I took advantage of a magnificent winters day to head up to the mountains today. I parked the car at the gate on the Grose Rd. and headed along Faulconbridge Ridge in the cool crisp early morning air. The sun was up by the time I reached the lookout at the end. Long steamers of cloud filled the valley below. I continued along the cliff edge before starting the descent to Faulconbridge Pt. The key to this I have found is to go left a fair distance before sidling back around to the main ridge. This entails a climb out of a high gully but avoids the cliffs. Once on the main ridge the descent was quickly completed with a small cliff line near the bottom the only obstacle. Linden ck was flowing well at the junction as was the Grose itself. Both look quite clear. After crossing Linden Ck I soon pick up traces of the Engineers Tr. which I more or less follow up to the Wentworth Ck junction. It is incredible that after 150 years without any maintenance there is any trace left at all. But seriously how did they ever imaging they were going to build a railway up the valley? I crossed Wentorth Creek just up from the junction. Here it is quite a large creek. But then it is the main tributary of the Grose on the southern side. Checked out the cave and noted room for quite a few tents. Then back across to begin the ascent of Linden Pt. Things started well enough. I was able to negotiate all the lower cliff lines without difficulty. Then higher up there is an impressive wall of cliffs that looked imposing. I elected to attempt to outflank them to the east. The line ran for hundreds of meters when, just as I was about to give up, a possible opening appeared. It was steep with a couple of chimneys but it went and before long I was taking in the views in all directions from the top. I couldn't relax yet because I still had 5k of untracked ridge travel before picking up the end of the Linden FT. With a careful eye on the map and compass I was able to negotiate this without too many problems. The scrub was stunted and quite thick in patches but was interspersed with rock slabs that were much easier going. Some even held water in shallow pools. They also afforded a good view of the route ahead which helped with the navigation. Then about 3 hours from the river I stumbled upon the feintest of animal pads. Sure enough it was the "fire trail", though it was never more than a single track which was thickly overgrown in several places. I could put the compass away and relieved of route finding my pace quickened. After another hour and a half I burst out onto a wide FT just as it made a big RH turn. This is at Sprinwood MR 699 722. i still had to get back to the car on Faulconbridge ridge so I turned left onto the FT and followed it out to the end. Here I dropped straight off the side down into Faulconbridge Ck. The second time I had crossed it that day. Then the last pinch up the other side where I picked up a fire trail which I followed back to the Grose Rd. Here I turned left and within a kilometre I was back at the car. An excellent day. Great sense of remoteness. Challenging route finding. All only one hour from Sydney.
K.