The Not-So-Plain Plains: Part 4

I’ll start with a confession. I am not the speediest of bushwalkers, not only in terms of actual walking pace, but also in terms of how quickly I pack up and get ready to depart. My walking companions refer to this as PFAing (short for the old Aussie slang: Piss Farting Around). It’s the ability to take a long time to get not much done. It’s an under-appreciated skill, and normally I’m accompanied by others who can match me in this (you know who you are!) 

[Waiting for me on a previous walk]

But on this walk, I am the PFAer nonpareil. So, knowing we have an early departure planned for our last day, I choose to play a different game. It goes something like this.

Move 1. Wake up excessively early. Yes, it’s not even 6am; it’s cold and dark, and the forest is dripping. But the rain has stopped. Up you get!

Move 2. Push aside any guilt you feel about ruining the quiet. You can’t wriggle out of a sleeping bag, deflate a sleeping mat, and stuff all your bits and pieces into bags without making an unreasonable amount of noisy rustling.

Move 3.  Go to the kitchen area, and find that water has pooled on the tarp roof. Further ruin the peace by splooshingthe water onto the ground. That’ll be sure to rouse the others from their tents!

Move 4. Forget about normal breakfast. A muesli bar will keep you going. No muesli bar? Never mind, a Snickers Bar or two is the breakfast of champions. And they’re just great with cold water.

Move 5. As the others amble into the kitchen area, greet them cheerfully, then stand up in an obvious way and go off to finish your packing.

Move 6. While the others have whatever they’re having for breakfast (don’t look; don’t envy!) go off into the forest for your toilet time.

Move 7. Your packing done, it’s time to buckle on your pack, lean nonchalantly against a tree, whistling and waiting. Better still, offer to help the others get ready. They probably won’t accept your offer, but you’ll have made your point.

 

In truth I may not have played the game this perfectly on our last morning. But – wonders will never cease – I am actually ready to leave with the others! 

 

That said, if I think that was the hard part, I am soon proven wrong. Tim has a plan, an untested one. Knowing how difficult our scrubby ascent onto the Februaries had been, he’s studied the maps, and thinks a direct descent towards the Wurragarra Creek can’t be worse. 

[Let the scrub bashing begin!]

We’re soon struggling through chest high scoparia and tea tree, and our trust in Tim is faltering. On our way in it had taken us around 90 minutes to get through the scrub. And that was uphill. Surely this couldn’t be worse? The answer to that may seem subjective, but sheer arithmetic must come into it. Yes it’s downhill, but we take over 100 minutes of rough, wet scrub bashing to reach the Wurragarra. I complicate matters by attempting an “alternative” crossing of the creek. When I finally crawl out of the scrub and join the others on the far bank, they’ve been waiting 15 minutes. That’s PFAing of which I’m not proud! I‘ve torn my trousers, have scrub debris down my neck, in my pockets, and through my beard and hair. If this morning’s walk is a game, I doubt even 0.5% of bushwalkers would buy it!

[A blaze on a creek-side pine - click to enlarge]

Tim is still upbeat, and assures us we’re almost out to the Arm River Track. Before that he stops to show us a very old and elaborate blaze on a pencil pine beside the creek. He tells us it’s older than those made by trappers and hunters, but relates to what was once called the Mole Creek Track. The blaze was probably cut in the late 1890s to mark a creek crossing point. It’s likely it was the work of surveyor E.G. Innes and/or his team as they surveyed potential railway routes.

[The scrub thinning, Mt Pillinger behind]

 

[Walking towards Mt Pillinger through coral fern]

By now the scrub has thinned out. Straggly, strangling shrubs give way to carpets of coral fern. It’s low, tough, deep green and makes for easy walking. We swish through the fern percussively, and soon reach the Arm River Track. It feels like a highway after our days of off-track walking, and we are glad of the fast and easy walking. 

