Beechworth Historical Park
Tyrone Thomas, along with John Siseman is one the pioneers of bushwalking notes in Australia. Tyrone's old books were the books that I first used when venturing into the bush in the early days of my walking career. Tyrone's old hand drawn maps allowed my imagination to run wild as I visualised the creeks, cliffs and beaches. Walking guides have come along way since those old days with the Chapman and Mr Tempest guides in particular lifting the quality of the notes and maps. I've still got all of Tyrone's old books though and every now and again I'll blow the dust of one and set off to explore some long forgotten walk. Half the fun of using the old notes is seeing if the routes are still followable as tracks have overgrown, bridges washed away, townships have encroached and bushfires have destroyed the bush. This stroll is one of those exploratory walks, while it was scenically pretty enough the challenge of following the old route was really the main attraction for me this morning.
After a night of solid rain I arrived at the start of the stroll to be greeted by weak sun light. I followed the left hand track here as per Tyrone's old notes. The new route goes off to the right.
After brekky with Sam at our accommodation I grabbed my pack and pulled on my boots before setting off to find the start of this walk. If I was going to write up this walk then I'd probably start the notes at the Chinese Park below the spillway of Lake Sambell and head off from there, however as I was following Mr Thomas' old notes I started the walk at the spot where Peach Drive crossed over Silver Creek, adding around four kilometres to my walks distance. First up this morning I followed a grassy pad on the north side of Silver Creek passing between a nice wetland area and the creek, although now days the signposted track leading towards Lake Kerford heads along the south side of the creek. After crossing the first road my pad re-joined the official Parks Vic route at a suspension bridge and everything was clear for awhile.
Initially I followed a bit of a minor pad out of town...
... before picking up the sign posted route.
Walking out of town along Silver Creek.
Silver Creek
As the track leaves town it passes through extensive old gold mining diggings.
The light was pretty good this morning.
I was still following the official track at this stage.
Now I mentioned that Parks Vic have signposted a track heading out to Lake Kerferd, however I was pretty sure the signposted track wasn't going to align with my 25 year old notes. After passing out of town and crossing Silver Creek a couple of times I arrived at the second caravan park and things got a little more exciting (it doesn't take too much in my Feral world!). My notes told me to climb away from the creek up a spur however the signpost was sending me across the creek into the caravan park. With my OCD kicking in I decided to push on with Tyrones old notes and climb the open spur. The good news was that obviously I wasn't the only walker to head this way in the last 25 years as there was a pretty good pad to follow...initially.
After the second crossing of Silver Creek the track passed through another extensively mined area.
Most of the mine shafts are fenced.
Some of the shafts have grates over them as the track goes over the top.
Just before the third crossing of Silver Creek I picked up this old pad and climbed a spur away from the creek.
Beechworth Historical Park
Yes, I say initially as after climbing the spur for a few minutes I dropped into an area with extensive gold mining workings. On my mud map this is called Pattersons Dam and making my way through these old workings required a little improvisation. Apart from the fact that I had to be careful of any of the open mine shafts that were scattered around the area there was also the fact that the pad had pretty well disappeared and it looks like the Parks Vic folks had removed the bridges. Normally these creeks up here wouldn't have provided much of an issue as they are pretty small however it had basically pissed down with rain for the whole night so this morning even these little creeks were flowing a banka. Still, with my dead cat like reflexes and dementia enhanced intuition I managed to make it through the old diggings and climbed away from the dam area onto a pretty, grassy 4wd that bordered what looks like some private land.
After a fairly easy climb I dropped down towards Pattersons Dam.
Pattersons Dam
Climbing away from Pattersons Dam my grassy track met up with some private land.
Following the old track I had private land to my right and native bush on my left.
Soon enough my grassy track intersected with the signposted track again and everything was sweet in my Feral world as I once again shuffled my way towards Lake Kerford. Now in hindsight things might have been too sweet because as I ambled my way along this 4wd track gently climbing up a ferny valley, pretty content with life, I started to suspect that once again I was off my intended route. After passing by a few buried pipeline signs I started to suspect that I was climbing Pipeline Track (yes, I'm smart as well as good looking...and modest!). Now Pipeline Track was on this mornings itinerary although I was meant to be descending it from Lake Kerford rather than climbing it to the lake, hmm. Seeing that I was almost at Lake Kerford by the time I realised my navigational conundrum I decided to push on and reverse this section of the walk and return to Beechworth via my intended outward route along Kerford Track.
Hey, hey...I've re-joined the official route again.
Apart from the town and native bush views this walk also features a bit of rural land.
It was around here when I decided to have a good look at my map and I realised that I was actually following my return route.
Climbing Pipeline Track this morning wasn't the worst thing I've ever done.
With the rock retaining wall of Lake Kerford in view through the trees I left Pipeline Track and followed an old track before climbing up the sloping retaining wall. Now Mr Thomas says to wade a shallow road ford here and that all sounds easy enough ....except that upon arriving on the top of the dam wall I discovered that there is no road...or ford...No, however there was a spillway complete with running water between me and the far bank. Now I'm nothing if not determined (or stupid maybe) so instead of doing what most other people would do and retrace my outward route back down to Beechworth I set about working out a way to cross the spillway. Crossing the spillway on the top of the dam wall wasn't going to be an easy option as there was a 2 metre high fence to get around so I started to look a little further down stream. Dropping down the dam wall I reached the spot where I could get around the fence, and after scrambling down the rock wall I was able to get into the spillway. Thankfully the spillway is around twenty metres wide here so while there was a fair bit of water coming down it was spread fairly thin and with a little judicious foot placement I managed to successfully negotiate the crossing with dry boots.
