Going Solo

[Climbing towards Twilight Tarn]

For many years my simple response to the idea of solo bushwalking was to find reasons not to bushwalk solo. I could name safety concerns; my preference for company; my enjoyment of sharing walking’s pleasures and pains with others. But lurking beneath those reasons was a possibility I didn’t care to acknowledge. Was I afraid of being alone with myself? 

I began to see this as a spiritual challenge. Despite writing at length about the spiritual side of bushwalking, going solo was one aspect of it that I had barely experienced. It became the kind of challenge that I needed to face up to, when the time was right. But when is that? I could always find reasons not to go, burying my unwillingness beneath the busyness of life. Eventually, as the days of spring grew longer and (slightly) warmer, I decided to plan a trip. I would spend a few nights alone near Twilight Tarn in Tasmania’s Mount Field National Park. It was a place I knew, but in an area that also held some worthy challenges. So, on a clear September morning, I put my pack in my car and took off on my first multi-day solo journey. 

 

* * *

 

For much of the first hour of the walk, my monkey mind is swinging from the trees. It’s demanding to know where all the others monkeys have gone; telling me that the strong wind is REALLY worrying; suggesting that the new lightweight pack IS going to be uncomfortable. Okay, I say, in my calmest voice, we’re not used to this. But we will be alright; all will be well. 

 

Henri Nouwen outlined the necessity of this kind of ‘gentle and persistent effort’. In “Reaching Out” he writes: 

 

'To live a spiritual life we must first find the courage to enter into the desert of our loneliness and to change it by gentle and persistent efforts into a garden of solitude. The movement from loneliness to solitude, however, is the beginning of any spiritual life because it is the movement from the restless senses to the restful spirit, from the outward-reaching cravings to the inward-reaching search, from the fearful clinging to the fearless play.'

[Coming or Going?]

 

Right now I feel a long way from fearless play. My soul is still skittish, jumping at shadows that might be snakes, or might be nothing. But I am walking, and that rhythmical movement, even the tiny clank of my metal drinking cup on my pack, helps to settle the monkey. I further distract myself by measuring my walking pace on my sports watch. I set myself the goal of walking at 4km/h, and I fail. But because I’m finding so much to stop and look at, and to photograph, it’s a noble failure. When my botanical friends, especially the buttongrass and pandani, wave their greetings, I must pay my respects.

[Buttongrass near Lake Webster]

 

I am finding a freedom in walking like this, in casting aside schedules, in not having the wishes of others dictate my speed, or lack of it. In one sense, it’s as though the years have peeled away. I’m like a child, free to follow my whims. When I was a small child I was obsessed with running water, and particularly waterfalls. My parents later told me I would coo “oooh, water!” as we drove past anything resembling a waterfall. Apparently I wasn’t always discerning, more than once taking delight in a stormwater drain emptying muddy water into a culvert.

 

On the second day of my walk I climb up to Tarn Shelf to “play” with water. Tarn Shelf is a delightful chain of alpine lakes, tarns and ponds on a rocky shelf suspended between the Rodway Range and a series of lower forest-fringed lakes. As I clamber up towards the first tarn, it’s windy. But above the rush of wind on rock and scrub, I’m sure I hear the roar of running water. Just days before, Tarn Shelf had been coated with snow. Most has now melted, and the meltwater is flowing off the slopes, into then out of the lakes, and down into the valleys.

 

I wander off-track, slowly making my way towards the source of the roaring. For the best part of an hour I high-step through scrub to view a series of delightful cascades coming from the outfall creek of Twisted Tarn. No-one else is there to corroborate whether or not I cry out “oooh, water!”

[Cascade below Twisted Tarn]

 

Tarn Shelf holds many other memories that now rise to mind. I find that when I’m not talking and listening, memory becomes my companion. And now I start thinking of two of my bushwalking mentors, Ken and Ray. Each separately brought me up here in my early days of bushwalking in Tasmania. Ray introduced me to skiing here, and if I was never any good at it, Ray was not to blame! Ken took me a little further afield. On one winter walk we braved deep snow, explored a couple of huts, and spent a cold night in the Lake Newdegate Hut. I must have been exhausted, because I managed to fall asleep while Ken was reading a book to me. He never let me forget it!

