Tag Archive for 'Victoria'

At Home In Australia

I often get asked what our living conditions were like when my wife and I called Australia home.  It was actually quite good and we enjoyed every day we lived there.  We lived in very rural part of the Australian state of Victoria just north of Melbourne:

We lived in a older house, but it was more than nice enough for my wife and I:

DSCF2308

The house was quite large with four bedrooms and a large living room and kitchen:

126

124

The front yard of the house wasn’t very big, but was nicely landscaped:

DSCF3614

I really liked these flowers that grew in our front yard as well:

DSCF9058

We didn’t have much grass in the front of the house, but it was enough to attract the local wildlife for a bite to eat:

DSCF4549

These large birds are called emus and they can be found all over Australia, from the rain forests to the deepest Outback and obviously in my front yard.  Emus are the world’s second largest bird behind only Africa’s ostriches, but I do think they should have the honor for being the world’s ugliest birds though.  The adult emus may not win any beauty contests, but their babies are cute though:

DSCF4550

The emus are also very curious animals which was evident when one time I heard my wife screaming outside.  I opened up the door to see an emu trying to get inside the car with her:

DSCF4542

Another time I was watching TV in my living room when I heard the screen door open and I looked behind me to see an emu looking into my home.  The emu had opened up the screen door with his beak.  The emus are usually harmless, but if one got mad at you they could hurt you with their hard beaks so it is best to treat them as the wild animals that they are and give them their space.

Our front yard may have been relatively small, but our backyard was absolutely huge:

2008_0127australia20046

So big in fact that the local kangaroos just loved hanging out in our backyard:

2008_0511australia10004

This is an Eastern Grey Kangaroo, which can get up to 6 feet tall and 145 pounds size.  This kangaroo that used to hang out in my backyard was darn near that size:

2008_0511australia10005

Here is a smaller kangaroo that used to hang out in my backyard as well and he spent most of the day sprawled out like this sleeping, he was actually quite funny to watch at times:

2008_0602australia10090

The good thing about the kangaroos is that they kept the grass down, which meant I didn’t have to mow the grass:

2008_0602australia10084

If you look at my backyard in the above picture you can see a number of tree branches thrown around my backyard.  These branches are from the massive gum tree that grew in the backyard.  For whatever reason the cockatoos used to break the branches off with their beaks and literally throw at me when I would work in the backyard:

2008_0616australia10162

The cockatoos are large and extremely intelligent birds that love to entertain themselves sometimes at my expense by doing things like throwing branches at me:

2008_0708australia10035

The cockatoos that used to hang out in my backyard are known as Sulphur Crested Cockatoos due to the yellow crest they display on their heads:

2008_0708australia10039

As you can see I had a whole flock of these chicken size birds that loved hanging out in my backyard:

2008_0708australia10034

The cockatoos weren’t the only birds hanging out at our home as a variety of colorful birds call Australia home and they all seemed to end up in our yard:

DSCF5257

DSCF8819

DSCF8871

I also had some colorful flowers growing in my backyard as well:

DSCF8881

Then finally in my backyard we also got to often enjoy colorful sunrises:

2008_0321australia20006

As well as sunsets:

2008_0321australia20008

We obviously had a great time enjoying the scenery and wildlife around our home, which unfortuately our current home just can’t compare.

Picture of the Day: Victorian Sunset

DSCF2305

This picture was taken from the backyard of my house in the Australian state of Victoria.

Picture of the Day: Sun Over the 12 Apostles

This is one of the best shots I have seen of the 12 Apostles along Victoria’s Great Ocean Road.

Australia’s Twelve Apostles Now Down to Seven

The ferocious waves that crash into Victoria’s southwestern coast have continued to carve away at one of Australia’s most recognized landmarks:

THE Twelve Apostles are now the Seven Apostles. Neil Sander, a tour operator noticed that one of the remaining Apostles had fallen at just after 5pm yesterday.

And with the Grand Final today Mr Sander believes it could be an omen.

“The Geelong surf coast beats a Saint again,” he said.

“I went ‘oh my god’.”

He arrived on the scene with a tour group of nine people and instantly noticed the missing apostle.

But by the time the group had arrived there wasn’t much to see, according to Mr Sander.

“Just a little bit of rock sticking out. The water was murky too, almost an army green mixed with a creamy colour.”

The apostle was one of those nearest the Loch Ard Gorge and Port Campbell and just before the remains of the Island Arch formation.  [Herald-Sun]

If you haven’t already I highly recommend reading my prior posting of my visit to beautiful Port Campbell National Park, which is where the 12 Apostles are located.   There you can see great pictures like the one below of this beautiful coastline:

On Walkabout Video: From the Summit of Mt Buller, Victoria

Here is a video from the 1,805 meter summit of Australia’s Mt. Buller:

You can read more about my visit to Mt. Buller here.

