A small group of us are planning on doing the Arm River track-Mt Ossa Summit walk in a couple of weeks' time - a trip I've wanted to do for oh so long a time.
Plan is to break the trip over the usual 3 days/2 nights, with a base camp somewhere well before New Pelion Hut... we'd much, much prefer to tent independently and away from crowds, and would expect little room for ART freeloaders during the OLT's peak fortnight anyway
The other rationale is that, due to work commitments, we won't be able to make our start until later in the first day. Everyone in the group is fit and capable enough, but I figure it's preferable to keep Day 1's mileage easily achievable without pushing hard into the evening.
The question is: are there any good, established and/or preferred tent spots along the mid to western end of the ART? (by tent spots, I mean enough room for two, 2-person hiking tents) Originally I was looking at somewhere around the south-eastern edge of Lake Ayr, for the obvious reasons (closeness to track, water source, flat grass and prettiness) but after a bit of searching on here the consensus appears to be that Ayr is leech-central. According to Frenchie's Bible it's also trout-free, which also takes away the other main drawcard of spending two evenings there
Spying the area on Google Earth there seem to plenty of clear areas, though of course it's hard to tell if you're looking at native lawn or knee-high button grass and swamp. By the sounds of things most people shoot straight through to Pelion Hut, but if a regularly used spot exists it would surely make sense to utilise it than flatten virgin ground elsewhere.
Any suggestions/coordinates would be greatly appreciated!
Cheers, Ben.