After climbing up onto the Lake Kerford retaining wall I had to negotiate the spillway!
Once in the spillway I climbed to to the lip for the infinity pool shot across Lake Kerford.
With the old road ford gone I accessed the spillway by dropping down below the concrete wall. Obviously this needs to be assessed by taking in the amount of water flowing down, along with your ability to scramble in and out of the spillway.
Once back on dry land on the northern side of the dam wall I soon found what remains of the old road and after taking a couple of photos over the mirror like surface of Lake Kerford I set off to find my way back to Beechworth. After climbing north away from the lake for a couple of minutes I arrived at the signposted Kerford Track, everything was going suspiciously well now as I followed the undulating Kerford Track back towards Beechworth. Kerford Track was bit of a mixed bag really, while the walking itself was pretty good the Blackberry infestations, particularly near the start, were pretty bad. Eventually Kerford Track started to climb up a broad spur northwards, when some cleared private land came into view I took a track signposted no through road to the east, according to my map this track is called Dixons Track although there was no signpost up here.
Once safely across the spillway I soon picked up the remains of the road Mr Thomas talks about.
Lake Kerford
Lake Kerford
Kerford Track was a mixture of beautiful native bush mixed in with the occasional outbreak of Blackberries.
Open forest along Kerford Track.
Kerford Track
Beechworth Historical Park
Dixons Track slowly dropped me back down towards Hurdle Creek (Pipeline Track had climbed this valley on the way up to the lake). Like Kerford Track, Dixons Track was a mixed bag, there was some fine native bush mixed in with some invasive species. It wasn't just the weeds that were annoying me down here though, there were a couple of informal bush camps that were less than pristine. One of these camps even had an informal shooting range set up, my responsible shooting mates having blasted the shit out of a tree with their 12 gauge and a .22 - the tree must of been some kind of a threat I guess. Once through the old camp the old 4wd track pretty well disappeared, however just as my track was fading away I met another overgrown track running down a gully and a few minutes later I was on the bank of Hurdle Creek. Looking across the creek I could see my outward route around twenty metres away.... the only issue was that there was a creek between me and the track I needed to get onto....however there was a bridge...unfortunately the bridge looked very, very dodgy. Stepping onto to the dilapidated bridge it was obvious that I wouldn't be walking across here this morning, the dilapidated bridge was on a 25˚ angle and the wood was as slick as ice. After ruling out the possibility of fording the creek (it was possible however the banks were close to vertical and a couple of metres high), I decided to cross the bridge using the tried and true shuffle across on hands and knees approach, yep it wasn't very elegant or dignified but I managed to shimmy my way across safely.
The un-signposted Dixons Track was also a bit hot or miss when it came to the scenery.
The good...
... the bad...
... and the ugly!
I used the patented Feral hands and knees technique to cross over Hurdle Creek.
Once across Hurdle Creek I retraced my steps back down Pipeline Track for a few minutes. Instead of following my outward route back through the Patersons Dam area I decided to follow the signposted route back into town now. The marked route followed the old 4wd track passed some rural properties before contouring along beside Silver Creek and passing some big old mine sites. Approaching the caravan park my route crossed and then re crossed Silver Creek before I once again met up with my outward route. With the predicted afternoon rain looking like it was going to arrive on schedule I now shuffled my way the last couple of kilometres back into town with a little more urgency. Arriving back at our accommodation just as the rain started I spent a very nice afternoon relaxing with Sam in front of the fire. I didn't know it then but we were about to go into our second period of lockdown so I'm thinking that it might be awhile before we get to do this stuff again.
Apart from the birds there was also quite a few Roos and Wobblies around this morning - although they all proved pretty elusive when I tried to photograph them.
Back on the official track again.
Have I mentioned the mining history... ?
The Dirt.
I walked 13.2 kilometres and climbed 311 metres on this stroll - add another 2 kilometres each way if you walk from the centre of Beechworth. Due to the navigational conundrums along with the physical difficulties of negotiating some of the trickier sections I'd have to rate the walk as I did it a medium-hard grade walk. Like I mentioned earlier I used some of Tyrone Thomas' old notes and mud maps out of the 1995 edition of his 120 Walks in Victoria book. The geology here is pretty remarkable I think, on the north side of Beechworth there is a fair bit of sparse forest featuring more stunted trees like Cypress Pines. On this side of Beechworth the forest is taller and wetter and seems to feature a lot of Manna Gums and ferns. Some of my regular reader would know that I sometimes pose the rhetorical question to myself of would I do this walk again? Now more often than not my answer is yes, however asking this question of myself today I'd have to say no. The main attraction of this walk for me was just the challenge of reworking Tyrones old notes and I won't need to revisit these notes for another 25 years I'm thinking - If anyone wants to walk from Lake Sambell to Lake Kerford then stick to the signposted track I think - it's a better walk.
Relevant Posts.
I'd probably stick to this official route if I ever revisit this walk.
Heading back into town I passed by some grazing bin chickens.
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