Taking a Question for a Walk

“How much longer do you think you’ll be overnight bushwalking?” 

That question comes as two bushwalkers with a long, shared history sit in the back of a car on the way to Lake Mackenzie, in Tasmania’s Central Highlands. They’re both in their 70s, so it isn’t a purely idle question. Few of us get to our 70s unscathed. We often have bodily issues – inside and out – that start to impinge on our physical capabilities. 

A case in point: one month ago, with two younger bushwalking friends, they had travelled up from Hobart to Mole Creek. They’d planned to stay overnight in the hotel then drive up to Lake Mackenzie for a three day bushwalk in the Blue Peaks area. But overnight one of them had become quite ill. The walk had to end before it had even begun. 

Fast forward to the March Long Weekend. The same four; the same plan. Blue Peaks: Take Two. The night at the hotel was very pleasant. They’d eaten well, then chatted and relaxed around the fire pot as a perfect day slipped gently towards evening. 

[Take Two: Enjoying the fire pit at Mole Creek Hotel]

Next morning their plan was to leave around 9, but they’d surprised themselves by being ready early. The other two in the party had never been to the Blue Peaks, and this was to be their introduction. The pair of older gentlemen had been exploring the area for over a decade. For them this was to be a fond return, a gentle exploration rather than an expedition. Still, a walk doesn’t walk itself, nor does a hill climb itself. So, after leaving the car at Lake Mackenzie, there was a degree of puffing uphill from the lake. They’d told the others there wasn’t much of a climb, but one of their watches declared that they may have bent the truth. The ascent was actually around 200m over a few kilometres; not a big climb, but enough to tell out-of-tune bodies that they’d been working. 

[Uphill from Lake Mackenzie]

That, sadly, fitted with the out-of-tune landscape. Damage from the 2016 bushfires that had ravaged this area was still plain to see. Saddest to witness were those plant species that were not recovering, especially pencil pines, sphagnum and some scoparia. In one valley a whole grove of pines had been all-but wiped out. But in the next valley, a similar grove was fully intact. The group paused at both to take in the stark contrast. * 

[Pencil Pines: Fire killed (above) cf Thriving]

The mild challenge of the walk continued when one member of the party misjudged a creek crossing, and fell face-first into ground that was not as soft as they had imagined. Despite a degree of pain and lost dignity, the victim allowed some candid photographs before full composure had been regained. 

[Ooops! A slip and a fall ...]

After a bit over 2 and a half hours, the group reached the campsite, and gladly threw down their packs in a small, hospitable grove of pencil pines. It was good to be back among these familiar pines, breathing their air, taking in a wider scene that’s graced with lakes near and far. And beyond that with mountains, mountains where their feet had been. A fresh breeze swirled around, mainly from the west, so tent sites were chosen with care. Then it was time for lunch, followed by the mandatory water collection. Work done, and muscles whinging a little, it was time for some relaxation. Truth be told, there may even have been some horizontal resting in tents, away from the mosquitoes that had begun to locate their targets. 

[The view from the Campsite]

Late afternoon, mosquitoes or not, the call of happy hour – with wine, cheese and other delicacies – couldn’t be ignored. They sat in a grassy area around a rock slab that served as their table. It was a beautiful spot to take in the expansive vista across lakes and mountains. And above that the evening sky was beginning to get ready for its daily sunset display. But before that, back in the pine-sheltered kitchen area, meals had to be cooked, compared and consumed. As they sat back replete, the chatter indicated that the two who were new to the area were warming to this much-favoured destination. 

After dinner one member of the party had unaccountably restless legs, and decided to go for an after-dinner walk. No-one else was keen to add more miles to their day’s tally, so he wandered solo down to the neighbouring lake, then along its shore. The water was low, the "tide" out. Perhaps that accounted for the absence of the swans that normally settled overnight on the lake.

[Lakeside scene a few hundred metres from Camp]

The small details of the Central Plateau are one of its lesser-known gems. For instance: golden mountain rocket. He’d been here before with his wife, and they’d delighted in finding golden seed heads in place of the expected red ones on a few mountain rocket plants. A botanist had told them this was rare, but not unknown. And now, as he ambled along the lake, he was finding more golden variants, albeit far outnumbered by the red version. But the sun was lowering, and it was time to return “home” for the sunset show. 

[The Usual Red Seed Heads on Mountain Rocket]

[Golden Seed Heads on Mountain Rocket]

Back at camp, he found the two "newbies" had already headed tent-ward. So, it was only the two stalwarts who braved the growing cold to watch this ever-new, ever-changing show on the widest of widescreens. A neat array of clouds hovered above the horizon: a promising arrangement for a sunset show. As they waited and watched, the sun seemed in no hurry, and their scrutiny didn't speed proceedings. They distracted themselves by marvelling at hundreds of moths that fluttered into the dusk sky, and spiralled around the nearby pencil pines. They were glad they far outnumbered the mosquitoes.

Eventually the sun did the miraculous thing it has done every day since our planet was formed: it dipped below the horizon. (Or, more correctly, our planet rotated out of the path of the sun’s rays). Now for the cold and patient wait for the sunlight on the underside of the clouds to finish off the show as it saw fit. The two of them photographed, chatted, waited, shivered, and photographed some more. And they reminded each other that they were, after all, at the same altitude as Kunanyi/Mt Wellington, and that warm gloves might have been a good idea!

[Sunset from the Campsite]

Had they been blasé television critics, they might have rated the sunset as good rather than great. But that would have been churlish, when really, their eyes were shining as they slowly turned from the westerly sky to take in the wider scene one more time. There was only a waft of breeze, and clouds were small and disorganised, suggesting they’d have a calm if chilly night in their tents. 

