Category: Day Walks

Chickens legs for lunch, it’s no KFC

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In a previous post I wrote about my  once in a lifetime experience with the Great Wall of China, a childhood dreaming. At the conclusion of the walk we pushed further north within 300km of the Mongolian border to a little village for lunch, all part of the tour.

It was close to Chinese New Year and there were signs of the impending festivities everywhere making great photo opportunities of the celebration preparations. zig zagging our way through the cars, people and bikes it was becoming very apparent I was no longer in “touristville” and somehow had become the attraction. It didn’t help I was in a  private vehicle, sitting in the back like I was being chauffeured. I guess I was.

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Great Wall of China, a childhood dreaming

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During the 70’s in the remote Northern Territory we had only the ABC, the government funded Australian Broadcasting Corporation to deliver us the news, soaps and educational viewing. As the 80’s dawned we started to receive commercial television courtesy of a set of videos flown in from Darwin and replayed locally. The news was a day or two late and so was the weather. Aside from these anomalies it opened up a whole new viewing experience and one of the programs that captured my imagination was The World Around Us.

It inspired a generation to explore our environment, with spectacular footage of the some of the most amazing places on earth. In one such episode the host adventurer was exploring the Great Wall of China. I was captivated by the history, the construction and most of all the environment, towering steep mountains and narrow ridge lines. I dreamt of walking it myself, stepping on its ancient stones and hearing the distinct music of China as I moved across the landscape.

It was just a pipe dream and I didn’t truly expect I would ever visit the far flung communist nation, but I could imagine. There were many documentaries throughout my teenage years that explored the Great Wall of China experience and I remained captivated by it.

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Mt Baw Baw, finding the one

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You might recall an innocuous line in a previous post that went something like this, “With my temp gauge proudly hanging in a tree, it does little to comfort us that the day is indeed warming, stubbornly staying below the 5C mark.” if not you can read it here Mt Baw Baw snow, look don’t touch.

Well that one line set up a year’s expedition to recover a little piece of plastic that had far more sentimental value that it could ever have monetary value, let me explain.

At the conclusion of our first and very successful snow camp at Mt Baw Baw, I inadvertently forgot to collect my temp gauge out of the tree and didn’t realise this oversight until we were off the mountain and unpacking in the days following.

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I need a miracle, that’s what I need

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Do you believe in miracles? I do, but I cannot explain them, something that as a science graduate many years ago, frustrates me in my curious pursuit of how things work.

I guess I should start by explaining what I mean by miracles, I’m talking irrefutable, creative miracles, ones that science can substantiate, cancer disappearing, blind seeing or in my case, bone that had disintegrated growing.

Why am I writing about this in a hiking blog? Well because inevitably on a long walk the subject of injuries comes up and someone always asks have you broken any bones, one such occasion happened this past week.

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Mt Imlay, slippery when wet

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The whales had been breaching all morning and it was one of the most spectacular sites I have ever witnessed. Right in front of our boat a humpback broke the surface with all but the tail out, an incredible site watching this behemoth of the ocean powerfully but gracefully at ease it in its playground. As the boat manoeuvred off the coast of Eden in the Two Fold Bay area there was another behemoth on the horizon that kept catching my eye, Mt Imlay.

Right in front of our boat
Mt Imlay from Twofold Bay
Breaching again

Mt Imlay at 900m cuts an imposing figure on the southern New South Wales coast as it sits proudly within the Mt Imlay National Park. 387km from Sydney and 30 minutes from Eden, it is also accessible from Melbourne (7hrs) on the Princes Highway.

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Sugarloaf Peak, into the Fear

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Walked May 19, 2012

In my mid teens I had a series of accidents on pushbikes that resulted in broken legs and an arduous recovery of which I would not want to repeat. It built a fear of falling striking back to the pain suffered in the accidents and associated recovery. As a result exposed heights and even the thought of them bring on sweaty palms and the chills.

It hasn’t stopped me doing many of the walks I love, but it has started to constrain me from adventuring into some of the more stunning (read mountainous) areas waiting to be explored, one of them being Sugarloaf in the Cathedral Ranges

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