Captain Cook called this old volcano
situated near present day Tilba Tilba Mount Dromedary as it has two
humps easily visible from the sea, but, to the indigenous people, the
mountain is Gulaga. Back in the late 1800's, gold was mined on the
slopes and, common with mining practices up to the present day, the
rainforest was cleared and streams polluted. Tilba Tilba is now a
sleepy little town surrounded by lush green farms and the National
Park is managed jointly with the indigenous Yuin people. The track
from Tilba Tilba to the summit actually goes to the slightly lower
(797 metres versus 806 metres) southeast summit and uses old gold
mining tracks.
When I drove into the small parking
area at Tilba Tilba, a young woman seated by the track sign waved
enthusiastically at me. I had no idea who she was but returned her
wave, albeit with somewhat less gusto. Immediately I parked the car,
a young man in shorts, a tee-shirt,but with nothing else at all, also
pulled in, parked and strode off with the young woman. Meanwhile I
dragged my overstuffed pack from the car, wedged in a few more items,
and also began to walk up the track. I had thought about bringing
just a litre of water and a light jacket, but then the old
mountaineer in me had re-emerged and I threw in a pair of gloves,
some long underwear, a puffy jacket, a sun hat and beanie, a pair of
shorts, some dried salami, a bag of nuts, a first-aid kit, raincoat,
and, finally the litre of water. The problem with being an old
mountaineer is there is just no end to the nasty things you can imagine happening while out in the wilds.
The first kilometre follows a gravel
road past a series of small farms and properties. Ahead of me the
young couple was rapidly disappearing from sight and I fought that
instinctive desire to speed up to match their pace, or preferably
overtake them. This social instinct is hard-wired in all of us, and
is frequently the cause for much annoying jostling on narrow tracks.
By the time I had got to the National Park gate they had disappeared
from view.
Track
I'd read a few trip reports that
described the track as hideously steep requiring multiple rest stops.
It's not and it doesn't. Instead it is a steady gradual climb up
through second growth eucalpytus forest. There is little in the way
of views, although there is one spot where you can see Wallaga Lake
and Bermagui. After about 1.5 hours, I reached the saddle where an
access road comes in from the north. There is a toilet, a picnic
bench and some interpretive signage. The young couple were having a
short rest, but, social instincts kicked in quickly and as soon as I
had finished perusing the interpretive signs they were off walking
briskly along the track. The main track wraps around the south side
of the peak before heading uphill to the summit through some old
growth rainforest, but, a steeper short cut track heads off about 300
metres from the saddle and allows a circuit of the summit.
The short-cut track is very faint,
unsigned, and is reached about 5 minutes after leaving the saddle. I
encountered the young couple again deliberating at the track
junction. When I said I was going up the steep track and down the
main marked track they decided to do the same. Initially, they were
right on my heels, but, the higher I got the further behind they
lagged, even when I had to backtrack because I had lost the track
momentarily (it is very faint). I, of course, was feeling good now,
as, not only had I overtaken them but I had left them far behind. No
doubt they, particularly the young man, were now suffering from
social angst that I was faster than them. Such is the power of
social instinct. I actually was a wee bit concerned that they would
lose the track so I called down to them a couple of times to make
sure they were still coming up the right way. The summit is only
about 100 metres higher from where you leave the main track so it
does not take long to reach the trig station.
The best view from the track
There really is very little view from
the top, but I sat down, had a drink and chewed on a bit of salami as
I had not had breakfast. The young man wanted to know exactly how
long it had taken me to reach the top and they were off down before
me. Of course, this put me in that awkward situation where I had to
either linger long enough for them to get well ahead of me, or catch
them again on the way down thus rendering another blow to their egos.
I didn't want to linger so I started off and very soon passed both
of them again. This, of course, spurred the young man to speed up
again behind me and I had a passing vision of that annoying track
jostle playing out for the next several kilometres.
I, however, wanted to check out an old
track marked on the map which led out to the higher northwest summit
so I spent about 15 minutes bashing along what might have been a very
overgrown road or might have been nothing, searching for this track.
A note to other people looking for this track, the rainforest track
is not shown correctly on the current topographic map. Although this
was ultimately unsuccessful, it did allow the couple enough time to
escape beyond my orbit.
Granite tors
Once back on the rainforest track, I
spent a little time wandering around the granite tors just off the
main track before starting a rapid downhill trot to my car. Between
the start of the track and the saddle I must have passed at least 50
people hiking up the track. All except the Batemans Bay bushwalking
group who were notable in being as well equipped as I was, were in
various states of distress. The lower I got the more distressed
people looked.
Coming down one section of track I was
quite confronted to see ahead of me a middle aged guy taking a piss
with his wife standing by - right in the middle of the track - which,
given the hordes of people passing by was analogous to standing on
the corner of Pitt and King Street in Sydney taking a slash. My
downhill progress was rapid and could not be halted that quickly, so
I was upon the couple before they had even woken up to my presence.
His wife tried to block my view and the guy shuffled around while I
averted my eyes. With any luck he pissed on his own shoes which
would serve him right for standing in the middle of the track with
his tackle hanging out.
Luckily, I had no more obscene
encounters, and got back to my car three hours after starting out.
The young couple had disappeared, probably into the local pie shop.
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