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| Looking towards the Taipan Walls from the ledge on Hollow Mountain. |
Hollow Mountain or Mount Wudjub-Guyun as the local indigenous people called this lump of sandstone has featured on my blog three times in around the last 12 months, so finding something a little fresh to photograph and waffle on about was always going to be a bit of a challenge. I had a few things up my sleeve on today’s visit though. The first point of difference on this day was that I was playing tour guide to my Queensland friend Jane, aka Ms Extreme of the great
Mildly Extreme Blog. The second point of difference today was we decided to include the short walk out to the Gulgurn Manja Rock Art site which added a bit of variety for very little effort.
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| The drive up to the Grampians in the early morning is always a good one, the east facing cliffs of Mt William and the Major Mitchell Plateau normally catch the morning sun. |
One thing that wasn’t any different to my normal Saturday routine was the early start, once again I was on my way before 5am for the drive over to the Grampians National Park. After picking up Ms Extreme on the way and stopping for a quick breakfast we arrived at the Hollow Mountain Carpark in a cloud of dust around 10am, time to start walking. I generally try and avoid the Grampians over the warmer months because it can be baking hot walking across the inevitable rock slabs, however with Jane only down in Victoria for a short time we didn’t have much option today.
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| Heading off this morning there are still a few wildflowers(or are they weeds?) in view beside the track. |
Meandering up the good walking track past some nice Grass Trees we arrived at the start of the rock slabs, from now until we returned to this spot in an hour or so we’d be continuously walking on sandstone. Ms Extreme possibly hasn’t done quite as much walking as me but I think she’s way fitter, a fact that was confirmed as she powered up the first incline stopping only to take another of her signature macro shots. No matter how many times I visit this area I never get sick of walking here, the towering rocky turrets and huge red cliffs always tend to flatter my photographic ability, and today was no different and I was definitely enjoying showing this magic spot off to my interstate guest.
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| Climbing the first scrambly bit, the views improved quickly. |
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After climbing for awhile we arrived at the first scramble of the walk, here the Hollow Mountain route climbs steeply up a rock shelf beneath an overhanging cliff. Now Ms Extreme has never really done any real scrambling in her walking carer so arriving at the bottom of this shelf was a little confronting for her. Stopping at the bottom for a minute to gather her thoughts we were soon scrambling our way successfully up past the dodgy section, Jane taking to scrambling like a duck to water after a few early nerves.
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Once past the first scramble we climbed up this sloping shelf towards the cliffs of Hollow Mountain.
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Once up the first short scramble the route climbs a large sloping shelf towards the cliffs that buttress Hollow Mountain itself, as you would expect the views along here were now getting quite extensive. With the morning already getting pretty warm we climbed the last few metres to the cliff line where we had a choice, following the painted arrows to the right would lead us to the top of what the National Parks people call Hollow Mountain, however we decided to head left instead into the cave that leads to the top of the rock slab that Tyrone Thomas named Hollow Mountain way back in the day. To be accurate Mount Wudjub-Guyun or Hollow Mountain isn’t really an actual mountain, it’s really an incredibly rocky and rugged spur that runs off the nearby Mt Stapylton, but hey, who really cares? What it definitely is though is great fun!
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My first peek over to the Taipan Walls.
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| I love the textures of this place. |
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Sitting in the entrance to the cave for a few minutes we had a bit of a drink as I filled in Ms Extreme about what was to come, this next section would be the crux of the mornings walk. Suitably refreshed we headed off into the mountain. While definitely not technical in nature the first section of the climb up Hollow Mountain is the bit that I dislike the most, my discomfort caused by the need to squeeze my well padded frame through a very narrow slot on an angle of about 70˚, thankfully I managed to shimmy through successfully today, only losing a little bark from my knees, looking back I saw Ms Extreme employ a novel rolling technique which got her through the squeeze a lot easier than I seemed to have managed.
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Ms Extreme using her patented rolling technique to get through the squeeze section.
