MT Gould

[iaindtiler]

Well with beautiful weather forecast for the last weekend, that mighty mt dominating the view from the northern end of Lake St Clair had to be climbed. The morning ferry ride up was a nice start with clear skies and smooth waters. The walk itself passes around the edge of button grass plains before entering beautiful mature rainforest. Then the climb up to the plateau. At times the pad is very faint, very overgrown and when obvious quite boggy. But the plateau soon arrives and the sandstone ledges are a treat, with pokmarks and shapes from the glacier retreating back when. Lovely camp spot by a small tarn but I had made good time so decided to summit Gould and come back to the tarn for the night. Once the northern end of plateau is reached the pad is very very overgrown, and its a decent scrub bash. But finally a beautiful little grassy opening appears before the steep boulder scramble begins. The fun now begins on steep scree ,then steep boulders that get bigger and bigger the higher you climb. Once on the summit ridge the real fun begins as you can make ur own way along the ridge, over , around massive boulders til you reach the true summit at the northern end of the ridge. The views are superb all round with the du cane range nearest and dominating. The view back along the Gould ridge is an impressive dolerite scene. Then it was back along the ridge, down with a few slips and back along the plateau for a beautiful night, and next morning, by the tarn. A frog chorus was the night time music.

Attachments

Camping on the plateau

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Rough route up Gould

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Looking back along the ridge

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Setting sun

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Gould reflections. Guardians to left.

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[eggs]

Much better weather than when we went through. Very nice.

[stepbystep]

Ahhhhh....so nice...love that place. Lucky you.

[north-north-west]

Be nice to see it like that. Weather has always gone feral when I've been there. Particularly like that last shot with the reflections.

[iaindtiler]

Yea was very fortunate with the weather. Beautiful spot, amazing boulder ridge hop. Definitely worth the tough going at times.

[Thylaseen]

Nice pics. We went a similar route but along the 'base' of the cliffs instead of over - somewhat steep and scrubby with no track but not too bad, we then followed the scree and 'std' track to the top.