Alpine NP (Mt Bogong) 12 – 13 November 2009

We left Mt Beauty in the building heat of the morning and drove into a peaceful country valley leading into the Alpine NP. The campground was beside one of those postcard creeks with water cascading over rows of rocks that made exquisite sounds. The air was so much cooler and we immediately felt refreshed. Within hours, our peace was shattered by the emergence from the bush of a tumbling, noisy group of teenagers. We thought of moving but gave them a chance! We quickly discovered that they were 10 ‘high risk’ kids that were undertaking a hiking challenge with four supervisors. We were impressed with their effort of a 70km trek over 8 days, from Mt Buffalo over Mt Bogong and down to this camp carrying heavy packs. They were kept in tight control and they were up early the next day and on their bus home.
There are a few walks from this site so we decided to explore our surrounds in the car before going for our bush walk. We ended up on a very mountainous and steep dirt track that ended in the name SPUR! It took us forever up and along narrow tracks of ROCKS! Peter was delighted and Heather a bit white knuckled, even Heather admitted that our Suzuki 4WD handled it all without a complaint! We guessed that that was not the walking track!
We found the walking track along the creek a little later and we really enjoyed the walk. We were instantly cool again – you could feel the cold air coming off the water. We felt like the air conditioner had been turned on!
Late in the evening, we were mystified by the arrival of horses and riders about 10pm. In the morning, the explanation was clear. A family was riding a 680km trip with six horses to the coast. They were camped close by and were taking the horses in twos for a drink at the creek!
Friday morning we had the campsite to ourselves and went for another longer hike along the creek. We enjoyed a quiet afternoon reading and relaxing. The air was a wonderful air-conditioned 23deg. Everywhere else was reporting over 30! The water in the stream was very cold from the Alpine region. It really brought home the idea of a cool valley for early settlers to relax by! After another cool night, we left Saturday morning for the Upper Murray and points unknown.