GOD’S PUNISHMENT

It’s Maria Island day, which involves being ready by 8.30 a.m., something we haven’t managed at all this trip, for the ferry departure.  Worrying about being ready and my dodgy right knee means little sleep is had because, for some unknown reason, I have decided to have a go at climbing Bishop and Clerk, a distinct outcrop of rock on the northern tip of the island that’s over 620 metres high.

Reading the reviews of others indicated it was probably out of my limits, but I figured if I factored in the push bike, there may be a faint hope.  “The climbing is relentless” one reviewer wrote and, apparently, at the end it gets a lot worse.

So, with much trepidation I headed out on the pushie after the ferry docked, hoping to beat all the walkers who would be trying the climb (turned out there were only six others).

Maria is an enchanting place, free of unnatural predators and thus wildlife flourishes, wombats, echidnas, cape barren geese and native hens, not to mention all the roos, are all flourishing. As you head out, you’re apt to come across some of them.  I mean, where else in Australia can you find a nice furry wombat right beside the dusty trail trying to have a sleep?

It’s open country initially, with vast seascapes across the water to a couple of tiny islands just offshore.  As you swing around to face the distant outcrop the trail gets steep, very steep.  I’m resigned to using a granny gear and zig-zagging and still have to stop a couple of times before the top.  Then there’s a matching steep downhill before another similar energy-sapping ascent with a bench seat for respite about half-way.

After that it’s woodland, though the edge of the cliffs is quite close on the port side still and, on the other side of the trail is the most patterned eucalypt I’ve ever seen in my life. However, as the lady wrote, it’s “relentless” in terms of uphill, though the trail itself is good and easy to follow. 

I manage to get further up, stopping to catch my breath on occasions until, finally, I give up, dismount, and leave my bike and helmet behind.  I figure I’ve only got about 2 kms to go, how hard can it be?

Well, it’s alright and I’m moving freely until the trail has tree roots and a few rocks here and there and it gets just a little arduous.  Then it gets a little more steep, more rocky and more arduous.  That was the good bits because it’s then that you see the landslide rocks.  Nothing in my entire bushwalking life prepared me for this.  It’s a nightmare..

At some stage in the past masses of lumpy rocks have cascaded down the mountain and now, devoid of vegetation, you have to walk up it.  Still, I can see that just 200 metres up the trees start again.

Oh dear, there are only a couple of trees and then the nightmare starts again and the summit looks light years away, it’s so much higher.

Through another couple of trees and then onto a bigger slope, it really is relentless but, then it gets worse!  When you finally get just below the summit, many people don’t go any further because, frankly, it’s just plain scary.  You have to scale a couple of vertical rocks with faint footholds to actually get on the summit.  It is no place for the faint hearted. 

I have a couple of goes before I get enough confidence to throw the top half of my body on the slab and literally drag myself onto it.  How I’m going to get back down I have no idea.

As every reviewer suggests, it’s a spectacular place to be.  There’s an aura here that wraps itself around you and won’t let go.  Whether it’s viewing the lower nearby “Clerk” bit of the formation or gazing back 5-6 kilometers from whence you came, it’s all impressive.

There’s a split rock formation here that involves jumping from one to the other and risking serious injury or death if you make a mistake.  I move around a few but won’t go on the furthest one.  After all, slip and it’s nearly 2,000ft to the ocean.

Eventually, after eating my meagre lunch and emptying my water bottle, other climbers arrive, two men followed by a younger middle-aged German lady, all much more supple than I.  Photos are taken and we get chatting.  Apparently Mount Amos is more scary because it has a slippery granite slope; I remind myself never to go there.

Because one of the gents is comfortable wandering around the far rock I eventually give it a go.  It’s not as scary as I thought but I can understand why all three women (another two have just arrived) point blank won’t go there.