[On the Arm River Track at last]

Merran and Libby lead off, and Tim and I bring up the rear. As the women pass a commercial walking group coming up the track, they nod and say hello, but don’t stop for a chat. However they’re sure we will. Not only does Tim love a good chat, but he and Merran’s son works for that walking company. And sure enough, as soon as we meet them we’re conversing with the head guide, whose boss is Tim and Merran’s son. We ask how their clients are coping with this “non-Overland Track” section of the Overland Track; a temporary change brought about by the loss of their second night hut in the February 2025 bushfires. He tells us that some walkers are fine with it, but others find the Arm River Track quite arduous.

[In rainforest on the Arm River Track - photo by Tim]

We wave them off, secretly glad to be going the opposite way. We’re soon delighting in the changing surrounds: now deep rainforest, now open heath. And then we hit the switch-backs, which start to feel never-ending. The constant downhill thumping takes its toll on the soles of our feet. Mine feel hot and on the edge of blistering. But there’s only one way to get this job done. “Soldier on” is a phrase literally made for this kind of persistent plodding. And it gets us there, back to the car in which we’re soon speeding back to Sheffield. There a café lunch together rounds off another great wilderness walk. We are feeling the privilege of being among the “0.5%” of walkers who’ve been where we’ve just been.

[What a privilege to walk in such places!]

 

The Not-So-Plain Plains: Part 1

How do I describe this place? I could try starting with the sound, or the seeming lack of it. Not that the forest is silent. Even in the dead of night there’s a faint thrum. Is it my own blood pulsing, or is it water softly whispering down the slope? The hoarse squeal of a squabbling possum briefly pierces the profound quiet. And when a strong wind arrives, the trees tut and shoosh at the interruption.

[One of the enormous pencil pines in the forest]

Might it be easier to talk about the light? Again I struggle. Even in the daytime the light is so low that an old light meter would scarcely register it. Yet it’s a darkness with shades and flecks, some murky, some hinting at an emerald shimmer. Just occasionally a beam of sunlight struggles through the foliage, only to retreat like a messenger at the wrong address. 

 

Then there’s what I can feel with hands, feet and face. My tent is pitched so close to a moss and lichen-draped tree trunk, that when I clamber out I can’t help but brush its damp softness. I can almost taste forest, unless it’s just its deep, damp-duff, pine-inflected scent.  

 

[Our forest campsite]

All of this might give the impression that I’m experiencing sensory overload. But no, it’s just how it is in a pencil pine forest, the type of forest we might all know and love, were we not so otherwise attuned. The type of forest that is becoming rarer as the decades pass, as heat, drought, neglect and fire take their toll. A fear of that might add to my deeply felt response to the forest. But whatever the rational explanation, this forest is simply one of the most soul-filling places I’ll ever visit.

[Starting on the Arm River Track]

But I should take us back to the start of the day, because places like this are inevitably hard won. And just getting here usually has its own story. I’d previously much enjoyed my two or three trips to the northern part of the February Plains, each time with Tim D. But for all its charms, the area shows many signs of human use and abuse, including intense fires, over-grazing and deforestation. In leading this walk, Tim must have decided it’s time we saw some less impacted parts of the Februaries.

 

We start on the Arm River Track, a formerly quiet track that has slowly become a much frequented short-cut to the centre of the Overland Track at the Pelion Plains. Most recently it’s also become the third day of some commercial trips on the Overland Track, following the loss to wildfire of a (private) hut and some trackwork in February 2025.

[Overland Track mountains, incl Pelion East and Ossa, from the Februaries]

There’s no disguising the uphill trend. We’re soon sweating our way up the long section of switch-backs that take up steeply up towards Lake Price, and our first mountain. Mt Pillinger is something of an outlier; not quite an Overland Track mountain, nor part of the nearby Cathedral Plateau. We cross the bridge over the Wurragarra Creek and pause for lunch in a grassy clearing off to the side of the track. 

[Mt Pillinger peeps out beside the Arm River Track]

[A pause near Lake Price]

Tim has been reassuring Libby that once we’ve left this busy-ish track, we will be heading off-track to the February Plains where, he says, “0.5% of walkers will ever go”. Libby, who’s very fond of remote and un-peopled wilderness, smiles and gives Tim a thumbs up. But as we’re eating lunch, a walker wanders up the Arm River Track. We give a friendly wave, and he comes off the track towards us, presumably just to say a quick hello. 

