2014 - Falls Creek to Eskdale Spur via Mt Bogong

 In 2014 we decided to have a crack at going up Quartz Ridge to Mt Bogong - so we wrapped a trip around this idea. Departing from Falls Creek, up to Mt Nelse and the Spion Kopje, up and down and up and down the Grey Hills to Mt Arthur, then down to Bogong Creek Saddle, up Quartz Ridge, onto Hooker Plateau, over to Mt Bogong, down to Cleve Cole hut and then out via Eskdale Spur.

The weather was unbelievably good.

This trip was the brain child of Pierre with the central notion of wanting to go up Quartz Ridge to Mt Bogong. With a bit of planning we arrived at a fairly good trip plan and the usual logistics commenced. Greg doing the trip planning, JayBee doing the menu planning, Pierre, Cam and Chis doing what ever else required doing. A major concern before we got underway was the smell of the Shellite, a new manufacturer and a new smell, would it work in our MSRs, would it work at altitude, would it work in the cold. Greg checked out if it would work in the MSRs, the rest was up to fate. After all it was still shellite and unsurprisingly it did work at altitude and in the cold - it just smelt different. 

We took some great photos during the trip. here are 361 of them. So sit back and enjoy them. Looking back at these photos we had fantastic weather - so good infact that we camped at the top of Bogong - right next to the cairn and most days were t-shirt days.

We completed the car shuffle on the Saturday before retiring into a couple of beers and a fine meal at a restaurant called Rios. The food was lovely with a good wine and beer selection. One car was left at Camp Creek Gap and the other was to be left at the Mt Beauty bus station. We caught the bus service up the mountain to Windy Point which was a great idea of Pierre's and did save us quite a bit of time at the end of the trip. It also saved us a bit of money.

We were ready for our trip. Sunday morning we were up early and off to the bus stop. We wanted to get a 9am bus up the mountain, the first one for the day. It was funny seeing a poor teenage girls texting with her nose as her hands were obviously too cold as she had them in the bus. Talk about being desperate to txt. We met a fellow x country skier - Karl who was off by himself for a few days. His plan was to go to Johnston's hut then he would make it up as he went.

We arrived at the Falls Creek car park at about 10am, a bit of mucking around doing final gear checks, rugging up as it was raining, and then finding a friendly driver to take us to Wind Corner. At about 11am we were off crossing Rocky Valley dam wall making our way to Heathy Spur track. We had to stop along the way as Cam's feet were giving him serious grief threatening his ability to continue the trip. He patched himself up and we continued on to Edmondson's Hut, much earlier than we had planned, but as it turned out provided an excellent setup for the rest of the trip.

Near the corner of Heathy Spur rack and the Mt Nelse Track we met up with Karl again as well as a bunch of Rovers who were on their way back to the Bogong Rover chalet from Johnston's hut. These rovers were from NSW.

At Edmondson's Hut we had lunch and re-worked Cam's insoles in his ski boots, the improvisation provided relief to his already damaged feet but crucially allowed Cam to continue the trip. We had a great night at Edmondson's hut. The hut provided great shelter from the weather as rain, sleet and sago blew in wave after wave.

The weather for the next day held more promise so with this thought we settled down for the night.

We woke up early to what was a bright and sunny day in stark contrast to the day before. A good breakfast, obligatory coffee and a quick tidy up in the hut and we were off. The snow was somewhat icy and traction hard to get, so we decided to walk up to the Mt Nelse Track. Greg having purchased some half skins was keen to try them out so he skied up as the rest of us walked. Once on the track we all donned our skis and took off. During the morning we saw a couple of foxes looking for something to eat in the distance. These creatures are a real scourge and by the looks of the fox scats that we later found looked to be well feed - our poor native wildlife.

We made our way up to the turn off to Spion Kopje and turned off to the left. We were treated to some great skiing on slightly softened snow. Finding a convenient rock we settled down to have morning tea.