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We now started to climb up a series of sloping ledges inside the mountain. The climb up here is pretty straight forward really, thankfully the spray painted arrow that some tool had defaced the rock with has now been removed (god I hope the dickhead that spray painted the cave didn’t find out about this spot from my blog). Stopping at one of the the cave openings I got the money shot of Jane gazing out across the rugged landscape, this must be the signature Mount Wudjub-Guyun photo I think. From the picture window it’s not far until we got to what, technically speaking is the hardest bit of the climb. Here we crossed a narrow rock rib before climbing out of the mountain onto a very high, slightly negative ledge. Ms Extreme was now pushing her limits as we made our way along the ledge to the next scramble up onto the summit area, after showing her where to place her feet and hands and providing a little comforting support Jane had soon scrambled her way up to the relative safety of the summit. Scrambling up behind her we picked our way through the convoluted rocky terrain to arrive at the dry tarn that is as good as anywhere to stop for awhile on the summit, while I rock hopped around the numerous rocky outcrops Jane kicked back and I’m guessing, soaked up the euphoric feeling that comes from completing something that pushed her limits.
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I love this shot...
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Climbing the honeycomb like insides of Hollow Mountain. (Jane's photo)
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Looking over to the summit of Mt Zero from near the top of Hollow Mountain.
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I scrambled around taking a few photos...
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| ...while Ms Extreme kicked back and enjoyed the view. |
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With the day heating up a bit and a fair bit of walking still to go we retraced our route back down through the mountain and out of the cave onto the broad sloping shelf. Instead of heading back down towards the carpark we set off along the tourist walk following the painted arrows to the top of the ‘other’ Hollow Mountain. As you would expect the climb up the marked track is a lot easier than the climb up through the middle of the mountain, it might be ‘easy’ but that doesn’t mean that it’s not good, the views of The Taipan Walls below Mt Stapylton make for one of the best photos of the walk. Not only is the view across to Mt Stapylton pretty sweet but the summit area provides a very airy view across to the summit and ledge that we had climbed half an hour ago.
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Heading towards the tourist summit.
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The view over to Mt Arapiles.
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| The Taipan Walls |
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After exploring the rocky summit for awhile we reluctantly started dropping back down to the ute, Ms Extreme now almost bounding down the rocks that an hour or so early had caused a little bit of consternation. Returning to the carpark we didn’t head straight to the air conditioned comfort of the ute though, instead we headed back off into the scrub to check out the Gulgurin Manja Rock Art shelter. The Jardwadjali People enjoyed this beautiful spot over the years, no doubt gazing out over the wide open expanses of the shimmering Wimmera Plains as they enjoyed the cool shade of the overhang.
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Mt Zero
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Being fairly close to roads unfortunately the Parks people have had to fence off the overhang to stop
dickheads ignorant people defacing the art, a fairly frustrating but unfortunately necessary action. The fence thankfully had a few slots to poke my camera through, although there’d be no framing these shots. The walls and roof of the cave here feature ochre stencils of children's hands mostly, the name Gulgarin Manja actually translates to Hands of Young People in English. Apart from the hand stencils the cave also features stencils of Emu and Kangaroo prints among a few other things. My extensive research into this subject has Professor Google telling me that some of the indigenous art in the surrounding area has been dated back up to 22,000 years but the actual art at Gulgurn Manja Shelter hasn’t been dated.
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The bush here is recovering well from some serious fires that ripped through a few years ago.
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Gulgurn Manja Rock Art Site
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| Gulgurn Manja translate to Hands of Young People in English. |
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With the day now fairly warm we headed back to the air conditioned comfort of the ute and headed home. I’m hoping Ms Extreme enjoyed her whistletop tour of Gariwerd, I certainly enjoyed showing her around my home state a bit. After dropping Ms Extreme off and saying our goodbyes until next time we meet up, I headed the rest of the way back home arriving just before dark after what had been a fairly long, but very rewarding day.
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The Gulgurn Manja Shelter is located at the base of this large rock outcrop.
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| There would of been worse places to set up camp 6000 years ago. |
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The Dirt.
According to Mr Thomas’ notes we walked around 4.2 kilometres and I’m totally guessing, but we probably climbed 300 metres or so….maybe, my GPS is even more unreliable than normal when it’s in a cave! Like I mentioned in my last post about Mount Wudjub-Guyun I’d rate this as a medium grade walk, but the medium grade is only really due to the scrambling (and route finding) involved. As I’ve eluded to, the elder statesman of Australian bushwalking Mr Tyrone Thomas has written this walk up, it’s in numerous editions of his old books. More recently Mr Tempest has also written it up as part of his Hollow Mountain to Mount Stapylton walk. Mount Wudjub-Guyun is at the extreme northern end of the Grampians National Park and it can get baking hot up here on the bare rock in the warmer months, so come prepared.
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