Mountain Goats near our objective

Tuesday 15 August: Orroral Ridge of Stone revisited – M-L/M-R,ptX. Drive via the Honeysuckle Creek camping ground to the car park on the Orroral ridge. If the gate is not open, add an additional 10km round trip on fire trail. First, visit The Belfry and investigate the cairned footpad near it which heads down off the crest. Then, using the footpad along the ridge, with forays into the rampant regrowth and granite tors, follow the stages of geocache GC4QN1H Workout203. Find GC21HAX 300 Spartans. Walk beneath the granite of the Trojan Wall to nab geocache GCJ163 Lego Land with huge views down over the Orroral valley. Around 12km and 500m climb. Short bursts of thick scrub and rock scrambling. If there is any juice left in the tank after that, a 4km and 200m climb return trip down an old road alignment (now a footpad) for geocache GC2CB2P Forgotten Road. Maps: Corin Dam and Williamsdale. Leader: John Evans 0417 436 877 john@johnevans.id.au . Transport: ∼$10 per person.

Further Information

I last walked the ‘forgotten road’ on 8 Jul 08.

Summary

Distance: 8.8+4.5=13.3km | Climb: 310+200=510m | Time: 8.35am – 1.30pm (4hrs 55mins), including 40 mins of breaks + 1.45pm – 3.30pm (1hr 45mins) | Grading: M/M-R; M(11)

Photographs

Photographs are available, where you can start a large sized slideshow.

Waypoint and Track Files

Download the .gpx file. (Right click, Save Link As…, Save – if you want to use it.)
To use in Google Earth, do File, Open… and select Gps or All files as the File Type.

Track Notes

I thought we were in for a wet when I looked at the weather at 6.30am, but we escaped with all but a few moments of misty shower in the morning. A bit windy on the Orroral Ridge, The sun peeked out in the early afternoon.

The fire trail gate was open at the Honeysuckle camp ground, so we were able to drive all the way up to the collimation tower (Tower Rocks) car park.

Now, on previous occasions, I’ve unintentionally led a party to the same spot twice on a walk 🙄 . Today I had to do it intentionally.

Walk 1

We first went to the posted coordinates of GC4QN1H Workout203. None of us could find the cache of equipment 😳 .

So we set off along the ridge footpad to the NW and had a look for geocache 300 Spartans. Now, I’d previously found it and went straight to the spot. Nothing there. Roger had the same location. But later at home he checked the cache entry on the web and found that it had been moved. Pays to have updated information!

We continued on to visit GCJ163 Lego Land, which Roger logged. He looked fetching in the associated clothing. More importantly, I earned a return visit led by Roger to the caches above Blue Gum Creek. I carked on the last trip 23 Sep 14.

On the way back we visited the Legoland cave and had a look from the nearby balcony. Always great views.

So back to the car and morning tea. We decided to have another look for the equipment cache for GC4QN1H Workout203. Lo and behold, we found it. Only trouble was that the next waypoint for this multi was back NW along the ridge, where we’d just returned from!

So we went back, having great fun finding the intermediate waypoints, each revealing the location of the next. Lucky at WP3 – I had my foot on it as I scrambled up and over and Roger spotted it. WP4 yielded its information relatively quickly after a circumnavigation of the boulder. A combined effort of magnet and stick. WP5 was a quick find. The final GZ certainly was a workout, with muggle mountain goats retrieving the prize for us. Of course the published waypoints and track have been doctored so as not to reveal certain locations.

Lunch beside an open creek bed. A footpad returned us to the ridge top. And so back to the car. 8.8km, 310m climb, 4hrs 55mins (including 40 mins of breaks).

Now 1.30pm. I sacrificed my exploration of the footpad near the Belfry and we drove down to park on the verge of Apollo Rd.

Walk 2

This involved following the waypoints and collecting the clues for GC2CB2P Forgotten Road. A nice stroll down the benched old road (now a footpad). A bit of a climb up through Bursaria for Lookout #1. Severe erosion beside the footpad lower down. A quick find at the last waypoint. Calculation done, we returned towards the car and logged the cache at the final GZ. Of course the published waypoints and track have been doctored so as not to reveal certain locations.

Thanks for your forbearance folks!

Track Maps

Track W1

Track W2

Party

5 walkers – Mark B, Roger E, Kim H, Ming L, me.