[Lunch near the Arm River Track]

We soon ask him where he’s headed, and are suitably shocked – and some of us amused – when he says “The February Plains”. We quickly explain why we’ve broken into sudden laughter. We share a bit of information on possible routes, and Ned (not his real name) walks off up-valley towards some formidable looking scrub. Before we’ve packed up from lunch he’s back, having found no way through the tangled bush. He asks if he can join us as we try to find our way up to the plateau. Shortly afterwards Ned must be wondering whether it’s the blind leading the blind, as our own “route” is very rough, steep and scrubby. We push uphill through scarcely yielding scrub for about 90 minutes before the slope finally eases, and the scrub becomes relatively thin. 

[... and the scrub finally yields]

We’ve been on our feet for more than 5 hours, nearly all of it uphill, some of it in gnarly scrub. Keen to find a campsite doesn’t fully express it! As we dump our packs to do a search, Ned says he'll keep walking. He’s wanting to camp as close to Mount Oakleigh as he can. Tim looks over the map with him before we wave “Mr. 0.5%” farewell, and start our own search in the vicinity of a nearby lake, one of the few in this area with a name. 

[Tim and Ned check the map]

After close to an hour, we eventually choose a large, thick pencil pine forest. There is a sunnier, more exposed lake-side camp nearby, but as we’re expecting strong winds in a day or two, we’ve chosen to have a protected campsite for all three nights. And protected it is, as well as hinting at being the above-mentioned soul-filling place. We’ll find that out later, but for now our order of business is simple: stop, set up camp, eat, sleep.

[Sunset and moonrise near our camp]

Walking the February Plains 3: Smurfing

If yesterday’s discoveries were unplanned, today’s will be deliberate - as long as we’re successful. From the cattle droving days of the mid 19^th century, we’re skipping forward more than a century to the final days of the marsupial skin trade. And we’re looking for what’s probably the final hut Basil Steers built. He is often considered the last of the high country snarers in Tasmania. 

 

The hut we’re hunting was built relatively recently, during our own bushwalking days, in 1985. It’s sometimes known as ‘Basil Steers No. 3’, but is universally nick-named ‘Smurf Hut’. Its construction was partly a protest against the government’s 1984 ban on snaring as a method of taking animals. Given that provenance, Basil built the hut in a hard-to-find location, towards one edge of the Februaries. (Honouring that intention, I will not reveal its exact location here.)

[Tim points the way, with Overland Track mountains ahead]

We set off quite early. The sky is predominantly blue, and the day promises to be warm. We by-pass Lake How, heading more or less south towards another lake. I naively assume it’s Lake Steers, which isn’t too far from our destination. It’s looking like a cruisy day. But not for the last time today Tim has to disabuse me of my belief. He points to some far-distant wooded hills, and tells me we’re headed towards them. We by-pass the unnamed lake, but still have to traverse some boggy ground getting across February Creek and its shallow valley.

[February Creek, with Mt Pillinger on the horizon]

Bit by bit we close in on those distant hills. Naggingly persistent feet manage this feat surprisingly well, although often at a cost. For an hour or more we’re high-stepping over knee high grasses and sedges. It’s not difficult walking, but it’s wearing. I’m encouraged when I finally see on Tim’s device that we’re closing in on the red dot marking the hut’s location. All the way I’ve been reassured by the fact that Tim has been to Smurf Hut before – hence the red dot. 

 

What I don’t realise until we enter some gnarly scrub is that Tim has never come to the hut from the northern Februaries. Rather he’s previously approached it from the Arm River/Wurragarra Creek direction. When you’re in bauera, tea tree and scoparia scrub, being told you’re “maybe 200m from the hut” isn’t as comforting as it may sound. After some sweat-inducing wading through said scrub, Tim concedes that we are too far west. We need to back-track. However we’re unable to stomach a complete retreat, so we choose a “tactical withdrawal", going diagonally uphill. 

 

We finally come out of the scrub into a pencil pine forest. This is promising, as Basil Steers and many other trappers/snarers preferred to use pines like these for building huts. Eventually we descend into the dim green of a myrtle rainforest, an even better sign, as Tim’s memory is that Smurf Hut is hidden deep in such a forest. And so it proves, as we eventually clamber down a small cliff, scramble over a series of mossy logs, and find the humble timber hut.