[One of the many tarns on Tarn Shelf]

 

Deeper into my solo time, I start thinking on some matters that have been bothering me. That’s part of the reason I’ve come. But what am I supposed to do with what comes up? Years ago I asked Rowland Croucher, a very experienced Christian pastor and writer, what sustained him through all the ups and downs of the spiritual life. Decades later I still remember his succinct answer: ‘Externalise guilt, fear and anxiety’.

 

For years I’ve placed this life practice within the context of confession, whether formal, as in the Roman Catholic tradition, in which confession is a sacrament, or informal. We all have, at some time in our lives, done wrong. Or we’ve failed to do what we knew to be right. It’s beneficial to come clean about these wrongs.

 

[A twisted path near Twisted Tarn]

Similarly we all experience things that deeply trouble us, whether they are caused by known/external factors (fear), or imprecise/internal factors (anxiety). I had always taken Rowland Croucher’s advice to mean that the weight of guilt, fear and anxiety is lessened and lifted by sharing it with appropriate others. “Get it off your chest” might be an over-simplified summary. There’s much more to it than that, including the whole theology of forgiveness. But on this solo walk I’m discovering one other unexpected nuance.  

 

Certainly I have the sense that some of these personal burdens are adding to the weight of my pack. But being on a solo walk, I have no immediate chance of confessing any of this to anyone besides God. And then comes a realisation. Perhaps taking these burdens for a walk is in itself a way of externalising them. By carrying them into the bush with me, I’m literally bringing them out in the open. Out here it’s harder to run from them, and they’ll stay with me until I do some processing. The peace and beauty of my surroundings helps this process. 

 

I’ve set up my small red tent beneath some yellow alpine gums and snow gums. The site is a little above Twilight Tarn, which glistens in the afternoon sun. A yellow-throated honeyeater calls confidently from the branches. At first its singular, rich “chowk” call ricochets through the trees. It follows up with a series of loud, melodious, staccato calls. Somehow its brio gives me confidence, and I start to feel more at peace, at home even.

[My campsite at Twilight Tarn]

 

The small clearing that is my home for now is surrounded by dolerite boulders. They look as though they’re reclining, and after dinner I’m ready to do the same. But as hundreds of midges have found me, I have to retreat to my tent to do so. I know from experience that these sneaky little critters, while giving the impression of just buzzing around your face, will settle and bite. 

 

Once I’m inside the tent, peace returns. I can rest and reflect on my day. I start considering how “taking my guilt, fear and anxiety for a walk” works in practical terms. Firstly I make sure I’m not doing a full inventory of everything that burdens me. That could crush me! Rather I wait to see which issues rise to the top, which are the headline concerns. Then I name them: literally give them a name. For me, of all of the things I might feel guilt about, I’m a little surprised by what comes up. I find I’ve been thinking about an old friendship that has withered, so I call this first burden “guilt about failing to nurture my friendship with X”. After naming it, I simply hold it, turn it in my mind, keeping it at some distance. Yes, in the busyness of mid-life; in being physically distant from my friend; in the aftermath of small misunderstandings, we have drifted apart.

[Richea pandanifolia - detail]

 

I try not to apportion blame during this process, but rather to gently interrogate my feelings. First off I feel gratitude for the years of our friendship, for the things we learned together, the good and hard times we shared. I also feel sadness at the stalling of our friendship, and my part in that. And I probe the complicated possibility of rekindling our relationship, pondering what it might take on both my side and his. There is not necessarily resolution today, certainly not “closure” (how I dislike that overused and inaccurate term!) But perhaps I understand myself and my friend a little better. Guilt among the gumtrees has lost some of its potency. 

