Recently a group of 7 Geehi Bushwalking club members undertook a walk on the newest part of the Snowy Mountains Alpine Walk. This final section is now complete and joins the upper alpine sections to the lower sections on the Thredbo Valley Trail.
On the day we started at Smiggins Hole as we had been staying there for the weekend. We joined the cross-country ski trails at Pipers Gap, and made our way to the track head via parts of the 2.5km and 5km ski trails. This extra 4km took just over an hour and was actually quite pleasant, a good intro to the main event.
After crossing Rock Creek on the small bridge at a stream gauging weir we finally met the new track. The first impressions were that the signage at intersection with the Rock Creek track to Porcupine Rocks was excellent. Very clearly marked with good distance and time information.
So off we went, gently climbing and soon we were making our way between large boulders with good views around. Very photogenic. After skipping past the 5km cross country ski trail and eventually crossing the Porcupine Link trail our climbing for the day was done. It was then predominantly downhill from there to the finish.
The next highlight was at the 3km mark where we encountered a rather grand new viewing platform complete with benches made from massive old bridge beams. This gave us fine views all the way down the Thredbo Valley and beyond, including our destination at Bullocks Flat. It was a great spot for our early lunch.
Despite there being a significant descent, the track was not steep, in part due to the route heading a fair way north before turning almost back on itself. The next few kms were through changing vegetation culminating in a delightfully shady rest point alongside a stream. This was at 5.5km to go and more surprises ensued.
Over the next few kms there were some amazing suspended steel walkways and even an almost spiral staircase avoiding wetter areas. The effort to make these was evident with some large trees cleared in order to allow the prefabricated steel sections to be delivered by helicopter. Even getting access to walk up prior to the track being there would have been a struggle.
And then we arrived at the bottom. We met the Thredbo Valley Trail, crossed it and followed the river upstream for the final km before crossing on the Ski Tube train bridge. From here we made our way back to the trail head at the Ski Tube terminal car park to be met by our two drivers with cars for the more luxurious trip back to Smiggins.
So, in the end we walked 15km with 11km on the new track and a descent of almost 800m. Walk time was total of 6hours with rests.
This was highly successful as a day walk and well recommended, especially if a pick up can be arranged as there is a long car shuttle otherwise.