On Walkabout On: Mt. Buller, Victoria

A place a have gone to many times that is a day trip away from Melbourne and yet feels like a world away is to the lovely Mt. Buller:

Mt. Buller is about a three hour drive from Melbourne and the closest major ski resort to the city.  The mountain is about a 45 minute drive from the small, but historic city of Mansfield that lies on the plain at the base of the mountain:

Mansfield and the Mt. Buller area is well known in Australia for its stockmen heritage that keep The Man from Snowy River legend alive:

Besides it stockmen heritage Mt. Buller is also famous for its wintry weather that provides some pretty good skiing for a mountain so close to Melbourne.  Here is a picture from the top of Mt. Buller during the ski season just last year:

This year the mountain received so much snow that the ski resort opened the earliest in its history.  In fact it is not uncommon for Mt. Buller to receive a dusting of snow even in the middle of the summer on Christmas Day:

Mt. Buller is the tallest mountain in the area, taller than both the nearby Mt. Stirling and The Bluff, but it is easily the most striking peak in the region with its 1,805 meter summit rising abruptly up from the plains that lies to the west.  The best thing about Mt. Buller is that anyone can access the mountain due to the well maintained paved road that goes to the ski resort on the top of the mountain:

During the ride of the winding road to the summit of Mt. Buller it was good to see how much the bushland around Mt. Buller has recovered from the 2006 bushfires which devastated the mountain and even threatened the ski resort:

Something that is quite humorous when driving up the mountain is to see the animal warning signs with kangaroos and wombats wearing skis:

And yes that is an American license plate on my Jeep you see.  It is possible to get an import license to ship your American vehicle to Australia for a limited amount of time like I did.

Besides the animal warning signs there is a gnome crossing sign as well:

And even a gnome home built into this gum tree:

No one has never accused Aussies of not having a sense of humor, that’s for sure.  After about a 30 minutes of driving up the winding and twisting road we got to the top of the mountain wear the ski resort is located.  Unlike American ski resorts that are located at the bottom of mountains, in Australia the ski resorts for the most part have to be located at the top of the mountain.  The Thredbo Ski Resort in the Snowy Mountains is the only resort I can think of that is actually located at the bottom of a mountain in Australia.

Anyway I drove through the resort and pulled into the parking lot where the trail head to the summit of Mt. Buller is located:

As you can see it is only a 4.1 kilometer round trip hike to the summit of Mt. Buller so it is a pretty easy stroll with some great views of the surrounding high country such as Mt. Buffalo in the far off distance to the north:

The trail begins with only a slight ascent up the mountain and eventually gets high enough to where my wife and I could make out the 1,749 meter (5,738 ft) summit of Mt. Stirling:

We also had a great view overlooking the Mt. Buller Ski Resort:

Mt . Buller was first skied in the 1920’s which back then there was no ski lifts to take skiers up the mountain.  It wasn’t until the 1950’s that a first generation lift system was built to help take skiers to the top of the mountain.  Today there are ski lifts that access every corner of the mountain.

Along the way up the trail it passes right by a one million gallon water basin that was constructed to provide water for the resort back in 1965:

Between snowmaking and water usage at the village the Mt. Buller Ski Resort uses 400 million liters of water a year.  The precipitation that falls on the mountain every year is not enough to meet that need thus there is a pumping station further down the mountain that pumps water up the mountain from Boggy Creek.

Here is a view of the summit of Mt. Buller from the reservoir:

On the top of Mt. Buller like other high country mountains in Victoria, grass lands is abundant because the higher altitude is generally too cold for trees to take root.  This abundant grassland is what made the Victorian high country such a prime cattle grazing spot in the summer months for the region’s stockmen.  Though the top Mt. Buller is mostly grass that doesn’t mean a few hardy gum trees weren’t able to take root at this high altitude:

These gum trees known as Snow Gums can only be found in Australia and have been found to grow at altitudes as high as 1,800 meters.  Past the snow gums the trail then starts to make a steep ascent up the mountain where we could really make out the rocky features of the mountain:

There are stairs that help make the ascent easier and at the very top is a fire look out that has an incredible view of hundreds of square miles of bush land in the region:

It is believed that the first westerner to climb Mt. Buller was the botanist Ferdinand Von Mueller in 1853.  He climbed the mountain as part of his expedition to record flora in the region.  At the time much of the flora had never been recorded by western scientists.  Some readers may remember that Von Mueller was also responsible for planting the variety of species of plants in the Town Hall Gardens of the then gold mining boom town of Beechworth just north of Mt. Buller.

