This walk was organised and led by Peter W as an ad-hoc FBI Tuesday walk:

Tues 10 Feb – Sugarloaf Creek tributary- rainforest walking – hard 7 km The idea is to explore the lower 2/3 of the tributary of Sugarloaf Creek - the one below Pooh Corner on Clyde Mountain road. We will leave cars on the Misty Mountain Firetrail at 708598, go 600 m N, 200 m down to the mouth of the tributary, up the beautiful falls and plunge pools, then 3-4 km up a relatively-wide to narrower valley in rainforest. When we have had enough, we possibly go back a bit, climb out 150 m up 300 m SE to the ridge, and go directly back to the cars in open Eucalyptus forest, hopefully following the old firetrail. Mainly out of riverbed, so I suggest boots, not volleys. You will need either trousers or high gaiters for the ‘light’ scrub, which is bad on the legs on the firetrail back. Probably some walking in the creek. Total climb 500 m. Map: Monga 1:25 000. Cars: 225 km ($27). Leaving Duffy 7:30, Queanbeyan ?7:50 .. If interested phone Peter W or email back. forecast Friday Canberra Shower or two. Min 13 Max 25 Sydney A few showers. City: Min: 19 Max: 23 West: Min: 17 Max: 27.

8 of us met at various places around town and along the Kings Highway, driving to near the bottom of the Clyde and around 6km in along Misty Mountain Road. Two and a half hours of driving each way, but worth every minute and kilometre.

Walk track

A few showers on the drive down and cloud on the tops of the escarpment, but clear and dry for the walk. First time for me in this area.

Parking at an exactly determined spot on Misty Mountain Road, we headed down a spur to cross Sugarloaf Creek. Easy walking through dry, open eucalypt forest. The creek bed and for a few metres each side were wonderfully different - moist and humid rainforest supporting a totally different community of plants. Ferns, mosses, vines were in abundance. I was acquainted with the Stinging Tree and was later to meet one personally. A short distance up the tributary we came to two small waterfalls and pools (see pic 1). Skirting around the falls, a short pause for morning tea followed, then we continued up the creek through this beautiful country.

We covered 3km of this tributary, most of the time with my mouth wide open in awe. Cabbage tree palms (Livistona Australis) towered above us (see here), there were interesting and colourful fungi and mosses (see here), birds nest ferns sat up in the trees (see here) and tree ferns were plentiful (see pic 2 and here). Thick vines allowed us to swing like Tarzan in places. There were also some large trees (see pic 3). Lunch was taken sitting on rocks in the creek and leech inspection revealed several hangers-on on all but a couple of us. I watched a yabby in the pool a my feet (see here). At this point we were within a kilometre (but 350m below) of Pooh Corner on the Kings Highway. An interesting area, excavated during WWII so explosives could be placed to prevent a feared Japanese advance from the coast. No teddy bear picnics to be seen anywhere on our walk.

After lunch we continued a couple of hundred metres further up the creek, to a point which was probably the grand falls which Peter had promised. They would be spectacular with a good flow of water. Considerable effort and time would have been expended to climb round them, so we called it a day.

Returning half a kilometre down the creek we struck up the right bank to the top of the ridge above, a steep little pinch of 130m up over 300m horizontal. A lyrebird close by as we crested. Peter picked up an old fire trail alignment he knew of which followed the ridge to SH435. We continued down the spur to cross Sugarloaf Creek, then back up to the cars.

This is beautiful country!

Lesson learned - in the subdued light (and without my glasses on) I thought I was taking reasonable non-flash snaps. But a lot had camera shake. Lesson - use flash, and natural steady placements were possible.

Excellent, thank you Peter. A stout party included Barrie, Grahame, Henry, Madeleine, Mike and Philip.

Distance: 6.6km  Climb: 500m.  Time: 9.45am - 3.30pm (5hrs45mins), with 30mins of stops.
Grading: S/R,W; M(10)

KMZ file for Google Earth/Maps: Sugarloaf Creek Tributary