The Overland Track with all the Classic Side Trips mission was born out of Kylie’s 50th birthday project – 50 Mountain Marathons in 50 Consecutive Weeks which ran until August 2024. With work and life in general preventing marathons in some weeks, it was inevitable that attention turned to missions that could deliver multiple marathons in a week, sometimes even on consecutive days.
DAY ONE
Climbing past Crater
Lake at sunrise
Our first attempt was lined up for mid-June where a gap in
work commitments lined up with a great big, slow-moving high pressure
system. Frosty nights and cool clear
sunny days for over a week! All went
well with an early morning Ronny Creek departure landing us on the Cradle
Plateau just after sunrise. At Marions
Lookout we excitedly donned our micro-spikes and carefully but, perhaps, a
little too confidently trotted down the first ice-covered section of
track. What could possibly go wrong?
Matching skid marks in the ice – how romantic!
Aaarrggghhhh!!!! Sure
enough, on the same downward slope at exactly the same time, our
over-confidence and cockiness resulted in a most ungraceful body slam onto a
thick sheet of ice-covered track. Amid
the laughter and admiration of each other’s respective gouges in the ice we
also realised Kylie’s shoulder was totally dislocated. Oops!
Kylie was the epitome of nonchalance as she leaned over and
popped the shoulder back in. There we
go. Let’s continue – carefully! The aufeis (Google it!) soon gave way to
frosty boardwalk which allowed fast running thanks to the low-tech but highly
effective chicken wire covering. Running
fast along a mountain plateau in weirdly still, sub-zero air is utterly
euphoric.
On our way to the top of Cradle, strangely dry boulders
protruded between patches of snow. Dry
dolerite is super grippy and a delight to move over. Despite this, Kylie’s progress was
uncharacteristically slow and it was clear an “all side trips” mission was
looking unlikely. Near the top, Kylie
implemented a classic wilderness first aid improvisation, directing me to
immobilise her bad arm by strapping it into the waist belt of the fast
pack. This allowed us to cautiously pick
our way back down from the summit and zip along to the Barn Bluff turn-off
where Kylie graciously invited me to scoot up Barny alone while she
contemplated how the rest of the trip would pan out.
Kylie’s shoulder immobilisation
solution
At this point I should explain our all-side-trips mission. The key issue was which side-trips to include and which to leave out. We settled on the official Overland Track website which documents side trips to Cradle Mountain, Barn Bluff, Lake Will, Forth Valley Lookout, Old Pelion Hut, Mounts Oakleigh, Ossa & Pelion East, D’Alton, Fergusson & Hartnett Falls and Pine Valley Hut. In total this makes up around 125 kilometres of trail with 5700m of vertical gain.
View from Barn Bluff back along the
Cirques to Cradle Mountain
Like Cradle, the Barn Bluff scramble featured super-dry
rocks making it easy to avoid the snow patches.
Back on the main track we needed to at least make it to Windermere to
keep the through trip alive. I was quite
relieved to find Kylie stopped at Waterfall Valley where a very short
conversation resulted in us staying the night there and saving our side trips
mission for another time. Little did I
know how quickly that next opportunity would arise!
DAY TWO
Barn Bluff sunrise
Lakes Crater Lilla and Dove from
Crater Peak
The following morning we tackled the icy climb back to
Cradle Cirque together before I scooted ahead to take a short detour out via
Crater Peak. At the bottom of the Horse
Track I turned right and met Kylie near Crater Lake so we could finish our
mission together. That evening we had a
stunning drive down the West Coast with a super sunset and moonrise at
Queenstown.
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