Well what can I say? Sometimes things just don't go as planned. Two of our crew had to drop out due to illness so it was left up to Bill(middle), Luke(right) and myself(left) to head out.
According to the maps we had, there SHOULD have been a reasonable walking track taking us most of the way to our destination. The said walking track could not be found as it was completely overgrown so we headed in along a 4WD track that ended after fording the river a couple of times. We decided seen as we already had wet feet we would we would just walk the 8 km in on the river. MUCH easier said then done. The banks were unwalkable in 99% of the area due to either sheer drops or impenatrable blackberries and undergrowth.
Six and a half hours later of of stumbling along in the river getting our butts kicked by log jams and looking like we had gone a few rounds with an angry big cat we were losing light and looking for a flat bit of ground. I was almost at the stage of just pulling out my sleeping bag and digging a bed under the undergrowth. We spotted a bit of a bench about 150m above the river and bashed our way to that, finding a reasonbly level little spot to pitch camp. We had a bit of a feed, got a small fire going to dry out our boots and clothes a bit and settled in for the night. Waking at daybreak the next day we decided to split up and go for a bit of a hunt hoping to find a couple of game trails to follow etc. I made my way to the river again hoping to make it to our intended camp so we could see how far we had to go. I only managed to make it about 1km and came up against water that would need swimming in front, cliffs on the left that would need some serious climbing(not an option with out some climbing gear) and 6 foot high black berries with no end in sight on the right. I had seen some reasonably fresh stag tracks but nothing real flash. Making it back to camp Luke and Bill came in about an hour later with similar stories. Bill had found the track we were meant to walk in on about 100m above us and said it was pretty overgrown.
We were sitting in camp having a chat when a blaze orange hat popped up just below us. There was a bloke standing there carrying a rifle. I gave him a wave and he came up to say hello. Turns out he was part of a couple of hound crews that were working the valley system we were in over the weekend. They had seen a couple of deer but not shot one yet. We had a chat for a while and discovered he had walked in on the track we needed. Talking to the boys we all decided that due to the nature of the terrain and the hound crews that it would not be condusive to good bow hunting so we decided to de camp and head back to the cars for the night and possibly have a look around closer to town. It took us 3 1/2 hours on the track to cover the distance that took 6 1/2 hours the day before in the water. We stayed the night at the cars, had a quick look around in the morning then headed for home.
It certainly didn't go to plan but we had a ball anyway. It was actually good to see how far we could push ourselves mentally and physically on the first day. Probably not an area I would go back to but you wouldn't know if you didnt go and give it a go. We didnt see any deer but we did see two wild dogs that looked almost to be pure dingo. Nice looking animals but not close enough for a shot.
Now to plan the next one and get a better fitting pack. We had an absolute ball anyway and were not dissapointed with the outcome. Time in the bush with like minded folk is never a dissapointment. Cant wait for the next one
Topic: Sometimes things just dont work out. (Read 286 times)
