Mt Defiance Ridgetops Circuit, Great Otway National Park - February 2020

It was a walk of contrasts today, both in terrain and over head conditions.

With Melbourne and a fair slice of eastern Victoria still either burning, cloaked in smoke or locked up for recovery I looked west for a walk this week. After checking out Willy Weather and the BOM I decided to head down the Great Ocean Road to the Cumberland River to go for a stroll, hoping that I would be far enough west to avoid the smoke that had been hanging around Melbourne this week. Well it turned out there was some good news and some bad news on that front, arriving at the Cumberland River first thing this morning there was no smoke, although it had been replaced by low cloud and mist…still a good step forward in my books.

I set off under a grey and brooding sky this morning.

Parking in front of the Cumberland River Reserve I locked the ute and headed off up the Cumberland Track. This old 4wd track heads for the hills a few metres to the west of the Cumberland Reserve Office. Once on the Cumberland Track the hard work started immediately as I climbed away from the coast, although initially at least I had some views back over my shoulder down towards the coast to keep me interested. After twenty minutes or so of climbing though, I was enveloped in the mist and my world became a lot more claustrophobic…and would stay that way for hours as it turned out.

Looking back down towards the Cumberland River mouth from Cumberland Track.

The views across the Cumberland River valley were pretty sweet as I climbed.

Cumberland Track made for nice walking.

It wasn't long and I was in the mist.

After climbing over the 309 metre summit of Mt Defiance I set off on what was a long ridge walk. Now I’d like to tell you about the great views that I got as I shuffled along the ridge for the next 6 kilometres, however with the mist and cloud hanging around there were no views this morning. It wasn’t just mist and fog now, I was also walking through light misty rain, although after such a hot and dry summer some warm(ish) misty rain was quite enjoyable really. The walk along the ridge line on Cumberland Track eventually topped out at a little over 450 metres at the spot where Cumberland Track intersected with Curtis Road, although along the journey there was a fair bit of Toblerone style action, including one very steep and slippery descent.

Ridgetop walking along Cumberland Track.

Cumberland Track

Cumberland Track.

Once I'd met up with Curtis Road (another 4wd track) I was pretty well at the highest point on the stroll. Turning left I dropped easily down Curtis Road for 15 minutes until I once again turned left, this time onto Wye River Road. Wye River Road is more your traditional gravel road and it was as I dropped down here that I met a few other people out and about, although two mountain bikers and a 4wd hardly constituted a crowd, especially as I’d now been walking for the best part of four hours.

Dropping down Curtis Road the walking was still pretty good.

Wye River Road is more your traditional gravel road.

The view today from Wye River Road.

Wye River Road.

With the misty light rain continuing I arrived at Jamieson Track and set off left down this closed 4wd track towards the coast. Jamieson Track started off fairly gently before passing Godfrey Track and dropping very solidly down towards Bass Straight. It was while I was dropping down here that the mist slowly started to lift, well actually the mist hadn’t lifted it was just that I’d once again dropped low enough to emerge from it. With some views both down to the ocean and across distant ridge lines the scenery side of the day was suddenly looking up.

Jamieson Track was a little overgrown to start with....

...although things were clear enough mostly.

Easy going down Jamieson Track.

The next ridge line to the south-west looks like it was burnt in the huge Wye River fire of December 2015.

My first glimpse of the coast line that I'd be walking for the next couple of hours didn't look overly promising.

I was pretty interested in the coast line view too. The reason I was keen to check out the coast was that I was hopefully going to be walking it back to the Cumberland River and I’d never heard of anyone walking it before. Peering down through the gloom from up on Jamieson Track things down along the coast looked a little daunting, Bass Straight seemed to be throwing everything it had at the cliff line and it didn’t look like there was going to a lot of dry real estate to walk on. After dropping down the last few hundred metres of Jamieson Track I passed through the national park camp that was in the middle of a renovation and then emerged at the Great Ocean Road…right next to the ‘road closed’ and ‘no un-authorised entry’ signs….hmmm. It seems that almost every walk I do lately either the tracks or the parks are closed.

There was a bit of renovation action going on at the national park camp ground.

The faint line in the cliffs is the Great Ocean Road.

Bass Strait was living up to its reputation today.

The bottom end of Jamieson Track - it seems like every walk I do at the moment is closed!

Once down on the small beach at the Jamieson Creek mouth I pulled up a rock, had a bit of a break and sussed out the situation. I’d already walked over 18 kilometres, most of it in light rain, I still had 4 or 5 kilometres to go along the coast to get back to the ute…4 or 5 kilometres that may or may not be do-able. Now I had sussed this bit of the walk out before leaving home, having a very close look at the satellite photos and checking out the tide times. The aerial photos didn’t show any obvious problems, although everything looks easier from space I suppose! With low tide at around 4pm things had looked about as promising as they could be really as far as the tide went, although the rough as guts, huge swell that was pounding the coast gave me reason to pause a little.

The over head conditions out in Bass Strait looked better. That's the Jamieson Creek mouth.

Heading north-east along the coast the easy sand walking only lasted for a few minutes.

Walking across these rocks isn't easy.

Progress was still being made.

