Day 10 – Rocky Gully to Ellery Creek North (Section 6 Larapinta)

 

https://nt.gov.au/parks/find-a-park/tjoritja-west-macdonnell-national-park/larapinta-trail

https://nt.gov.au/_media/docs/parks/bushwalking-and-hiking/larapinta-trail/larapinta-trail-section-6-information-sheet-and-map.pdf

Last night was much milder, I slept only in underwear, no thermals or layers.  We were up this morning at 5:30am and away just after 7am.

https://northernterritory.com/cn/zh/alice-springs-and-surrounds/see-and-do/rocky-gully

The start of this morning’s walk started with a solid climb in which we quickly gained height. It was up and down over rocky terrain, with the odd short patch of trail that allowed a free stride. There were less wildflowers on today’s walk than yesterday, however there were a lot of Zebra Finches about this morning.

Once we reached Alice Valley View, it was generally free walking to East Junction, with fewer rocky outcrops and more wildflowers. There were several dry creekbeds to cross that were picturesque. We stopped for morning tea at East Junction and saw a Ringneck Parrot. We stayed on the new alignment of the Larapinta Trail heading for Ellery Creek North, rather than turning towards Ellery Creek Big Hole and Ellery Creek South. Between East Junction and Ellery Creek North there are several large areas of piled rocks where sections of the Heavitree Range have broken off. The noise that must be generated when these chunks break away and crack into pieces as they land must be impressive. We arrived at the Ellery Creek North Trailhead at 12:30pm.

https://nt.gov.au/parks/find-a-park/tjoritja-west-macdonnell-national-park/ellery-creek-big-hole

https://northernterritory.com/alice-springs-and-surrounds/see-and-do/ellery-creek-big-hole

We enjoyed lunch and had a wash and rinsed out our hiking clothes before heading out to explore.  Ellery Creek Big Hole is beautiful, and cold as has been our previous experience. We had previously seen it from the southern side, and I had not realised it was as long as it is. From the northern side there is a fair distance that you can wade out before reaching the deep section that separates the northern and southern sides.

We spent the remainder of the afternoon reading out books, and charging our devices.  This evening a fellow hiker, Toni, removed the splinter that I had thought was a blister starting from the base of one of my toes – much more comfortable. Thank you Toni! We opted to sleep in the shelter, which looked out over the plains between the Heavitree and Chewings Ranges – picturesque!

Statistics

Hike Distance                 13.66km

Hike Time                        4h 38m

Ascent                              325.0m

Descent                           410.1m

Day 9 – Hugh Gorge Junction to Rocky Gully (Sections 5 and 6 Larapinta)

Hugh Gorge

https://nt.gov.au/parks/find-a-park/tjoritja-west-macdonnell-national-park/larapinta-trail

https://nt.gov.au/_media/docs/parks/bushwalking-and-hiking/larapinta-trail/larapinta-trail-section-5-information-sheet-and-map.pdf

https://nt.gov.au/_media/docs/parks/bushwalking-and-hiking/larapinta-trail/larapinta-trail-section-6-information-sheet-and-map.pdf

Last night was a beautiful quiet night. We had the gorge to ourselves other than one other camper upriver from us, who we did not hear at all. It was a still night until about 3:30am when the wind picked up. We were up at 5:15am. 

We left camp at 7am. 

We reached the famous water crossing after about 45 minutes. This was much closer to Hugh Junction than I had thought. Given the time of day (before 8am), the walls blocking the sun and the wind rushing through the gorge, it was very cold even before I got in the water. The crossing took us 30 minutes by the time we undressed, ferried packs and got dressed again. The water was very cold, as expected. I got such a physical shock from the cold that my Garmin alerted and wanted to contact my emergency contact. 

It is quite a reach down and up to transfer the packs

As we finished our crossing a group of young women arrived going the other direction and appeared to be horrified at the idea that they were going to have to strip off and go in the water. We told them we would put our clothes on and then move around the corner out of sight to finish getting ready to move on. I am not sure whether they were concerned about stripping down in front of strangers or the idea of going in the water, either way we thought it best not to be an audience. Although we were out of sight, we were quite certain when each individual entered the water – there are certain words that seem to flow involuntarily from one’s mouth in these situations, and at a higher than usual pitch.

 I added a thermal top, shirt, down jacket, rain jacket, pants, wool gloves, buff, beanie and hat in an attempt to get warm. We had a snack and then continued. It took me two hours of solid walking to warm up. In hindsight, I should have made a hot drink and used my space blanket to get my temperature up more rapidly. 

The walk through Hugh Gorge was pretty with a mix of sand, rock and boulder crossings. Thankfully, not the continuous boulder crossing of Spencer Gorge. 

We arrived at Hugh Gorge Trailhead and campground at 10:30am to refill water, have a break and arrange packs. We talked about camping at Ghost Gum Flat tonight as we felt it was too early to stop for the day at Hugh Gorge Trailhead. Ghost Gum Flat is a dry camp, and we decided that it would be better to not carry the extra weight in water and go on to Rocky Gully Campsite and its water tanks. This meant our original days 8, 9 and 10 would now be done in two days. We messaged Zak from LTTS to let him know that we would like to arrive at our next food drop a day earlier than originally scheduled. 

https://www.treksupport.com.au/

We left Hugh Gorge Trailhead at 11:10am. The path from here was mainly across plains, and around intermittent rocky outcrops, crossing the open space of the Alice Valley, between the Chewings Range we had been exploring, toward the Heavitree Range. We watched many different and amazing cloud formations move rapidly across the sky and received about three drops of rain during our walk. 

Ghost Gum Flat is a dry camp with a single table and plenty of room for tents in an open shady area with a prominent Ghost Gum. I found it quite a pretty spot. 

Ghost Gum Flat's Ghost Gum

From Ghost Gum Flat to Rocky Gully was up and down over rocky hills. The ground is again quite hard underfoot. This area had the most wildflowers we have seen thus far, but was otherwise relatively boring. We also saw more wild tomatoes and noted that the ripe fruit are black in colour. Today had strong winds. I was very grateful that we completed Section 4 and 5 (with Brinkley Bluff and the Razorback) on days that were much less windy than those both before and after. 

Some of the wildflowers are almost alpine like

We arrived in Rocky Gully campground about 5:15pm – a long day. I was tired and foot sore. I felt I was running very low on fuel. The water crossing earlier in the day had taken a lot of energy out of me to get warm again and following a very exerting day the day before plus a smaller than normal meal last night; I was very tired when we arrived in camp. I also thought I had a blister forming on one toe. We found a spot to set up our tent and made dinner.

The remote monitoring system for tank levels 
- ensures hikers are unlikely to encounter lack
of water

I then became a functional human being again. I spoke to fellow hiker, Madonna, whose amazing group and their support person were working out a way to get a birthday cake out to the trail for my awesome husband. This campsite was quite unusual in that it was crowded but my husband appeared to be the only male in camp with about thirty or more women, some of whom were very loud. If there were other men there, we did not see them. There was one group of vocal women, who were on their first day on track, doing a section or two of the trail, and seemed shocked that everyone else headed to bed by 7:30pm and intended to be up before the sun. We all hike differently, but on this trail most people we met appear to be up with the sun and go to bed early. 

https://northernterritory.com/cn/zh/alice-springs-and-surrounds/see-and-do/rocky-gully

Statistics 

Hike Distance     20.46km 

Hike Time            8h 34m

Ascent             506.8m 

Descent             537.1m