We made our way to the turn off to the Grey Hills track. We dumped our packs and pulled out what we needed for lunch. Packing these supplies into a small day pack we took off to Spion Kopje knob at the very end of the plateau. We found a sheltered place out of the wind behind some rocks offering great views down to Fall Creek village, rocky valley dam and immediately in-front of us, Mt Fainter. We had a great lunch, but the weather seemed to have an ominous feel to it as clouds began to build. We had a fast ski back to our packs. We got our wind proof jackets out and headed down the Grey Hills track. Our proposed campsite was a place called Crows Nest, a tiny flat spot and highly exposed. Given he wind that blew in later that evening it was a good thing to push on further into the Grey Hills. In the second saddle we found a site that looked like a great camp site. We set up camp and enjoyed a lovely sunset. Before evening set in we received a nasty dumping of sago that sent us scurrying for cover in our tents. With the cloud burst past we got out of our tents and prepared for dinner. Cam dug in the camp kitchen - soon we were having a hot cup-a-soup. Dinner was not overly complicated and soon over. Dessert, a hot chocolate then off to bed - at about 7.30pm. Such ragers.

After what seemed like sleeping in a turbine room, from the wind that was blasting through the sky above us but only causing slight flapping of the tent during the night we woke to a cold morning, but not enough to freeze the snow. Our skis bit into the snow providing good traction so we decided to ski the Grey Hills pretty much all the way to Mt Arthur and then a lovely ski down through the trees. he Grey Hills looked really peculiar. On one side a line of dead tree just off the ridge line and snow on the other side. The fires would have killed off the trees but the bare side was a bot of a mystery. The day was gorgeous once again and t-shirt weather. Lovely lunch at the bottom of the Grey Hills before climbing upto Little Arthur and then Mt Arthur. JayBee and Chis tried a short cut to the ridge line that was to take us down to Bogong Creek Saddle, however ducked down a couple of ridges too early and had to climb back up to complete the ski across to the top of Mt Arthur before selecting the correct ridge down.

The walk down the ridge was fine, however the plastic boots punish the toes. We arrived at a our camp site - the helipad, and were privileged to a spectacular sunset.

The water was from the start of Big River, not very big at the start, but just refreshing and clear, the walk to the river was just a short stroll down the hill. The campsite an the map is shaded so probably OK in summer, but would have been cold and damp for our stay.

 We woke upto a very cold morning. Lots of frost on the tents and on the ground. Clear skies and what looked to be a great day for gong up Quartz Ridge. After breakfast we loaded our skis into our packs and walked down to the start of Quartz Ridge. After registering our intentions in the the book we started our gentle climb up Quartz Ridge taking care not to miss the turn off for Quartz Ridge. Missing the sign post would have seen us walk down to Cain Hut which would not have been particularly helpful. 

We walked for a few kilometers before hitting enough snow to don our skis and to start the slow climb up. he weather was just totally brilliant and yet another day of wearing a t-shirt. The climb up was pretty uneventful. We stopped for lunch just below Quartz Knob and enjoyed great views of Mt Bogong to the north, the gullies to the east and the a rugged drop off to the west. After lunch we decided to walk up the remaining distance to Quartz Knob. The consequences of a slip and a fall would have been dramatic. We checked the weather forecast for the evening - light winds, clear skies etc etc so the decision was made that we would setup camp on Mt Bogong. Not all party members were comfortable with this decision.

We donned skis just after Quartz knob and headed along Hooker Plateau to Mt Bogong. We arrived at the summit at about 3.30pm and started to setup camp. A previous group - as it turned out a group of police who were engage in a rescue - had camped there a few days before. We dug the area a bit more and expanded it to accommodate 3 tents. The breeze was a steady southerly so we setup our kitchen on the northern side of the cairn.

We had a beautiful night on the summit with clear skies, a small crescent moon and once again a spectacular sunset. Dinner was had, washing up and off to bed. 

