First day post daylight savings and it was a cracker. Beautiful blue sky, perfect autumn temperature, and a full crew ready to hit the mountains. Sandy and Jenny led the way, with Doug at the back, making sure no-one was left behind.
Most of the crew met at Albury Homemaker Centre, where we headed off to meet a couple more travellers at Talgarno. From there it was on to Mt Granya.
As we set off from Talgarno, a wag on the UHF made a comment about the unfortunate turtle in the middle of the road, “Perhaps if he’d used BP instead of Shell, he might have made it to the other side.”
Off the blacktop and onto the dirt and gravel of Mt Granya, it was a straight-forward ride up, past some very pretty and distinctive vegetation, most notably the open tussock grass, carpeting the mid-levels of the forest. Beautiful.
The fire tower at the top overlooks a carpark that we all managed to squeeze into, comfortable for 4 or 5 vehicles, pretty squishy for 10, but we did it. The view from the look-out was pretty spesh, and it was just warm enough to shed the jacket and enjoy some morning tea.
Back in the vehicles, we set off for Mt Benambra. As the going got a little rougher, we stopped to air down, ready for what turned out to be some pretty rough and rocky roads, a couple of 3 point switch backs, good size puddles, and a tree down across the usual track (fortunately this was just beyond the air down point and there was a gentle grassy slope so we could get around.)
We really enjoyed the drive up what is a largely untouched part of our beautiful landscape, into the Alpine trees, and we also kind of enjoyed the Tetris at the top trying to park 10 vehicles in a space suited to 2. Or did we? It was tricky, but teamwork made the dreamwork. Most of us then headed up the monumental steel structure of the Mt Benambra look out.
The view was spectacular, out over wild forest covered rolling hills and mountains, and the Dartmouth Dam, shapely and shiny far below. Not sure our photos will do it justice, but it was well worth the drive. Breath-taking, as promised.
We Tetrised back down to the hut and enjoyed another gorgeous view while we ate lunch and chatted together. Someone chopped up a massive watermelon and shared it amongst the friendly, companionable day trippers.
After lunch it was down the other side of the mountain to the Dartmouth Wall and Spillway to air up, farewell our fellow travellers and hit the frog and toad.
Most of the fauna we had encountered across the day was of the recently deceased roadside variety, poor old Wally the wombat, however, we heard over the UHF that someone sighted a live lyrebird roadside not long after leaving the Dartmouth Carpark.
All in all, it was a fantastic day with a great bunch of people who generously and kindly shared their knowledge and expertise with the newbies which was very much appreciated. We’ll definitely be doing this again.