[The old hut at Twilight Tarn]

 

There’s another aspect to it, well put by Catholic nun and theologian, Sister Joan Chittister. ‘Once I have felt guilt, I become a softer part of the human race.’ Or to put it in terms of the approach to spirituality I’ve been taking, the inward work can have outward results. A solo trip can be about me, certainly. But it can also be about others. And it can point me towards possibilities such as reconciliation and forgiveness: which have both outward and upward aspects in my spirituality.

 

Apparently there’s still more that wants to rise to the surface. Whether it’s fear or anxiety, I’m not certain, but on the final morning of my walk I stir from sleep well before it’s light. In a half-dream, half-awake state, I hear a bird fluttering. In my mind it’s small and dark, and I name it the bird of death. I’m more curious than afraid, and I ask the bird of death ‘Is it my turn? Have you come for me?’ The bird doesn’t speak, but looks at me with one unblinking eye, and I sense two things. First now is not my time, and second the dark bird is never far away.

 

I’m not troubled by these dream thoughts. They remind me of what my younger sister Liz told me as she was nearing the end of her battle with brain cancer. We are all dying, she said. It’s just that I know the timing. Liz died far too young, at the age of 38. But as a person of faith, she was inpirational to the end. Back in my tent, as I’m pondering these big matters, I remember that today is Liz’s birthday. 

 

Two Ways of Knowing Autumn

[Red phase fagus contrasted against the more common gold] 

One May morning I am walking through the Cascade Gardens wishing I had my camera. The early light through the deciduous trees is highlighting their gold, red and burnished leaves. Around the trunks fallen leaves are piled thickly. The air is still: full of rich, sweet, memory-laden scents. The man resists the boy’s urge to kick and throw the leaves about the garden.

A few mornings later I am walking through the same garden wishing I had my ear muffs. Council workers have driven a truck onto the sloping lawn. There is a huge and noisy machine aboard, with fat hoses – blue and concertinaed – coiling out of it across the lawn. The workers are sucking the garden dry of leaves, raking them into the nozzle of the over-sized vacuum cleaner. There will be no kicking and throwing of leaves today.

* * *

Over the years I have come to imagine that I know autumn. That is I know the chemistry of deciduousness and the role of chlorophyll in leaves. I understand that chlorophyll not only gives leaves their green colouring, but also helps to convert sunlight into sugar. In deciduous trees, as days shorten, that chlorophyll starts to break down and another pigment called anthocyanin starts to predominate. And it’s anthocyanin that gives autumn leaves their colour.

[Brilliant autumn-like colours in snowgum bark are also caused by anthocyanin.]
 

I also know that with shorter days and lower temperatures, the leaves eventually stop taking up any more nutrients. Their on-tree life ends and they fall to the ground, returning precious materials to the soil. That is something of what I “know” about autumn leaves and deciduousness.

[Fagus at Tarn Shelf in Mt Field National Park]

At the same time I’m aware that the German language has two words for “knowing”: wissen and kennen. The first refers to knowledge about something; the second to a familiarity with a person or place. One is more about facts, the other is more about experience. I find this a useful distinction, though not in an “either/or” fashion. Both facts and familiarity, knowledge and experience, contribute to a deeper knowledge of someone or something.

One kennen part of knowing includes that sweet, evocative smell I experienced among the fallen leaves. It is a knowing that dates back to the time I first experienced autumn. It is the sweetness of memory, of familiarity, of deep experience involving all the senses. It adds to my wissen knowledge that the sweetness of the smell is based on the sugars that are being liberated from the fallen leaves in order to feed the next spring growth. Unless, of course, a vacuum cleaner or a troop of small children has cleared them away.

* * *

While most Australians will have to go a long way to gain kennen knowledge of native Australian deciduous trees, Tasmanians have ready access to Nothofagus gunnii, the deciduous beech, popularly known as fagus.