The wind blew steadily all night, the fact that we had dug in the tents a bit made our sleep much easier - the walls on the southern side of the tents providing and deflecting the wind from our tents . There was no great rush to get out of bed and going as it was cold and windy. A late breakfast at about 9am sort of set the tone for the day. We only had about 4km to travel to Cleve Cole hut so there was no rush.

The snow was pretty icy which required care to avoid slipping and falling. Once again the sun was out and the weather great. As we were packing up our tents we saw the first people that we had seen for a couple of days. They were walking to the summit, having come up Eskdale spur in the morning they were out for a day snow boarding and gully skiing. A great day for that. Having had breakfast and packed our camp site we stuck on our crampons and walked off the summit through Hells Gap and onto the pole line to Cleve Cole Hut. We met a group that were off skiing for the day. They were a bunch of Ski Instructors from Mt Buller, clearly they had forgotten that Movember happens in November, not August. These guys were up for a mates 30th and had decided that mustaches were the go. They let us know that one of their party had a buggered knee and the other had Ebola or some sort of gastro bug. 

We arrived at Cleve Cole and meet the person with the buggered knee, I asked her where her mustache was and so she showed me - I was not quite sure what I was going to see until she pulled a falsely from her pocket. We also meet the Ebola case who had a mo as well. Again t-shirt weather. We setup camp, had lunch and then went off to ski gullies.

Another group of people arrived whilst we were having lunch, a group of three snow shoers. It turned out that one of them was practicing for a trip in the new year up Aconcagua in Argentina. We asked them how they got into the snow shoeing and ski touring. The guy who wanted to climb Aconcagua was a scout and the other two were friends that he had managed to inspire to try the outdoors and they did have the bug. 

Chis just wanted to ski and did a few runs before being joined by JayBee. We proceeded to climb to the top of the ridge above Cleve Cole and then did a massive series of 8's all the way down to the bottom. Seeing it was sooooooooo much fun we did it all over again, before we were joined by Cam, Pierre and Mr Bean. We skied down Camp Gully and just had a generally just a great day, practicing telemark turns and dodging trees and creeks. The afternoon was really brilliant. We reluctantly headed back to Cleave Cole as the shadows started to grow longer.

We had afternoon tea, then Cam dug in our kitchen. The group of people for the 30th had headed up earlier to the ridge line above Cleve Cole for a sunset celebration, some champagne and cheese cake. They returned when t was well and truly dark skiing and lighting their way with head torches. It looked really good as they come down the slope head torches on and a slow ski down.

A quite nights sleep.

Another glorious morning - t shirt weather again. After breakfast we packed up and had one last look around as we all knew that this was the last day of the trip. We made good time to Hells Gap. We met up with the three snow shoers - they wee off to practice self arrest on the event of a slide down a icy slope - they had their ice axes but I suspect that he snow was too soft for them.

We dumped our packs at Hells Gap and and did some skiing for an hour or so. We had a good look at where we were heading off the mountain onto a platform at the top of Eskdale Spur. We carefully sidled down to the platform as a fall would be massively inconvenient but not overly dangerous. As we were having lunch I noticed a guy blasting down from the top of the turn off from the pole line, next he was at Hells Gap, then on the platform and then shooting off down the path to Michelle Hut. He was a very accomplished skier.

As we were having lunch several groups were climbing up Eskdale on to Cleve Cole hut for the week end. Our trip was ending and theirs was beginning.

We met a group at Michelle hut - the same vintage as us and from Surrey Thomas Rovers. They had a typical ex Rover supply kit, at least a 2 liter cask of port.

This trip cemented in a couple of things for me - one was that a lot of the people that we have met of these trips got a taste of the outdoors from Scouting and two that the biggest challenge for people who do these outdoorsy things is that they struggle to find people who they can do these things with. We are really a very luck group of mates.

The walk down from Michelle's hut just punished our toes and it was a great relief to get to the bottom and get those boots off.