Kooyoora State Park - November 2016

Looking out from Melville Caves.

If anyone reading this waffle thought that my last post was a bit flat well that was because Sam and I were returning home for my dads funeral, he'd passed away while we had been at sea a couple of days earlier. I have to really thank Jane (aka Ms Extreme) because I wasn't my usual gregarious self that day, it was really good to have a like minded soul to take my (and Sam's) mind off more serious issues. So anyway that's the reason that the last post had you nodding off in front of the screen.

And we're off....

This week I decided to head up to Kooyoora State Park and go for a bit of a stroll. I have walked up here before but it was a little further north in the park, a largely off-track walk along a ridge, today though I decided to head to the more popular Melville Caves area. This section of Kooyoora State Park has a large selection of walking tracks that range from very short to 7 or 8 kilometres long, I was planning to link two of the walks into a figure eight and thus make up a reasonable length stroll that would hopefully showcase what Kooyoora has to offer. Leaving home early I set off on the three plus hour drive to the park, after driving through pouring rain around Woodend and Kyneton I was happy enough to arrive at the park in the late morning to be greeted with patches of blue sky.

Strap yourself in for plenty of big rocks, this is the view from near Hollowed Rock.

Leaving the ute I grabbed my pack and headed off towards my first point of interest, the imaginatively named Southern Lookout. Kooyoora State Park is famous for its bushranging history as well as its indigenous history, but more than anything its famous for its big rocks, the Flintstones would have felt at home here, this place is just one big rock garden. I was following the Long Rock Track and initially it was wide and well marked as I made my way past Hollowed Rock before taking the side trip up to Southern Lookout. It didn't take long today to work out that Kooyoora State Park was in the middle of a mozzie plague, every time I stopped I'd get attacked by the droning, whining, insects. Being such a sweet guy the mozzies seem to absolutely love me (or maybe its just that I smell like mozzie food, who knows), whatever the reason they made the majority of today's walk a bit uncomfortable, I'm still scratching three days later. Southern Lookout provided an overview of most of the route to come, I could see over to McLeods Lookout and the long spur that I would descend in one direction and back towards Melville Caves in the other.

Southern Lookout.

A fat Stumpy Tail, he was tempting fate a little being out in the open as there were numerous Wedge Tail Eagles soaring in the thermals above.

Leaving Southern lookout I started a bit of a climb, nothing really to worry about even for a fat old bastard like me. What was a little bit of a surprise was that the track was a little overgrown, initially it was longish grass that I was pushing through but in some of the wetter gullies I was pushing through head high bushes. The track continued on its climb towards McCleods lookout and I continued to get mauled by the resident mozzies, topped off now with some serious hey fever due to the long grass and bush bashing, I was struggling to keep the feral mojo up a bit but at least the scenery was a positive I suppose. You may be thinking to yourself about now that 'this feral bloke is a bit of a wanker, he's always going off track so why is he complaining so much?' and you'd be right (well at least about the wanker bit) I do occasionally enjoy an off-piste stroll but the thing is I've got to be in the mood and prepared, nothing shits me more than finding myself getting a scrub massage when I'm thinking I'm going to be on a easy ramble. Anyway, enough of my whinging, after crawling through a small tunnel of boulders I arrived to take in the expansive view from McCleods Lookout.

Have I mentioned that the track was a little overgrown in places, this stuff was playing havoc with my hay fever.

Hmmm, not a great sight for the oversized Feral walker.

McCleods Lookout was at the eastern end of my walk today, I was now at the top of a long rocky spur that I would follow down before doubling back below along a shallow valley towards the ute. Swatting away the mozzies I got a couple of half decent photos from the lookout before starting my descent, the open rocky spur was the best section of the walk in my opinion. Initially though I had a couple of tight squeezes to wedge my oversized posterior through, these track builders must of had a good sense of humour when the routed the track through this labyrinth of rocks, I can see them now having a smoko and a laugh as they imagine fat blokes like me negotiating their obstacle course. Anyway after passing through the tight spots the rocky spur opened up along with the views, the granite slabs actually provided a fair bit of grip so even on the steepest spots were pretty cruisey, although the route occasionally required a bit of interpretation as it crossed some of the long bare sections.

