Popeye Canyon Lower

23/11/2025

Jason, Kris, Hywaida, Kylie and Meeeeeee

Continued on from Banks Canyon

It teemed down overnight at camp. But our trusty tarp kept us cozy and by morning the sun was peaking through the clouds.

We had said goodbye to Levis and Monica and talked ourselves into another short canyon while we were out here.

Kylie, Jason and I had visited the top couple of sections of Popeye Canyon as a day walk a few weeks earlier which had some pretty bits in it, and so we were keen to have a look at the lower section.

I cooked up a plan to head straight down from camp to the grid reference that the Jamison guide lists as the start of Popeye (a kilometre or so below the upper section).

We start down a ridge in between two faint gullies. These soon join to become a stoney bottom creek that tumbles over a substantial cliff line. We only brought a short rope with us today so make our way a bit further long the left hand bank and find a way down into what we came to christen MCPCC. Mega Clear Path Creek Canyon.

heading out to enter via the upper section may have been easier.

Anyhoo we find ourselves in Popeye creek. It’s not looking like much but H and K don light wet suits.

Looks like there’ll be some more creek walking, I’ll suit up later, the rest of us say.

10 steps later, literally, like literally 10 steps babes, we round a bend and the creek drops into a tunnel like canyoney section.

This would be the theme for this section of Popeye. boulder hoping interspaced with tunnels and cavey bits. A few abseils and short swims
and awesome company

but not much quality canyon.

Plenty of weirdness thou

we head all the way down to the…… it hurts to say it…. Dingo *fugging* Creek for the final 10m of “canyon”

The plan is to head down said creek to an exit Kylie had mapped out opposite gateway canyon. I’m hopeful this section is similar to the bit below HITW and we can just float with the current.

There was a bit of floating.

A bit of boulder scrambling.

Some scrub bashing.

And lots of sinking knee, sometimes hip, deep into fine sand to have it defy the sand traps and fill the bestards.

I still have sand in places sand has no place being.

Still, it’s a wild and beautiful part of the Bungleboori system worth visiting. Once.

The bottom of Gateway canyon was a welcome site

The walls lining the creek had gone from broken slopes to towering cliffs and I’m wondering just how tricky this exit is going to be.

Surprisingly it’s straight forward, cutting back along a gentle ramp to a not too steep nose that avoided the cliffs altogether.

Nice one Gadget

All in all a fantastic weekend out in the wilderness with my kind of people.

just what the doctor ordered.

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Bell Creek

COMPLETE(ISH) IN A DAY

Kylie, Hywaida, Kris, Jason, Aimee, Tash and meeeeeeeeee

19/02/2022

I’ve done the lower section of Bell creek a couple of times. It’s beautiful.

Like really, jaw droppingly beautiful

But the first time it took us 3hrs to walk into the start of the access canyon, Bell Fry(which is a pretty little canyon in its own right)

Next time we knew where we were going and a hazard burn had taken out a lot of the scrub on the ridge. So we cut that down to just under 2hrs.

But it was still a difficult walk, having to scramble into the start of Du Faurs creek then climb up the other side.

Anyhoo, the Jamieson guide says a good overnight trip is to include the upper section. It also suggests you could do both in a very very long day.

Myself and Madie had mentioned a few times about having a crack of doing it in a day. But we never got around to it

This year a trip got planned. Unfortunately last minute I had to work😢

I get a text. Ok we are heading in.

Just over 6hrs later. We are out.

Wait! What?

Anyhoo I finally got the chance to give it a crack.

Now I’m not as quick as Madie and Russ but a 30min walk down a fairly easy ridge, with me just following my nose until Aimee checked the map and corrected my course and we slipped down a short side canyon and entered Bell creek just upstream of where it canyons up.

Our entry “canyon” was a short slot with 2 tricky down climbs, some parties would opt to rope up or at least handline. We used some sticks. Oh and it had an arch:-) ©Jason

I’ve said before that Du Faurs creek is a more canyony version of the Wollangambe. Bell creek is even more so.
We wade scramble and float down some long, impressive canyon sections @kylie

So the girls hadn’t caught up for a while and there was a chatter. Well, I say chatter but it was more weird noises and giggling. And, I say giggling, but it was more like cackling. Like b grade movie witches planning downfalls.

©Jason

TBH I wasn’t expecting the upper section to be so good.

“Upper sections” as described in the book can be hit and miss around here. The upper section of Du Faurs creek is good. The Bowens (North and South) have upper sections that contain pretty canyon sections but they pop in and out and there is scrub and scrambling between. Upper Wollangambe is basically a creek walk…. But this one has sustained sections of quality canyon.

Ok so there are no abseils… I get that’s what some people are after but it’s like 2 totally different sports. Vertical canyoning and this.

Maybe the old skool bushwalkers had it right when they described these trips as Swalks (Swim/walks)

either way it’s an adventure in beautiful surrounds with great people. Winning
©Aimee
It even had some duck unders
And spots for p̶l̶o̶t̶t̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶s̶c̶h̶e̶m̶e̶s̶, I mean quite contemplation
As green as green is
It’s not easy being green…. or brown.. or sumfink. Not 100% sure but I think its a Whistling Tree Frog, Litoria verreauxii. If you can confirm or offer an alternate ID comment below ©Aimee

Because I knew it wasn’t the very very long day Jamieson suggested we weren’t rushing at all. We even stopped for little lunch… I never stop of little lunch… but we still managed get from the car to the junction with Bell Fry in just a bit over 3.5hrs. So not much longer than the standard way into the lower section and far more interesting.

The gate keeper to the lower section

As surprisingly nice as the upper section is the lower section really is special

It might not be as iconic as the Hulks Fist in Claustral but its the Hulks Hand

and soon

Magic happens
©Kylie

The Lower Section just keeps going

Click the images to enbiggen ’em

We stop for a bite to eat and Kris finds this little beauty

And then the Canyon opens out a bit. It’s still grand and dwarfs us as we boulder hop down to the junction with Du Faurs creek. Then up to exit out Joes and up to the fire shed.

Group Size: 7

Time: 8.5hr car (Water Trough Hill) to car (Fire Shed).

Some of God’s children just are naturally wild: Ray Wylie Hubbard

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