|
Journal: |
I got up at 5:30am having gone to bed quite late after catching
up on email, etc., and felt tired and maybe not ready for another
day of exertion. Anyway, I packed all my now-clean gear, ate
the breakfast I had purchased at Woolworths last night and walked
100 metres to the Tumut Courthouse where I was to meet the school
bus at 6:45am. There was a heavy fog and it was cold. I
walked on the spot to keep warm until the bus eventually arrived
around 7am. I paid my $2 and chatted with the driver as we
covered the 10km to my starting point for the day. It was
still very foggy, but the bus driver assured me that it would soon
lift, as it did over the next hour as I followed a country road
through autumnal foliage and past working farms to reach Blowering
Dam.
My route then climbed up through the forest to the right
of the dam wall before becoming a very pretty foot-track along the
edge of the Dam but high enough to be in the bordering forest.
I gather I am now covering the same ground as the Hume & Hovell
Trail Ultra Race and, if it continues like this, I will be tempted
to return in October to participate. For the next hour or so,
the trail either bordered the Dam or turned inland to cross old
farmland, slowly being reclaimed by the bush after the owners moved
out to accommodate the Dam.
For some reason, I was feeling
quite tired and plodding a bit, maybe because of insufficient sleep,
and spent a lot of time listening to the radio to take my mind off
the fatigue. The scenery, however, was fantastic and this
section is one of the highlights of the trail thus far.
I had
an early lunch break at Browns Creek Campsite and thereafter the
trail followed fire trails, a lot of the time through pine
plantations, but also passing by some lovely undeveloped grassy
Dam-side picnic/camping areas populated with yellow-leaved trees and
kangaroos. At the top of one climb I checked my phone messages
and returned a call from a National Parks ranger to confirm details
of my encounter with the fire-lighters on Sunday afternoon.
Apparently the controlled burn wasn't approved and will be followed
up.
I was making good time in the afternoon, but the day was
passing slowly. I was hoping to find accommodation at an old
Forestry Camp, but had not been successful in contacting them.
I thought about just turning up and, on the assumption it was
out-of-season, just finding some where to get water and camp under
shelter. It had started to drizzle occasionally and the
forecast was for showers later.
When I reached the general
area of the Forestry Camp, it wasn't readily identifiable and what
buildings I could see had Private No Entry signs on the approaches.
I decided to carry on in case the camp was further on, but it
wasn't. At this point I saw the first emus of the trip,
joining hundreds of kangaroos grazing on the old pasture land.
I carried on another couple of kilometres and arrived at another
attractive picnic area but with no benches/tables or shelter or
water. It was approaching 4pm and I decided I was better to
camp while I could see and before the rain arrived. I found a
spot where some fallen logs provided a table and set up my tent in
intermittent light rain. I filled my water carriers from the
dam and decided to forgo a wash since it had been cool all day and I
hadn't really raised a sweat. I cooked and ate dinner in the
cloudy gloom of the early evening, observing the occasional
headlights travelling the Snowy Mountains Highway across the other
side of the dam.
I retired to my tent soon after 6pm to write
up my diary and later will listen to the Federal Budget speech on
the radio (I know it's sad, but I'm a helpless news junkie and
former economist). I have my fingers crossed that it will not
be raining when I get up, or it will be very difficult to pack
without getting everything wet.
|
