I have a 1984 edition of Tyrone Thomas’ 120 Walks In Victoria. Some of the walks are recognisable as hikes that would appear in guides today. One of them, Walk 113, Bomjinna – Major Mitchell Plateau, wouldn’t, however, as the walk has quietly disappeared through fire and flood and regrowth. Tyrone’s directions are simple: “First use a good foot track from the picnic area westwards. The pad leads up a valley in forest, then through the cliffs near Mount William right to the Mount William turntable”. Sounds simple enough. But as I said, fire and flood have removed the trail, which is now partly rehabilitated, partly overgrown and partly ‘around here somewhere’.
The first stretch is still recognisable as possibly an old four-wheel drive track, although flood damaged despite some rehab work. At some point we left that track and headed south (I think) to climb a ridge from where we had a wonderful view of the cliffs ahead. From there the track disappeared but we headed in the general direction of that way for a bit and then uphill and across and maybe slightly downhill and over to the right until we hit the line of cliffs, where we followed the person in front because we thought they knew where we were going. A check of a GPS app reassured us that once upon a time the track was around where we were walking, assuming the track was accurately mapped (unlikely) and anyway, the person at the front does know where they are going – I’m sure of it. Well, we soon arrived at the turntable, so they must have.
From the turntable it’s a 27 km slog along the bitumen to the summit of Mount William. Okay, 27 km might be an exaggeration distance-wise – it was probably about two – but it’s pretty accurate slog-wise. Bitumen! Argh! Lunch at the summit was very welcome.
Next was across the tops on the usual track, dropping off Mt William and climbing onto the Major Mitchell Plateau. This has to be one of Victoria’s best walks, with fantastic views east and west. As we walked, hikers heading the other way passed on rumours of another hiking party up ahead “There must be at least ten of them,” one person said, while another said “At least a dozen.” It was going to be busy in the one camping area at First Wannon Creek. We briefly considered stopping the night after dropping to Boundary Gap but the absence of water and a couple of dead ‘roos put an end to the considerations and we pushed on to First Wannon, climbing onto the southern section of the plateau. The climb, at the end of a long day, was tiring and my poor muscles started to cramp.
The camp was crowded-ish with a group of ten, or twelve, or however many, from Geelong, who kindly and without any fuss made room for us. Dinner and then an early night under stars with a special guest appearance of the space station flashing overhead ended a good day out.
Next day was cool; tents were packed up damp and we set off again. Despite the cool windy conditions it was superb day wandering across the plateau before finally descending east to where the cars were parked near Mafeking.
The Major Mitchell Plateau is one of Victoria’s best walks, very popular so there are bound to be a number of hiking parties sharing it on any given weekend. One of the highlights was Will acting like a ten-year-old, leaping around on the rocks at the top of one of the climbs and saying rather excitedly how “Wow” it all was. He was right, it is very “Wow”.