7 September 2013 - Horsham Caravan Park, Horsham, Victoria

Today is The Day, long awaited by Australians everywhere and those who take an interest even if they are not eligible to take part in the electoral process. I have already mentioned in past postings that my husband and I are political tragicks, and have taken a keen interest in the carryings-on of the Federal Parliament here in Australia. In fact it is a great shame that someone who has made such a study (or hobby) over the past couple of years should not be allowed to vote when there are eligible voters who do not even know the name of the leader of the opposition! I was dead envious of Chris when he voted early at Port Augusta.

It was interesting to see this morning on the television, that while television advertising has not been allowed for the past twenty four hours, the candidates can stand outside the polling booths bold as brass, handing out “How to vote” instructions and encourage the undecided to vote for them. And the television and newspaper journalists can regurgitate all the campaign highlights and interview the party leaders and any other political spokespeople which means that the undecided or fence sitters can be influenced right up until they tick or mark the voting paper. And the campaign hoardings all remain up too! All quite strange. Anyway we have a bottle of wine in the fridge and a packet of chocolate coated almonds at the ready, although I am not sure that I understand Chris’s rational for the latter. Fortunately the rugby test is being screened at a delayed time so we might be able to have our cake and eat it too.

Earlier I had woken to happy birdsong and thought for a moment the rain had moved; alas, there was more, noisily on the roof and when we peeked through the blinds, we were surrounded in rain mist.

Views from the top

Mid-morning after I had machine dried all the laundry, the day started to clear and by the time we were on the road to Natimuk and beyond, the sun had come out and the remaining clouds were few. On reaching the Mt Arapiles-Tooan State Park, we drove up the summit road and were treated to superb 360 degree views all around the area, over many square kilometres of cropping patchwork, with the occasional sheep grazing country and the one dairy unit we had passed just east of Natimuk, at Quantong. We were amazed to see so many lakes, none of which we had seen on the maps of the area, until later I checked an old one I had, and sure enough, there they all are like a bad case of acne scattered right through the region, many shown as dry lakes, but today all looked as if there were either full or partly so.

We walked to the lookouts at the summit, around another track to Melville Cave, a large hole high up on the ragged cliff and then around the nature walk. This latter is supposed to take half an hour and there is a leaflet available to explain all the points of interest. We did the walk in about ten minutes, I rushing along behind Chris not quite as fast as the biting insects that thought he was just too tasty to be ignored. Needless to say all walks after that were done in clothing to our wrists despite the increasing warmth of the day.

Fascinating formations

We then drove down to Centenary Park, the camping area of the State Park, and found dozens of small tents already set up, and few people. It turned out that most were up in the rocks, climbing the famed peaks, cliffs, crags, gullies, buttresses; in fact any one of the 3,000 climb "lines" they chose. The climbs have names like Voodoo Gully, Rats Alley, The Pharos, Curtain Wall, Yesterday Gully, Death Row Pinnacle, The Organ Pipes, Pilot Error Wall, Castle Crag, and so on. The rocky mountain outcrop is very impressive even to the non-climber and we spent over two hours watching climbers on three lines on the Organ Pipes, something we had never done before. We were most impressed with the bulk and weight of gear the climbers each carried with them, and were given the opportunity by the senior citizen climber later to feel the weight of it all. And the interesting thing is that these climbers only carry their gear and perhaps a bottle of water; think about those who carry their camping gear on their backs!

Crazy but competant climbers

True mountaineers discovered Mt Arapiles as a climbing mecca in 1963, but it was not until the later 1960s that word got out and the mountain started to unlock its secrets to the serious climbers. At the end of 1967 there were 230 routes on the Mount, today there are about 3,000. There is apparently about one climbing fatality every two years; of the injuries I know not.

Chris was offered the opportunity however another climber had earlier suggested we call at the place in town that offers climbing tours or trials. Chris said he was too old to give it a first shot and my back is definitely too dicey at the moment to be trying such high jinks so we were quite happy to watch. In fact the first of the climbers we observed were all women, a couple of friends and a mother and daughter couple, this second couple climbing a Grade 14 climb (1 is easy and 35 is the hardest). The mother was obviously enormously experienced and the daughter had been brought up to follow in her footsteps. Another climber arrived with his climbing partner and told us he had been climbing for forty seven years. His partner assured us that she was older than she looked which caused us much tantalising discussion. 

Finally we pulled ourselves away and headed back home, so glad we had delayed our day to this park, the weather so perfect for the scene today.