Then, if you thought coming up was bad, wait till you have to descend!  A change of underwear would be a requirement for some.  Going over the edge onto three uncertain steps has everyone worried and I’m glad I remembered my “go down backwards” policy because it makes it a lot more doable, but still scary.

My knees are in “complain” mode all the way back down the rocks.  “Will it ever end” keeps crossing my mind but, of course, it eventually does and the roughish part of the bushwalk commences.  A tree root here, a rock there, but at least I’m going down and the bike lies in wait somewhere further on.  That “somewhere further on” seems twice as far as when I was ascending, and my relief is palpable when the bright green helmet strapped to the frame comes into view.  Now it’s all downhill and much faster and easier.

When, on the top, the German lady and I had compared bike notes and she said she loved riding the mountains in Germany.  Imagine my surprise when I passed her walking.  She’d left her bike about two kilometres before mine and had hardly climbed anything.

I’d originally hoped to make the 2.30 ferry and rocked up with nearly half an hour to spare.  It had taken me around 5 hours to do something I’ll never do again or recommend to anyone.

Still, having done it, you get boasting rights (and a lot of pain for a few days afterwards!).

 

                                                       INDIAN HEAD - DAY TWO

It had been a tough day, I’d just returned and it was time to go to the toilet, of which there are three, mens and ladies plus a unisex.  As I walk past the ladies a middle-aged man is talking to someone inside. Transpires it’s his very young daughter and she’s crying; apparently she can’t get out as the lock is malfunctioning.  Unable to assist and it looked like the matter was in hand, I moved to the gents and sat down.

The father was reiterating that he would get help or some tools.  His daughter cried on.  Then he said he’d contact the manager, whose name was Gary.  He contacted him sooner than he thought; Gary was in the middle toilet taking the situation in and his clear voice indicated that he would soon organize assistance, just give him a minute.  Sitting down it all sounded like a script from a backyard comedy.

Gary was a character; he stays on site for free as he looks after any problem or notifies N.P.W.S. if it’s something he can’t handle.  The park has no fixed sites, no power, just toilets and cold showers.  Earlier in the day he’d enlightened me about the trail I was contemplating, the track to Diamond Head.  He was a veritable font of knowledge and two things he kept reiterating were that it was very steep and, it was wonderfully scenic. 

He looked a tad doubtful when I said I wanted to use the mountain bike, concerned about the steepness and the deteriorating state of the track.  Not to worry, I’ll give it a go.

The first part was easy, about half a kilometre up a moderate hill till there’s an open space.  This is where the hang gliders take off when the wind is from the right direction.  It’s also an unrestricted view south, down the seemingly endless beach all the way to unseen Crowdy Head beyond the horizon, a seascape so vast as to beggar the imagination.

I move on, past the sign that explains Kylie Tennant’s presence here in the naming of some things, such as the lookout.  She was an author of the earlier 20^th century and loved the place, “League after league the headlands curve up the coast of the continent.  The white fingers of the sea play on them, each bluff giving out its unique note, making its own music.”

Now the track becomes problematic; either side has dried firm mud but there’s an eroded watercourse in the middle which makes cycling virtually impossible.  I dismount and start to walk.  There’s a sense of anticipation now as I move closer to the heights and the cliffs on the other side that confront the ocean.

Finally, I crest the bluff and it all looks promising as I swing left and savour the onshore wind, admiring the tiny native wildflowers that exist, if only barely, on the slopes and wondering what insects pollinate them, because the bees and other winged creatures have long ago been blown away by the persistent sea breezes.

I look down and there it is, the arch I’d noted yesterday during research.  Gary’s words come back to haunt me.  “It’s very steep”.  Indeed, it is, it’s no place for a bike there so I scramble on down on a trail where I would have loved my walking poles but, of course, they’re not to hand, literally.