[A collage of fagus photos from Lake Fenton] 

I have reflected elsewhere here on the significance of fagus http://www.naturescribe.com/2010/04/another-side-of-anzac.html Suffice to say it is one of the natural wonders of Tasmania; a phenomenon that never fails to lift my spirit. But this autumn I had only limited opportunity to add to my fagus kennen. Lake Fenton in the Mt Field National Park has probably the most accessible, and lowest altitude, fagus in southern Tasmania: ideal for the time-poor pilgrim.

Around Lake Fenton, in the wet, bleak, thin-soiled boulder fields, is a broad expanse of deciduous beech. For 11 months of the year you would be hard-pressed to find it. Surrounded by eucalypt and pandani woodland, the trees are bare in winter, and green and over-towered in summer. Only for a few weeks in autumn do they glow; a wide, low, golden flame burning through the surrounding green and greys. 

[Fagus dotted through woodland near Lake Fenton]

The best of it is a 10 minute walk from the roadside. We take care on the slippery boulders; pull hats and hoods around us against wind and showers; wait for an abatement in the weather. Despite the conditions, I notice we are smiling the whole time. It may not be the best we have ever seen, but there is still a minor magnificence to it. We pause and gaze for as long as we’ve got. At least we’re certain there will be no vacuum cleaner coming along to interrupt us.

The Omnivore's Delight

Omnivores, whether bears, ravens, dogs or humans, have a dilemma at this time of the year. We have such a glut of fresh food that we don’t quite know what to do with it all.

[Part of the great lettuce glut of 2012] 

We could simply wait: the glut will fade away as quickly as our Tasmanian daylight. While today we have 10 hours of daylight, by the winter solstice in a few weeks time, we will be down to 9 hours. And even then the sun, busy powering the plants of the northern hemisphere, will be giving our food plants scant attention.

Presented with a surplus of food, and a shortening of days, most omnivores have an irresistible urge to do something with their bounty. Some deal with the boom or bust situation by gorging themselves when food is plentiful, and going into torpor or hibernation when it’s scarce. It works well enough for Alaska’s brown bears. Along the Pacific coast of Alaska, the summer glut of salmon is hard to believe. Millions of large, plump salmonids swim into a finite number of streams to spawn. Bears – and humans – literally have to walk over fish to cross a creek or move along a shore.

[Expired Alaskan salmon: just a few of the millions]  

You might expect that bears would gobble down fish indiscriminately. In fact they become quite fussy. When we were in Sitka in south-east Alaska, we came across fish that had small holes in their heads and slits along their bellies, but were otherwise intact. The lumbering bears, perhaps 3 metres tall and with paws the size of dinner plates, had used their claws as delicately as scalpals to remove just the brains and roe, the parts with the highest fat content.

The same fussy eaters would then supplement their fish diet with other plant matter, especially berries. We did likewise when we discovered blueberries growing wild in Sitka’s wet forests. Oh to have that kind of scroggin in our bush!

After their extended feast, brown bears head to their dens for around six months. It’s generally called hibernation, although the bears don’t stay fully asleep. In many cases the females even give birth during the winter, not something any mammal would sleep through. Australia’s eastern pygmy possums, fattened on nectar and insects, favour torpor rather than hibernation, as described in this earlier post.

Another response to surplus is to put food aside in some form so it can be accessed and consumed during the lean times. Butcher birds, woodpeckers and squirrels are among those to “squirrel away” their food. Dogs bury bones as part of the same instinct.

Humans, with their mastery of fire, glass, metals and refrigeration, have a substantial advantage over most omnivores. We can, in truth, store summer in a jar. Or less romantically, in the fridge or freezer. In Alaska many of our friends smoke salmon to preserve it over the winter months. Cured, smoked and salted meats were staples for many centuries prior to refrigeration. They continue to be hugely popular.

[Summer in a jar: chutneys by Lynne]

Our own glut includes tomatoes, lettuce, basil, and parsley. And even though much of our fruit is finished, we’ve also been able to find a few late raspberries and apples. We have no shortage of recipes for tomatoes and apples, especially sauces and chutneys. A few hours work help us to store the ghost of summer in the pantry. While both basil and parsley can be dried for later use, we turn our excess, blended with oil, pine nuts and parmesan, into delightfully tangy pesto.