Normally I'm checking out ship wrecks on those coastal walks...on this one I was checking out rusting engine blocks and differentials - I hope they had their seat belts on when the launched off the Great Ocean Road!

After carefully analysing the situation I set off along the coast anyway. The sand lasting for only a few minutes before I arrived at the rocks. Now sometimes walking these coastlines I get lucky and find myself walking extensive rock platforms…. Yeah, Nah, not on this walk though. Well there were some rock platforms, however there were also a lot of very, very rough rock walking, either over beaches of round boulders or long sections along jagged rocks. To make this walk a little tougher there was very little dry land, especially where the Mt Defiance Cliffs met the coast, which meant that not only was I having to scramble but also in a couple of spots I was having to keep an eye on the swell to keep my boots dry.

I got lucky occasionally and had some rock platforms to walk.

Looking back towards the Jamieson Creek mouth, things looked a little...grim!

Looking forward things weren't a lot cheerier either.

The geology of these cliff lines is interesting, it looks like its a mix of Conglomerate Rock and Sandstone.

Passing below Mt Defiance dry real estate was getting a little valuable.

A quick look at the map (although I’m not sure anyone bothers looking at my maps except me;) and a lot of people would be thinking that ‘this Feral bloke is a bit of a wanker, the Great Ocean Road is only a couple of millimetres away’….and they’d be right, well at least about the wanker bit…but I digress. Yes, the Great Ocean Road is very close and quite often I could see the tourists tootling along in their SUV’s, however between the coastline and the road there is a cliff…a big and high cliff….a big and high cliff that there was no way I was going to be climbing. Occasionally the cliff line did finish for short stretches to be replaced by very steep scrub and blackberry lined gullies, I suppose if things did go really pear shaped I could of escaped up one of these gullies but it wouldn’t of been pleasant.

The waves surging over these rock platforms looked pretty sweet.

Bass Strait was wild today.

After rounding Mt Defiance things opened up a little...it was still slow walking though.

I haven’t mentioned the weather down here on the coast yet, while it had been misty rain up in the mountains down at water level it was vey warm and humid, while I was mostly walking in a sea mist I could see Bass Straight bathed in sunshine a little off shore. Now normally I’d be a little peeved with grey overhead conditions, however this afternoon the contrast between the mist covered mountains and cliffs and the blue ocean seemed to work for me a bit. The rough swell of Bass Straight was also helping my photos a bit too, the waves surging up and over rock shelves looking particularly sweet.

Looking back down the coast, the contrasting over head conditions were obvious. 

Ahead of me out towards Bass Strait things looked completely different. 

The hard walking returned as I got closer to the Cumberland River mouth.

It doesn't look like much however scrambling over these rocks is slow going. I've just scrambled down off this one which to give it some perspective, is around 3 to 4 metres high.

I was walking almost directly beneath the Great Ocean Road again now.

Like last week’s walk from Fingal To Cape Schanck my coastal route seemed to get progressively rougher the further I went this afternoon, now this was a little concerning as I’d already walked around 20 kilometres by now today and was pretty well rooted tired, I certainly wouldn’t of wanted to rock hop my way back to Jamieson Creek and then walk the Great Ocean Road. So I was more than a little relieved when I rounded one more headland to suddenly see other people on the coast, figuring that I would be the only one stupid enough to have walked too far to get here I assumed that they must of come from the Cumberland River…and for once I was right.

The walking was rough as guts however the scenery was pretty sweet.

I stopped to look back over my shoulder again - I might never come back here so I wanted to take it all in and remember it.

Almost at the same time as my boots touched the sandy beach near the Cumberland River mouth the sun emerged from the clouds above me and I was able to get a few blue sky shots. The Cumberland River Reserve is a large and popular camping area and there were many people out this afternoon and it was slightly surreal for me to suddenly see so many other people after so long on my own today. Passing the beach side crowds I wandered up the west side of the river, carefully crossed the Great Ocean Road and arrived back at the overflowing car park. Time to head home.

I've just noticed some people on the small rocky outcrop in the distance, this was the first time I was reasonably confident that I'd make it.

Hey, hey, I'd made it.

The Cumberland River.

The Dirt.
I walked 23.4 kilometres and climbed 870 metres on this extreme walk. Yep, I’ve dusted off my extreme rating again. This walk is tough, while the climb up into the Otway Ranges is hard and long enough, it was the coastal section that was the next level stuff. It looks like the coast is only walkable very close to low tide (maybe 90 minutes each side), the dodgiest section is the bit closer towards the Cumberland River. Even with a favourable tide the coast requires some moderate scrambling and a fair understanding of tides and swell, not to mention the ability to move over very rough ground fairly quickly and efficiently. What was pretty easy today was the navigation, once I picked up Cumberland Track I basically just kept turning left until I arrived back at the ute, 23 kilometres later. I used the notes and map out of the House of Chapman’s Walking the Otways written by the Geelong Bushwalking Club, the notes and maps in this book only cover the inland section of the stroll though.

Relevant Posts.
Skenes Creek Circuit, 2019.
Lorne Forest Walk, Great Otway National Park, 2017.

Cumberland River mouth.

The sun came out for good now.

Cumberland River

There is normally plenty of parking here, although it was very busy today. There is another car park on the other side of the bridge on the Great Ocean Road.