[Smurf Hut, with Tim outside]

Its name has always piqued my curiosity, but as we stoop to enter the hut, it explains itself. Everything about the hut is diminutive: the doorway; the size of the logs stored in the entryway; the height of the ceiling; the three wee bunks. It would be perfect for smurfs*. Indeed Tim and I agree it would be ideal for our friend Jim. Not only does he love a hut, especially one with a fire, but he is also – how shall we put this – a vertically-challenged man. The four foot long bunks would be perfect for him.

[Tim inside the diminutive hut]

We lunch outside the hut, soothed after our exertions by the cool quiet of the forest. After lunch I wander around the hut’s exterior. According to the late historian, Simon Cubit, the hut was never used as a skin shed, and certainly the walls show none of the signs of skins having been nailed there for drying or tanning.

 

We’ve learned lessons from our outward journey, and set off for our home lake via a less scrubby route. Although it’s still a long haul, all of it off-track, I’m pleasantly surprised to get back by mid-afternoon. While Tim soaks his hot feet in the lake I just sit back and enjoy being becalmed. Had we actually been sailing, it would have been a quiet afternoon. 

[Tim cools his feet]

There’s just the occasional puff of wind, and the lake is still enough to reveal one further secret. On the far side we can see the tell-tale ripples of a platypus at work. Occasionally it surfaces, bill, nose and eyes briefly visible before it dives again. I am in awe of these amazing creatures, not least because they’re one of only two egg laying mammals in the world (along with echidnas). I’m also astonished how they’ve managed to occupy this small lake that’s far distant from any other reliable body of water. I once watched a platypus toddle over land, and concluded it was unlikely to set any land speed records. Yet here they are, as they are in so many isolated lakes, tarns and creeks in Tasmania.

[A platypus walking overland]

After dinner I dig out some of my writing and read it aloud to Tim. On this walk, and earlier by phone, we’d been discussing some of my lock-down work about ‘the spirit of bushwalking’. It’s good to read it, albeit to an audience of one. It’s even better to discuss some of the knotty issues with someone who shares my perspective on walking and spirituality. Tim offers some helpful suggestions, and we toss around ideas, agreeing that there will be on-going discussions. I feel encouraged to keep working on it. Being detached from the everyday seems yet again to clear the mind.

 

Gradually the blue day morphs into a dark jewel of an evening, and our honest day’s walk helps sleep to come swiftly. When the light of our final day leaks into our campsite, it reveals a mirror-flat lake, enticing us out for an early start. We have one more item on our agenda: to pick up the trail of cairns from day 2, and see if we can follow the old February Plains Stock Route out.

[It's perfectly calm on our departure day]

After all our years walking together, I should be aware that Tim’s journeys of discovery are rarely short-cuts. But as I’ve also been bitten by the exploration bug, the two of us happily fan out and scan for cairns. We walk far further west than we would otherwise need to, but are rewarded by the discovery of a series of cairns heading north. We follow these to Sardine Creek, near which we find some remnants of droving days. We feel sure that we have indeed been on the old February Plains Stock Route. 

[Another cairn on the February Plains Stock Route]

[Old fencing wire, possibly from the cattle droving days]

But now it’s time to leave off being explorers and head out for a substantial – meaning not dehydrated – lunchtime meal. We cut down valley to pick up the old (locked) road that comes down the west side of the Februaries, close to Basil Steers Huts 1 and 2. We’ve been off track for nearly four days, so it’s strange to be moving fast on a solid surface. By the time we get back to the car, our feet are hot. But soon we’re driving off, and Tim announces a supreme idea. When he gets phone reception, he pulls over to ring his wife Merran. Without him even prompting, she graciously offers to make home-made hamburgers back at their place. Any aches and pains are so quickly eclipsed, that Tim and I do a happy little smurf dance before driving home. 

[A Smurf-blue sky bids us farewell]

* For those who don’t know, smurfs are fictional creatures from the mind of Belgian comic writer “Peyo”. Small, blue and human-like, they live in mushroom-shaped houses in the forest.