[Late sun near Camp, with a sunlit Little Throne, (centre back)]

It turned out calm for some, but for one party member, it was anything but. Cue the return of the same symptoms of an underlying illness that had scuttled their previous walk. The patient, they learned in the morning, had been up several times during the night. Digging holes for urgent toileting in the dark is no fun, they were told. Add rain and a torch failure, and … (the rest required little imagination). 

There was little discussion. If the situation was short of “press the button, call the helicopter”, it definitely required an early departure. Our patient was as upset about abandoning a second trip as he was about feeling crook. The other three simply accepted the necessity of getting out a day early. So they began packing. The patient couldn’t hold down any breakfast, but he sipped some hot water, and slowly packed up. 

[Healthy, well-watered Sphagnum and Pencil Pines]

Fortunately, the overnight drizzle and showers now held off, and they packed up mostly dry gear, and got walking before 10am. In theory the walk back would be easier and quicker than the journey here. But that didn’t factor in a sick walker with no energy, who felt as though he was swimming upstream, even on a mostly downhill walk. For him, simply setting one foot in front of the other was an achievement. That made getting back to Lake Mackenzie in around the same time as yesterday’s walk in, an amazing effort. 

Despite the early forced departure, the group agreed that they had still met the walk’s major objective. The door to a special place had been opened for the “newbies”, and they were sure they’d be back. As for the patient, medical advice and time would determine his answer to that question posed in the back of the car on the way in to Lake Mackenzie. 

[Seed head, possibly Showy Copperwire Daisy] 

* It was heartening to see that the University of Tasmania, in collaboration with Hydro Tasmania, has begun restoration trials in the area, including the re-planting of pencil pines.

Return to Blue Peaks 1: The Aftermath

Blue Peaks Track, Central Plateau, Tasmania: It’s an early Friday afternoon, early autumn. The weather is benign, so is the company. And yet there’s turmoil on the track. It’s a turmoil that matches the lead-up to this trip.

Bushwalking isn’t supposed to be like this. It’s usually a simplified, pared down existence. Challenges are defined, and everyday cares are excluded from the rucksack. It was this summer’s fires that changed all that.

[An ominous bushfire sunset, January 2016] 

In the weeks leading up to the trip the six of us have exchanged dozens of emails, made numerous phone calls. Plan A has been in, then out, then in again … possibly. We’ve discussed Plans B, C, D and more in detail. Our decision has depended entirely on whether the Mersey Forest Road would open again after a prolonged fire-caused closure.

The uncertainty has robbed us of anticipation, one of the pleasures of any trip. I’ve even been waking in the wee hours, my mind going through the options, struggling to match the preferences of our walking party to the potentially available routes.

It’s not until we’re half way up the Midland Highway on our first day that we make the final call. Rumour has it that the Mersey Forest Road will open tomorrow morning. It’s too late. We’re off to the Blue Peaks again. Tim O and I might have just been there in December, but the others haven’t, and the road is definitely open.

There’s one other definite. We’ll be walking into one of the recent fire zones. And it’s the aftermath of the Lake MacKenzie bushfires, just a few hundred metres up the track, that is the cause of more turmoil.

[The charred trunk of a pencil pine, Blue Peaks]  

As we climb the slope away from Lake MacKenzie, the bush is its usual muted, mottled green. Then, as we round a bend at the top of the slope, the ground is suddenly bare. The varied greens are replaced by basic black and brown, a 3D landscape now two dimensional.

We’ve been expecting a bleak scene, but not this assault on every sense. Of course it’s visually awful, with blackened, twisted, bare and broken bush, and barely anything still green and growing. Even the puddles created by recent, too-late rains seem singed, filled with sooty sludge and burned debris.

And the bush also smells like death. Beyond the burning of leaf and limb, there’s the whiff of scorched soil and of countless other incinerated living things. We even see leeches fire-frozen in the act of stretching.

[Burned and unburned: the chaos of bushfire] 

But it’s the sounds – or the lack of them – that haunt me the most. Although there’s a breeze, with no leaves to rustle the wind has no voice. Not one bird calls: not even a raven or other carrion chaser. We too are silent, walking slowly, taking ghoulish photographs, deep in our own thoughts.

I’ve studied fires for years, and have been in fire zones before. I know that much of this bush will slowly recover. It will just need time. Indeed in some places there are already a few tiny green shoots. But while there will be some healing here, it’s the things that will never recover that have me the most concerned.

And sure enough, around a corner we meet our first forever fatalities. Just two months back Tim and I had paused for photos at the track’s first prominent pencil pine. An old survivor, this scarred but living pine stood next to others that had succumbed to past fires. Perhaps its sodden home, among sphagnum and cushion plants, had offered it some protection.

[Before and after the fire: pencil pine and cushion plants, Blue Peaks] 

This time it hasn’t been so lucky. One large limb, ripped from its crown, lies ruined and brown beside it. Its one remaining limb has been singed, though for now it’s still green. Near its base, the normally plump green cushion plants are a sickly brown and yellow: deflated, defeated, doomed. So too are the desiccated sphagnum beds.

We walk on through this strange half-dead landscape. The chaos that is fire has left some patches entirely unburned. Parts of our track are a bizarrely green ribbon through brown, burned barrens. The waterlogged scoop of many footfalls has protected it. But the saddest sights for us are the fatally burned pencil pines. One large stand along a sodden, sphagnum-filled creek that would normally be its salvation, has been almost entirely cremated. We won’t see them here again.

[Before and after: pencil pines and sphagnum, Blue Peaks] 

Twenty minutes later we leave the burning zone. The air has started to feel refreshed, and we hear birds and even frogs again. The bush is now its familiar khaki mix, and we turn our focus to the hard work of walking. We hope we’ll soon reach the unburned refuge of our pencil pine-fringed campsite beneath the Blue Peaks.