As per my Oakey Creek activation, drove to the intersection of Macquarie Road and Boundary Fire Trail
A short distance along the road reached the junction with Oakey Creek Fire Trail
There was a sign indicating no access to Araluen, so you can't drive up here from Araluen if you want to. Not that I would, the contour lines suggest rather steep...
Continued along Boundary Fire Trail. Just after this junction it become 4WD, steep and rocky with drainage humps, went into 4WD mode in the Xtrail and slowly descended and ascended some hills. After a while the track came to another junction with Gollarribee Fire Trail. Parked here and walked to satisfy SOTA rules, and save the car from further road bashing...
The road up was steep but not as bad as the section I just drove on
Walked for 1.3 Km and after a false summit reached the highest point. Bit of a view of the South Coast through the trees
Set up the radio in the scrub on the left side. Used a log to support the squid pole.
Got on 40m at 11:25, found the band very quiet. Most of the local VK1s and VK3s very weak, they had problems copying me with lots of fading. Seemed to have more luck with VK2s to the North on the coast and West, VK2UH at Yass was good, stations in Newcastle, Wollongong, Sydney strong. Best contact was VK4CPS Paul near Brisbane, weak but readable, not bad for the time of day. Gave it away after midday as getting hot and headed down to the car for lunch, made 21 contacts.
On the way back noticed you can't access this area via River Forest Road, so no option but to return the way I came...
The drive back was interesting, ran over a branch that got lodged under the car, and as on a steep slope had to continue until it flattened out and could free it...
For variety drove back via Milo Road, this time heading to River Forest Road and Penance Grove, one of the highlights of Monga National Park A nice board walk among tree ferns.
Track log of drive/walk
No comments:
Post a Comment