The K2K became the new goal as this was another walk I was yet to complete. I wanted to really push myself so I discussed with my other hiking partner on what time we thought was possible. I spent some time reading over past trip reports and were very surprised to see that a lot of people had completed the walk in less than 12 hours. I decided that this would be the time limit we would allow ourselves.

The Trip Report:

Start Location: Kanangra Walls carpark
End Location: Katoomba
Weather: Patchy Rain/Sun, 11 – 21 Degrees
Distance Mapped: 42km
Group: Matt & Dan
 

The trip began in the early hours of Saturday at roughly 4:45am when we left our accommodation at Hartley Vale for the night and began the hour and half drive out to the walls. It wasn’t easy waking up this early as we had enjoyed a few too many beverages the night before and were both kept up by the sound of the neighbors partying into the early hours of the morning. Dan drove us through the sketchy cliffs of Jenolan Caves and then down the long dirt road that eventually became the Kanangra Walls carpark.

The wombat must have not wanted us to pass!

I quickly got myself organised as it was already 6:45 by the time we parked the car. I was a little uneasy about how much water I was going to carry with me as I had made mistakes on past trips that have proven costly. I decided to carry 5L as I had approximately 3KG of food and 2KG of other items (Map, Beacon, Jacket, Pack) which would give me 10KG to carry (Some might say this was too much but I felt it was the ideal weight). It was just after 7:00am and we were moving, it was a great feeling to be embarking on a new walk that I had read so much about and I started to get excited about the obstacles I may face ahead.

This was the first walk I would be using GPS on as Dan had recently purchased a nice Garmin GPS device loaded with the TOPO for the area. I am usually a traditional compass and map person but I became rather fond of the GPS by the end of the trip. We followed the track out along Seymour Top and couldn’t help but stop for photos as this was all new territory for us both.

The amazing views from Seymour Top

Walking Along Seymour Top

The sunrise put on an incredible show for us as we walked in awe of the views around us. A quick glance of the watch meant that we were falling behind already as the photography had been consuming too much of our time. I knew immediately that I’d be returning for another visit so I wasn’t fussed to be back moving at jogging speeds.

Dan taking it all in looking back at Kanangra Falls

Amazing views in all directions

We pushed through Brennan Top and had no troubles following the trail, I would point out that novice trail walkers could easily loose the track here as the trail drops off the cliff a little. It was hardly a scramble but enough to hurt if you fell down the bottom. There were also arrows drawn on some of the rocks to aid future walkers. We made light of the Kilpatrick Causeway with our jogging speed and reached the top of Mt Berry before we stopped for a quick snack. The leeches were immediately onto us and we spent several minutes trying to remove them all from our clothing.

The annoying leeches

We zipped through the Gap between Mt Berry and Mt High and Mighty and reached the top of Mt Stormbreaker by approximately 9am. The fog had started to move in bringing with it small droplets of rain which was welcomed as we were fairly hot at this point. The walk ahead looked rather steep and rugged but the trail was very set in making going very easy.

Mt Cloudmaker in the distance from the knoll just before Mt Stormbreaker

I had hoped to arrive at Mt Cloudmaker by 10:00am and we seemed to be tracking right on pace. A quick check of the GPS showed we were very close to the summit and the time was 9:50. I had never been to the top of Mt Cloudmaker but it was a great feeling reach it. We took a seat next to the logbook and had a quick read of previous entries before signing ours in. We didn’t want to waste too much time here as I knew the next leg to the cox river was going to be the toughest as previous trip reports have mentioned very confusing trail intersections. The trail we followed was fairly consistent and we reached Dex Creek in no time at all. This place lived up to my expectation, It was a beautiful meadow with a super clean creek running through the middle of it. I was still carrying most of my water but I drank a few handfuls and cooled myself down a bit. There seemed to be trails going everywhere so we decided to go with the one that went towards the west side of the ridge. A very costly mistake was then made as we found ourselves heading further and further down off the side of the mountain. The GPS was out in hand and couldn’t seem to pinpoint our location exactly. I decided to backtrack up towards the highest point of the ridge to get a better idea of our position using trusty old compass bearings, this was time and energy consuming bashing through the thick scrub. I followed the compass to the degree with my map and before long we had picked up a faint trail. It continued vaguely along before becoming much more distinguishable. It was a relief knowing we were back on track and moving a good pace, we had spent almost an hour and half zig-zagging to find our way back on track.

The Strongleg Butress was a solid decent which seemed to drag out for awhile with a couple of knolls slowing us right down. We reached a strange point on the trail where someone had left a red flannelette shirt hanging on a tree stump. It seemed to be fairly clean but there was no trace of an owner anywhere on the ridge. It was left behind and as we descended Mt Yellow Dog grew higher and higher before us.

Mt Yellow Dog soaring high infront of us

Almost at the river we were greeted with a large lizard who had taken ownership of a tree. He seemed friendly and allowed us to go fairly close to him

The Lizard in the buttress

By the time we reached the Kanangra river it was already 1:00pm, we had somehow taken 3 hours to descend from Mt Cloudmaker. Definitely not the time we had planned on reaching the river. It was starting to get very hot at this time as well, the descent was strenuous on the knees and body (I feel for those who ascend this beast). The creek was a beautiful sight and had we not be so far behind schedule I would have lay right there in the middle of the creek.

