup near the top to look straight down the valley at the dam, and yes, Pauly managed to eat anothet pie, or was it two, his pie warmer got a workout that weekenfd I think the tally was 6 ????? After that we cruised back to the Cumberland junction to air up and roll back home.
Thanks all for coming it was good to catch up and poke our way around the far side of Woods Point, for sure there's plenty of tracks out there waiitng to be explored. Now I'm off to replace that busted exhaust rubber mount and look at that leaky diff pinion seal, the joys of an old rig !
Cheers.