numietta

Wild wet Wollemi Wilderness 2

| flynny101

Continued from WWWW1.

Saturday dawned clear but heavy rain was predicted to set in late in the day.

All the comforts of home or sumfink

Today we would leave the camp gear behind and head to the canyon we came out here for. We navigated our way along the, well you can’t call it a ridge but lets say “convoluted yet connected spur” and down to our target creek, which soon canyoned up.

Doesn’t look like much yet but just down there…
It was as specularly beautiful as I’d imagined

Many times throughout the day we would, once again reflect on similarities to Carnarvon Gorge and some of the remote slots we had explored well upstream of the usual tourist hikes. Just all rolled into 1. And greener.

it was grand
Deep, narrow, and twisty
and it went and went
Before opening into a cliff lined oasis.

We wondered down through remnant Gondwana rainforest, in that moment we were content and complete.

There is not enough superlatives to do it justice.

Mini Hunks fist

But the day wasn’t done with us yet. We wound our way through lush coachwoods and ferns to the jaws of another deep and impressive slot.

We wasted no time roping up to drop in
Once again we are dwarfed by moss covered walls
and still it drops
and once we reach the bottom a beam of sun lights up the spray of a side waterfall. The photo does not do it justice but Magic happens.
It’s hard to feel anything but humble out here.
We explore side canyons, again struck by similarities to side slots in Carnarvon Gorge.
We go slow, carefully pick our footsteps not wanting to damage the thick, spongy moss carpet and just soaking in the experience.
And of course before the canyon was done with us it would give us one short swim.

A ways downstream we refill our water bottles and quit this creek via an easy pass onto another convoluted but connected spur.

The sky is ominous so we punch up the spur back to camp.

just over six and a half hours after we left we make it back to camp and attempt to dry things off a bit while cooking diner before retiring under the tarp just as the storm hits.

Sunday

We had some canyons planned but it had rained hard all night and was not letting up. The dump was predicted to get heavier through the day cumulating in a thunder storm after lunch. So we opted to retreat down our first spur back to the pretty creek. The flow had definitely increased since yesterday and by the time we waded upstream to the bottom of a canyon that would lead us back up to the fire trail we had walked in on the rain was getting heavier.

Knowing this canyon was deep, narrow and long and still expecting a storm we reluctantly decided to slip up a pass beside it instead. The ridge I was hoping to use to avoid dropping back into the head waters of the canyon proved to be far more complex than the topo map suggested but it eventually got us to the road via another spectacular knife edge.

With empty heads and full souls all that was left to do was to follow the trail back to the car and the long drive home.

At the end of the day, your feet should be dirty, your hair messy, and your eyes sparkling: Shanti

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