This walk was organised and led by Mike B as an irregular NPA/CBC Tuesday walk:

Tuesday 21 July 2009: Lower Sams Ck- L/R,X. Boboyan car park - Gudgenby Saddle - SE along Sams Ck Fire Trail - W along Lutons Fire Trail - N along Sams Ck to Sams Ck Fire Trail - car park. About 24 km including 5km off-track or overgrown fire trail and about 700m total climb. Route not fully known to leader. Note: Limit of 8. Map: Yaouk 1:25,000 Leader: Mike B mcbremers@optusnet.com.au Transport: $46 per car, $11.50 to $15 per person.

6 of us drove in 2 cars to the Yankee Hat car park. Lovely to be a back seat passenger, thanks Mark. A wild dog in winter coat near the way in along the Old Boboyen Road.

Further Information

A walk in an area to the SW of Mt Gudgenby, off to the side of the well known Sams Creek fire trail. You can see the area of the walk from the NSW NP&WS Scabby Range Nature Reserve Draft Fire Operations Map 2007. Here's a bit of their map:

From 2009 07 21 Lower Sams Creek

Walk

A lovely, mild (well, not much frost) day. A quick walk in along fire trails and up to the SW corner of the Bogong Creek feeder, 'Kangaroo Green', to where the large yellow tape (and new blue one) marks the start of the footpad to Gudgenby saddle (4.2km in 55mins). A further 2.3km and 275m climb in 50mins saw us at the Gudgenby saddle, the judiciously placed new blue tapes and 2 or 3 small cairns picking out the footpad well (except for where we lost it 100m or so from the saddle). Down the other side, across Naas Creek and a halt was called for morning tea. Views up to Mt Gudgenby, still snowy on its S face.

Strange to turn S from this point, but we did. Could not pick up Sams Creek fire trail going S at this point; anyway, it was nicer down near the creek. Views to nice granite tors on a knob of the ridge undulating SE from the Gudgenby saddle (a nice walk here for the future). After around 1.6km we did arrive at the T-junction of the Sams Creek fire trail (the way to the N blocked by bulldozed trees), Grassy Creek fire trail (the continuation of Sams Creek ft going S) and the Maurice Luton fire trail. Turned W into the Maurice Luton ft.

Very pleasant walking along here through unburnt forest. Nice views to Mt Gudgenby (see pic 1) and to the Scabby Range (see pic 2). Crossed into NSW (not a border marker to be seen) and the Scabby Range Nature Reserve and so down to Sams Creek, flowing strongly. Various crossing methods, using a fallen tree appealed to most of us.

A 'dormant fire trail' marked on the fire operations map was nowhere to be seen, so we bashed up the side of Sams Creek, soon discovering a noisy length of cascades (see pic 3). Very pretty.

Just after 12noon we entered a small creek flat and called lunch. Very civilised - time for one to boil the billy, most of us to lie back on sculptured tussocks and one (never to be publicly identified) to enjoy a brief zizz. 13.5km so far to here, stepping out at a good pace.

Soon after lunch we crossed Sams Creek again, walked some more significant creek flats which we knew would be there from a Google Earth recce, then turned right and up over the ridge and across the border to rejoin Sams Creek fire trail (just visible here).

Easy enough to trundle down it to the SE, a new double blue tape marking the turn off point to take us to across Naas Creek and a climb back up to the Gudgenby Saddle. Arvo tea.

Exited the saddle area at the prominent cairn, which took us down a well worn footpad (slightly different from our route in in the morning), but eventually picked up the blue tape and so back down to 'Kangaroo Green'. A slog back to the cars.

An excellent walk to a new area. Thanks Mike B, and Eric G, Karen C, Mark B, Max S.

Distance: 24.1km  Climb: 750m.  Time: 7.30am - 3.50pm (8hrs 20mins), with 1hr 10mins of stops.
Grading: L/R,X; H(14)

KMZ file for Google Earth/Maps: Lower Sams Creek

All is revealed: "We put the tape in on our Kelly trip subsequent to a discussion with ... We've yet to define the last 150m to the saddle."