Lettuce is more problematic. Lettuce pesto doesn’t have a convincing ring to it. Neither will it freeze or dry. Despite our best eating efforts, much of last summer’s crop is either shooting or becoming rabbit food. One friend believes that’s all it’s good for, although I can’t agree with him on that. I will miss the wet crunchy freshness of homegrown lettuce over the next few months.

One bitter-sweet seasonal marker for us is the autumn colouring of Tasmania’s endemic fagus (Nothofagus gunnii). We make our annual pilgrimage to Mt Field’s Tarn Shelf to see its beautiful autumn display. Although the colouring and dropping of leaves tell us that colder, darker times are on their way, I never tire of seeing that flame lick across the high slopes. The colouring seems an act of both retreat and triumph.

[Fagus lights up the Tarn Shelf in Mt Field National Park] 

On our way home we happen across the last of the season’s fresh raspberries for sale in Westerway. At home a handful of late berries struggles to redden, but at the berry farm they have just enough to sell by the punnet. Back in our kitchen I combine fresh and frozen raspberries and sylvan berries, and cook up a large pan of hybrid red berry jam.

I know that in the depths of winter a spoonful of that jam will bring a summer smile to my soul. Although it’s highly doubtful I need delay sampling it until winter.

Snowed Under

[walkers head towards Mt Field East, a light 21st century dusting of snow on the gound]

One winter, nearly 31 years ago, something very unusual happened in Mt Field National Park in southern Tasmania. The night of Friday August 10th 1979 saw more than a metre of snow fall on its mountains. Driven by a freezing south-westerly wind, the snow smothered the park from low levels to the heights of Mt Mawson, changing the shape, sound and look of the mountains entirely.


Skiers keen to spend their Saturday taking advantage of this amazing snow cover – one John Davis among them – must have rubbed their mittens in anticipation. With the whole area skiable, many skiers were ascending and descending the slopes when, without warning, a snow cornice above the Golden Stairs collapsed. John Davis and some other skiers were trapped beneath. While the others were rescued, John remained buried in the snow and died. His was the first death by avalanche recorded in Tasmania: a grisly and unwanted statistic that is unlikely to be added to, given climate change and the kinds of snow seasons Tasmania has experienced this century.


My first year in Tasmania was the year after this tragic death. Every visitor to the ski-field was told the story, and most had a grim desire to see the site. I was among those who gingerly climbed the Golden Stairs in snow, subsequently skiing cross-country towards Mt Field West. But from the mid 1980s onwards, skiing at Mt Mawson was starting to become a hit-and-miss affair. And this century not many winters have seen a good ski season.


I returned to the area earlier this July, enjoying an icy excursion into the highlands, ‘though not via the Golden Stairs. Like the gaping jaws of Sydney’s Luna Park after the ghost train tragedy, the “stairs” have a sad taint. The route is now closed.


While it was cold wandering over to Tarn Shelf – this was July after all – there was barely enough snow for a miniature snowman. The visit confirmed that I’d never invest in ski gear for use in Tasmania. It also had me reflecting afresh on John Davis’ dreadful luck.

New Zealand is another matter altogether. While their glaciers are shrinking, skiing is alive and well. And avalanches still manage to claim many lives every year. Even in late spring, trampers on many of Aotearoa’s mountainous tracks are advised to check avalanche forecasts. In some places bridges and other infrastructure are removed over winter to prevent them being swept away by avalanche.

[walking through an avalanche prone area on NZ's Routeburn Track ... and it's almost summer!]

It is sobering to walk through an avalanche zone, especially when Kiwis tell you with a smile that a football sized snow-ball at terminal velocity will take your head off. “But the good thing is, you won’t hear it coming” one added, with typically dry gallows humour.