Kanangra Creek

We hadn’t stopped for a decent meal yet so we crossed on over to Konangaroo clearing as I had never been before and took the time to take our boots off and lay out in the grass. It was a very relaxing area and the sun had come out making our lunch of Banana bread and cheese and bacon rolls pretty enjoyable. I could have stayed here all day and it was very tempting to try and convince Dan that we could always aim to finish in under 24 hours instead.

An hour had past so quickly and being just after 2pm we needed to reach Katoomba by 7pm to be successful which meant we had 6 hours. I wasn’t confident at this point but It was worth the crack. We crossed the Cox river at Konangaroo clearing as we had opted to climb the left side of Yellow Pup ridge rather than walk around to find the trail. This was a difficult decision as I couldn’t seem to find a suitable crossing area that wasn’t too deep or too rapid. I made my mind up to just go for it and zipped my pack up in a watertight bag. The water reached my knees and then slowly made its way up towards my waist before It finally started to reseed once I reached the other side. Dan made it across just a bit further downstream and managed to only get his shins wet by using the slippery stones as steps.

The route taken across the cox and onto Yellow Pup

A successful crossing

The climb up Yellow Pup ridge turned into a difficult scramble as it was very steep and hard to navigate. We pushed our way upwards towards the top of the ridge and before long we found the welcoming sight of the trail. I have walked up Mt Yellow Dog before but this time seemed to be much harder then the previous. My legs were starting to cramp up and I was barely making progress as we climbed higher and higher up the trail. We stopped multiple times to catch our breath and to drink some more electrolyte fluid. The ridge went on forever and we both were beginning to feel serious signs of fatigue. Time was getting right away from us and my moral had sunk to an all time low for the trip. I dug into my food sack and ate some of my favourite chocolate to boost me up a bit. It seem to work a little as I was able to move at a pace faster then a turtle for at lest a little while.

Reaching the summit of Mt Yellow Dog was a top moment as I knew the next 10km would be fairly easy going and the next climb would only be Mt Debert. For some reason my whole body began to function back at normal levels once the climb was over, things were moving well and I started to regain moral. The only down side was that the time had reached 4pm and we hadn’t even reached Meadlow Gap. Step by step I wanted to keep going and there were long stretches of silence between Dan and I.

We finally reached Meadlow Gap and looked at the time to see the moral drenching time of 5:20pm we were pretty much down and out, reaching our goal meant running from here and we hardly enough energy to keep pushing forward let along run. We knew we couldn’t make the agreed 12 hours but for some reason we still didn’t pike, we kept going forward. We had reached point mentally where we just wanted to finish what ever the time may be.

Mt Debert was easier than expected, slow moving but It certainly wasn’t anything like Mt Yellow Dog had been early in the afternoon. Up and over the ladders and we were marching along the long, boring mind boggling fire trail that was The Narrow Neck. Dan had gotten some reception of his phone and called in a lift to meet us at the locked gate as we didn’t really want to walk all the way back to Katoomba. I think I fell asleep whilst walking on some moments of the neck as the trail went on and on and on. I reached a point physically and mentally where I didn’t think I could reach the end. I sat down for awhile and soaked up some fluids and food and waited for my body to digest everything. Dan got me moving again as he showed me the GPS distance marker that said we were less than 1km from the gate. I was somehow able to slowly make my way along and sure enough the locked gate greeted us with a smile. The darkened sky meant it was some time after 8:30pm and the official reading was 9:35pm.

Our time had been 14 hours and 35 minutes, not what we had hoped for but we were certainly proud of the effort. In the car ride Dan and I reviewed the TOPO maps to appreciate just how far we had walked. We finished the day off with some pizza and beer and discussed our what our next big challenge would be

Final Notes:

The K2K walk was one of my favourite walks completed to date and I am very much looking forward to another attempt adding in a lot more time. If I were to attempt this walk again in the time limit of under 12 hours I would pack less water as there seemed to be a lot of water along this walk (Possibly due to recent rains). I would also try to memorise the best way through Dex Creek a few times as this was where we lost a lot of time.

For anyone else who is planning this trip and has never been before, I would advise carefully planning your route through Dex creek as this would definitely be an area where inexperienced people could easily get lost and disorientated.

We have been customising some great looking websites fully manageable with wordpress, and are hoping that we will have these all live in the coming months.

These last few months has also been very groundbreaking for the team and myself as we have uncovered some great potential plugins and tools to use for future projects which we will use and undoubtedly result in better usability for clients (What we want). WordPress continues to be our CMS of choice and recommendation to anyone who wants an excellent CMS system with amazing abilities to customise.

I would love to post more images on the work we are currently doing but these websites are still private and awaiting final approvals.

Until then,
bon voyage

After a day like this, I seem to come home and have an extra kick of motivation, It might just be that all that vitamin D from the beaming  sunshine.

*All photos taken using and Iphone.

The project ran smoothly and we were able to link wordpress with a very powerful e-commerce system called X-CART. X-cart allows you to sell and manage an online shop with excellent support and great add-ons.

Another project that has since been completed is the new website update for Jason Grant.

A great site design also which was provided by Renee Anne.

I felt it was necessary to move onto something more modern along with a better functioning personal website. Simplicity is the key and WordPress has enabled me to work the way I want to while still having access to one of the best CMS available today.

Beginning the year 2011 I wanted to expand my horizons in website design and be able to provide more versatile results. WordPress has very much helped me achieved this and I have now a wonderful CMS to work with.

While my old website brand will still remain one of my favourites