The view from McCleods Lookout.

So you want me to squeeze through that.......

Heading down this rocky spur made for great walking.

Reaching the bottom of the spur I crossed over a huge rock rib, passing a small eucalyptus tree growing out of a rock hole filled with inky black water....and a shit load of mosquito larvae. I was now heading back in the general diction of the ute through typical dry Australian forest, the scrub was livened up though by the ever changing array of rocks on offer, big rocks, small rocks, hollow rocks, red rocks, grey rocks, and everyones favourite big black rocks, bugger me there are a lot of rocks up here. After crossing a few small rills of water I started to climb again as I made my way back up to meet my outward route, there were a couple of track junctions along here that require a bit of map consultation but really you can't go to far wrong in this section of the park.

This circuit has obviously been around for a while in one form or another judging by these old track markers.

The small rock hole at the bottom of the rocky spur that I'd been descending.

Go left here...

Go right here...

After re joining my outward route I was soon back at the Melville Caves Picnic Area, by-passing the comforts of the ute though I crossed the access road and started what looked like a fairly daunting climb up to Melville Caves. This walk had received a little love maintenance wise and initially I found myself climbing a wide crushed granite path, however arriving at the start of what looked like a never ending series of steps it looked like the maintenance budget had run out. The steps were slowly being overgrown with long grass, with a helpfully placed bench seat half way up in danger of disappearing altogether. Pushing through the long grass I was pretty happy that I'd bought my gaiters on this stroll, the grass was playing havoc with my allergies. Climbing higher the views improved substantially as you would expect, looking down to the valley what caught my attention though was the approaching black clouds, today had been warm and overcast but it looked like things were going to get a it damper in the immediate future.

Evan the climb up to Melville Caves was fairly overgrown, if you look closely you'll see a bench being claimed by the long grass.

Seal Rock.

Climbing higher I started to pass some large caverns, in effect Melville Caves are really a cluster of different sized caverns between huge boulders. Melville Caves was initially home to the Jaara Jaara people before becoming infamous after European settlement as the hide out for the bushranger Captain Melville. Nowadays you can explore some of the caverns on a marked track complete with a fair bit of hardware to ease your passage and that's what I did. After another tight squeeze I found myself inside one of the larger caverns, with enough light coming in from cracks it was pretty easy to make my way through, but it was definitely interesting walking. Popping back out into the daylight again the walk was quickly coming to an end, after checking out the view from the lookout above the caves I started down the steep descent that would deliver me back to the ute, keen to get back before the clouds delivered on their promise. 

Looking back as I reached the caves I could see that there was a bit of weather heading my way.

Looking back down to Melville Caves Picnic Area from the caves.

Here we go again, time to wedge myself into the caves.

The Dirt.

Well I did manage to get back to the ute without getting wet, but I copped it on the drive home. I walked 9.4 kilometres on this stroll and climbed 433 metres, I'd rate this as a medium grade walk. For this walk I used some more of Melanie Balls notes and maps out of her book Top Walks in Victoria. This little state park looks like it might be suffering from a lack of a maintenance budget, some of the tracks a fairly overgrown, with sections of erosion and signposts missing it feels a bit neglected. All that said though it is very interesting walking at Kooyoora, especially if big rocks are your thing, just go prepared for some long grass and scrub crowding the track and you'll be right, oh yeah, and keep a bit of an eye on your map as track markers can be a little thin on the ground in spots. To be fair this section of Victoria has seen some extreme weather in the last few months which probably explains the amount of mozzies around and may explain some of the track maintenance issues.

Relevant Posts.

Imagining Ned, Bendigo, 2015

There is a little bit of hardware in the cave to make the journey easier.

Melville Caves Lookout.