It’s step by slow step; this is grade 4/5 stuff, not for the unfit or faint of heart.  The further down the more dramatic it becomes.  It’s one of the great seascapes of Australia.  A huge colourful cliff, a narrow bay awash with strange iridescent yellow/green rocks and then the arch on the left hand side being constantly tormented by the angry seas, at times so big they actually go over the top of the arch.  It’s mesmerizing.  You don’t know where to look, it takes over your brain, tormenting it with so many attractions in one spot.  This is the “scenic” of which Gary spoke.

I also realise I’ve been here before.  Before I was into photography, before I became a keen bushwalker, before I became a cyclist, about six decades had passed since I was last here.

Up or down, either is tough here and you won’t be making it without stopping regularly.  I spend about 20 minutes at the base, mesmerised by the grandeur of it all and so pleased I got to record it with favourable weather and seas, in one of their grander moods. High cirrus and big seas make a lovely combination, one suggesting calm and the other, mayhem.

Eventually I looked up and realised it was time to climb the rough narrow unmade track to the top, and it takes time, pausing to breathe in more oxygen than I was capable of while moving.  All the time the roar is taunting you from behind, trying to capture your attention still.

At the summit a couple have come along and I get them to take a picture of me, so few do I have.  They’re just about to head down so I pass on a few pointers before heading off….slowly.  There are bits of track here and there that are rideable, and just as many not.  Way below another group of rocks is defying the watery onslaught, foam splashing all over as the wash rears up and over.  It’s a timeless scene, yet time is the key.

I pull up at a bench seat where Gary sits to shoot the whales with his new camera.  He told me he takes a large umbrella and tripod up here these days so he doesn’t have to move much.  Judging by his profile, I can understand why.  The occasional beer is not unknown to him.

The next feature is a massive, semi-eroded pillar, only half detached, its deep brown colour contrasting with the blues and greens all around it.  It evokes power and mystery; it’s so unlike anything else here.  What geological event caused the situation?

Way down below, the lines of swells seem more organized than before and there’s an attempt by some hardy grasses to grow, buffeted by the natural elements as they are.  They’ve won over half the rock but other areas are denied to them.  The stalemate continues.

I clamber down the slope on a trail even less distinct that the previous one and it’s just as steep, just a few degrees off needing a rope.  One slip could really ruin your day!

Beneath the grass covered rocky outcrop there’s another arch in the making.  The salt water has made its way through a crevice and explodes every so often right through before thrashing around on the land side.  There’s a sort of disjointed harmony to it all.

Gary told me about the man he bought the camera off.  He goes down and lays on the grass for hours waiting for that timeless shot of a seabird coming back with prey attached to its claws.  He’s got everything from Brahminy kites to sea eagles.  Years of patience will do that for you.

I’m back on the “main” trail and climbing.  This is the bit where I really don’t want my bike.  It’s narrow, badly rutted, hard to get a foothold and you’re trying to manoeuvre a bike as well and it’s all uphill.  Easy going it’s not!  I can’t even see the top of the ascent because the trail rolls over near the summit.  The couple who took my photo have long since passed me and are well into the descent somewhere on the far side.

There’s more cliffs and Diamond Head just visible on the horizon but the route has moved away and now the vastness of the hinterland becomes the main feature.  Still, there’s more slope to get up until, finally, I’ve made it.

I spoke with an American couple just before the summit and they come from Washington State and we briefly exchanged notes as I said I’d been to Multnomah Falls.  He said the trail was good on the other side, the descent to Diamond Head.  I hoped he was right.

Transpires that he was and I’m ever so grateful because now, at last, there’s some justification for the mountain bike.  I get comfortable and swoop down the trail to Diamond Head, quickly passing the old couple and, in no time at all, I reach Diamond Head Caravan Park and I know it’s all road from here.

The only catch is I get more and more desperate to have a comfort stop.  Wind is pushing my belly in all directions and now it’s painful just sitting on the seat.  I’m forced to pull up and empty my stomach and feel fortunate there’s soft leaves at hand.  The relief is palpable and I now make my way to the real toilet, which is where the story came in.