From Pottery Road 2018

Today Bob is taking us on a walk at the end of Pottery Road, a place we've not been to for about four years.

Weather forecast is for possible showers in the morning, clearing and than cool.

We arrive near the end of the road, parking where there is room for several cars, as there is very little parking space at the end.

We leave the cars and walk up the short distance to the gate. Here we head left through another gate and almost immediately take a track on the right.

Heading off on the first track of the day

This is a hilly area, and we turn off the track heading up through the dry bush.

Going up

A few clouds over Wellington

We reach a fire trail at the top

There are tracks and fire trails everywhere in this area.

Open, dry bush

The track we came up on to the left

Lots of flowers in the bush now

Easy walking

We climb a hill and find a spot for Morning Tea. It gets warm when you keep moving and various articles of clothing have been discarded by now.

Morning Tea

Looking downhill

Tea finished, we move on until we take another track at a junction and start downhill. A walking stick has been left behind by one of the walkers at our Morning Tea spot, so being last, I head back to find it. We find it beside the track and return to find a couple of walkers coming up with a message from Bob. "Wait for the rest of the group where we last were." That caused some more discussion as to the meaning of "where we last were". There is another track leading downhill from where we were standing, and operating on the principal that Bob never walks back along a track if he can make a circle instead, I walk down and soon hear voices from the rest of the group.

We regroup and walk back to our break spot before going off into the bush again. The map at the end will reflect my walking back for the stick, so I will not publish a GPS track of the walk, but the distance should be fairly accurate.

We make our way both on and off track

Glimpse of the River Derwent north of Hobart

Another junction of about five tracks

A flat, grassy area

It's about here that Bob warns us of the steep grade we're going to go down, asking us to be careful as we descend. We're lucky it hasn't been raining as it would be really tricky if wet.

Steep, rough descent

Looking up doesn't really show how steep it was

No one fell, and we walk a short distance before coming upon the old sign shown below.

We head left at the sign, not entering the disposal area

Now we start climbing again on a track that looks popular with mountain bikes.

We reach the top of the track which stops at a closed gate and it's here that we break for lunch.

Lunch in the sun

On the other side of the gate is a sign for the Mt. Stuart Circuit on Knocklofty.

Mt. Wellington behind

Being Spring, lots of little flowers appear, but you have to look carefully as many are very small.

Organ Pipes without cable car

Lunch finished, we set off along another track. Bob has promised us no more hills to climb. We'll see.

We pass through an unlocked gate with a 'Please Close' sign, which we obey.

Through this unlocked gate

Bob has promised no more climbs, but I can see the ground rise just ahead

Another hill

But there is another track leading off to our right and going down, as do we.

As we walk I hear some shouting from up front and make my way up to see an echidna in the field next to the track. Unfortunately, I wasn't quick enough and got my camera focused just as it disappeared into the bracken.

Echidna, what Echidna?

We follow the track between rubbish, beehives and a fenced off vegetable garden and we eventually end up just a few metres from our cars.

We had 15 walkers and covered 7.12km in 3:10hrs. Quite a nice walk, I don't mind walking through dry bush plus it's easy to go off track and there are plenty of tracks and trails to have more walks here.

No GPS track because of differences between my walk and the others, but you can CLICK HERE to view an animated version.

 

Myrtle Forest 2018

Today Bob's leading us on a walk at Myrtle Forest at the back of Collinsvale.

The weather is supposed to be warm to hot in Hobart, so it should be just about right for our walk at the back of the Wellington Range.

After some confusion, we arrive at the car park and set off up the road.

It's not long before we reach our first decision point. The track is closed due to flood damage back in May that hasn't been repaired yet.

Well, the first bridge is o.k. and I'm sure we can overcome any other difficulties so we continue on.

Setting off

Pleasant walk in

Warning

The track isn't too bad, there are a couple of washed out places, but these are easy to negotiate.

Near the beginning of the foot track

First washed out section

We continue on until we reach Myrtle Falls and the lookout platform.

Crossing Myrtle Creek by Peter

Looking down stream

Gail takes a falls photo

Myrtle Forest Falls by Peter

We continue on, climbing up the rocky track until we strike a bit of a problem. The climbing pace has taken it's toll on one of our walkers, leading me to call the front runners back. Bob arrives and decides to change the walk and also we'll divide the group into two. One will continue on the Myrtle Falls Track and climb Collins Cap and the other will climb up the turnoff not far ahead and climb up to the fire trail above.

Our party member feels a lot better after a short rest and our smaller group begins climbing to the Collins Cap Track turnoff. Unfortunately, we keep catching up with the others until we make our break leading to calls for them to hurry up! No more problems climbing this track and we can keep our own pace.

There are a lot of  Richea dracophylla growing here, and many are in flower.

Photo by Peter

Photo by Peter

We reach the top to find Peter waiting for us. He and Wayne take off, heading for the top. I decide to take a walk along the fire trail to see what I can see.

Lunch

 I didn't mention that when we were on the lower track several walkers came down, one with what appeared to be a butterfly net, and made their way through us.

Not chasing butterflies, but spiders as part of some private research. They had permission to do this from the authority and when I walked down the fire trail, I came across their camp.

Spider experts camp

This area is quite open with hills all around.

Collins Bonnet

Collins Cap

 While looking at Collins Cap, I could just make out some small coloured dots, and hear distant voices. I tried taking several photos by guess work as I couldn't make out any detail in the LCD display. One worked out.

Bob with the other group heading up

I actually thought they were coming down as tha'st what the dots appeared to do. Anyway, I enlarged the photo from the 20X to get the picture below.

Not the best quality, but you can recognize yourselves

I returned to the others having lunch in time for the spider hunters return. They were leaving today.

The rest of us start back down the track, heading back to the cars.

Peter has taken several photos of the climb up Collins Cap and these are shown below.

Needle Bush seedpods by Peter

Lichen by Peter

Track to Collins Cap by Peter

Gliophorus Viridis by Peter

Hakea Lissosperma - Needle Bush by Peter

Looking down on Suhr by Peter

Looking towards Mt Field by Peter

Precipitous Bluff in the distance by Peter

Meanwhile, back at our location.

This was all fire blackened the last time I was here

Lichen

Heading down

It would be interesting to see this spot in a few years

The track

Decorated by nature

You don't want to go off track

Back to Myrtle Forest Creek

We arrive at the picnic shelter and find a bloke walking his dog. I remember him from our walk here back in 2014, he owned the land we were walking on.

Happy to talk, and happy to have walkers, he is trying to recreate grass land by planting native grasses to attract the wildlife.

We seemed to agree on just about everything concerning politics and conversation as he walked back to the cars with me.

For those who know, parts for the movie The Nightingale and The Kettering Incident were filmed here. One of his mates nearly ran over the leading lady of one of these productions as she walked along the road.

It was a good walk, short but good. Thanks to Bob for varying it to meet our needs at the time.

I've posted two maps one from my GPS and another I drew up by guessing what track Bob took with the rest of the group.

We had 18 walkers and covered 6-8km depending on which track you followed. None of the usual information due to circumstances.

My guess as to where the other group went

Track from the smaller group