Bushwalk Australia

Hi All,

After six months of planning, the school group I lead started the Great Ocean Walk on Saturday.

After six hours, I pulled the pin on the walk. {had a participant with abdominal cramping issues, a participant with a pulled Hamstring, and another with a cold that turned so severe that she couldn't breathe properly.} C'est la vie, some things are sent to try us. I could have managed the two, but the pulled hammy is an issue.

Current Conditions:

Above Shelly Beach, and on the fire trails above Blanket Bay, the mud is fairly deep and slippery, approx 8" deep on the fire trails and walking trails in places.

What's interesting is the rain that they've had has brought the Gippsland Earthworms up = the worm casts are pretty impressive.

Apparently, the section between Cape Otway and Aire River has mud about 12-16" deep on a trail.

Our group started walking at Apollo Bay at 8am, and the fit healthy group were managing about 2km/hr on average because of the mud, the sick group were managing a lot less. I walked into Blanket Bay with the sick ones at about 7:30pm, the others would have had a 9 hour day doing this walk section if they weren't slowed down by the others - I sent them ahead at the top of the hill so they could set up camp and cook in the remaining daylight.

Expect slow going - it's a mud slog at the moment.

Cheers,

eddie

Thanks for the update Eddie,
Sorry it didn't work out for you - at least you have the planning done for the next installment.
I would imagine the downpour we had last night only adds to the muddy woes - sounds great though.

Just in case you needed proof that Gippsland Earthworms are big, here's a photo of their casts. Amazed me, anyway - they stand about 4" high or so, not that you can tell from the photo - look at the basket of the walking pole for a size indication.