The upside of lots of rain

Posted on January 6, 2021 by marilyn

MANGROVE MOUNTAIN – 6 January 2021
After almost 2 weeks of off and on rain (about 60mm at Mangrove Mountain), it seemed like a good time to check out one of our local waterfalls.  The goal was to practice some of our (newly learned) SRT skills for white water abseiling – albeit not to the level of the BIG waterfalls, but we were intending to start out small sort of like dipping your toe into the deep end!  Trish, Alissa, Brad and Jim joined me and we could see a window in the forecast where there wouldn’t be any rain!  Continue reading →

Posted in Abseiling, Bushwalking, Canyoning | Leave a comment

I’d really like to lead a trip where everything goes according to plan!

Posted on December 31, 2020 by marilyn

BLUE MOUNTAINS NP – 27 December 2020 – 3 January 2021
It was supposed to be an epic 8 day trip!  But, over the course of 5 days, there were endless reassessments and we went all the way from Plan A, to Plan I – reducing the trip to 5 days walking.  Given the 7 day weather forecast when we started, this shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone! Continue reading →

Posted in Abseiling, Bushwalking, Canyoning, MSS | 8 Comments

Extreme Sea Caves

Posted on December 15, 2020 by marilyn

MUNMORAH SRA – 15 December 2020
You can plan for every contingency, and then a massive low over the East Coast of Australia causes very high swells, virtually negating the .18m low tide predicted.  The whole trip was planned around this very low tide at 4.20pm and there was a bloody 1m swell!  And if that wasn’t bad enough, it was overcast with low visibility so the photos don’t even look any good!  It was an adventure though. Continue reading →

Posted in Bushwalking, BWOC, MSS | 6 Comments

The bushwalking gods were smiling down on us

Posted on December 13, 2020 by marilyn

COLO WILDERNESS – Drip Rock Fire Trail – 13 December 2020
When you drive to a gated fire trail, that you know from past experience is locked, but rumour has it that it’s open, and you find that yes, it’s indeed open, you know that the universe is with you.  And you’ve just been saved from walking a 22k round trip. Continue reading →

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Three wounded knees in one day

Posted on December 12, 2020 by marilyn

COLO WILDERNESS – Wounded Knee Canyon 12 December 2020
The goal of the day was to do this canyon in one day.  Most people (including me) have done the canyon as an overnight trip.  I’d suspected that it could be done in a day, if you started early and did it in the summer months when there were more daylight hours.  And then a month before our trip, I found out that (bloody) Kent had already done it as a day trip! I was a bit disappointed that we weren’t the first to do so, but what the hell, it was still a great trip Continue reading →

Posted in Abseiling, Canyoning, MSS | 4 Comments