From the summit of the mountain easily the most striking mountain that can be seen is the rugged slopes of the 1,725 meter high plateau known simply as The Bluff:

The next most prominent mountain would be Mt. Howitt, which rises to the East of Mt. Buller:

Off towards the south we both could make out the 1,482 meter (4,862 ft) summit of Lake Mountain that was devastated in early 2009 by the massive bushfires that also destroyed the beautiful town of Marysville at the base of the mountain:

Here is the view towards the north with Mt. Buffalo once again off in the distance:

Also towards north Mt. Cobbler can be seen.  Here is a closer look at this scenic mountain that I need to get around to climbing some day:

Finally here is the view looking towards the west which is dominated by grazing land and a few rolling hills which the rugged peaks of Mt. Buller slopes down towards:

There is actually a trail from the summit to where you hike down to the bottom of the mountain from here, but I just didn’t have the time to do so on this day, but I would love to do it some day in the future.  Mt. Buller is just one of those mountains I just never get tired of visiting and I’m sure most other people probably feel that way to once they get a chance to experience this great mountain.

On Walkabout Around: Mt. Stirling, Victoria

From the Mt. Buller area there are a number of four wheel drive trails I have taken my Jeep on that really provides some stunning views of the beautiful Victorian Alps.  I have taken the four wheel drive road from Mt. Buller that takes visitor to the beautiful campground at Sheepyard Flat along Howqua Creek.  Further down this road from the campground is the trail head to the hike up the massive plateau known as The Bluff that is absolutely excellent day out hiking. However by continuing by The Bluff the four wheel drive road actually becomes a circuit around the imposing Mt. Buller:

All along this road there are a variety of views of the scenic Mt. Buller which begins with views of this great mountain from the South:


Mt. Buller rises above the tree tops in the distance.


A closer look at the 1,707 meter (5600 ft) summit of Mt. Buller.

Also along the road are a number of other great views of the rugged Victorian Alps:

Along one of the spurs off the main four wheel drive road to Mt. Stirling is a road that descends steeply into a valley where there is a short trial to the Bindaree Falls:

The bush here was quite overgrown when I visited and the trail in need of some definite maintenance:

However, these conditions shouldn’t be too surprising considering how remote this area is.  When I got to the falls there really wasn’t much to see as there was just a trickle of water coming down the side of the rock outcropping:

There is a small natural cave here so I could definitely see at one time this place being used as a camp site for the Aborigines whenever they foraged deep into the Victorian Alps. 

If you haven’t noticed from the prior pictures, these mountains were hit with a severe bushfire back in 2006, but the forest continues to grow and recover with signs of life continuing to sprout out everywhere:

As the road goes further past The Bluff it actually loops back around Mt. Stirling which is famous for its Man From Snowy River fame. 


The 1,749 meter (5,738 ft) summit of Mt. Stirling in the distance.

As Mt. Stirling got closer and closer as we continued down the road, The Bluff behind us became less and less imposing:


The Bluff can be seen in the distance.

As I approached the slopes of Mt. Stirling the bushland was once again greatly burned due to the bushfires from two years prior, but still clearly the vegetation was making a come back. 

The drive along the slopes of Mt. Stirling just has some spectacular scenery to include one of the most rugged hikes in the Victorian Alps which is to Mt. Howitt and the hiking across the Cross Cut Saw:

Out in the very far northern distance I could even make out Mt. Buffalo:

Another prominent peak that can be seen is Mt. Cobbler:

Here is a closer look at the summit of this scenic, but isolated mountain deep in the Victorian Alps:

Along the road I came to the turn off to the Mt. Stirling summit and the road was sealed due to some work they were doing restoring the area so I didn’t have a chance to get to the top of the mountain, and instead would just have to make do with a picture of its summit from a far:

By now my wife and I had completely looped around Mt. Buller and were on the North side of the mountain which provided some great views of this peak:

From the North side I could even make out the Mt. Buller Ski Village on top the mountain.  During the summer time it is hard to believe this place gets enough snow during the winter to support skiiing, but it does:

All in all if you have a four wheel drive vehicle or even a vehicle which just a little ground clearance this trip around the mountain is a good day out.  Just make sure you bring some food and water in case you get stuck and definitley bring a good map to ensure you don’t get lost.  It is important to use common sense when driving or hiking in the Australian high country.

On Walkabout Video: On the Summit of Mt. Bogong, Victoria

Here is a short 360 degree video from the 1,986 meter summit of the tallest mountain in the Australian state of Victoria, Mt. Bogong:

You can read about my bushwalking trip to the summit of Mt. Bogong here.

On Walkabout On: Mt. Bogong, Victoria – Part 2

Prior Posting: Mt. Bogong, Victoria – Part 1
__________________________________________________________

As I ascended up the Staircase Spur of Victoria’s highest peak, Mt. Bogong I was beginning to actually get pretty tired because I had now been walking straight up for about three hours on this trail plus I was even beginning to feel the altitude a little bit due to my shortness of breath:

Anyway as I broke through the tree line and was rewarded with views of the surrounding Victorian Alps:

I may have had my first views of the walk, but I now had no trees to block the cool wind that was blowing over the treeless top of Mt. Bogong:

As I walked up the trail I couldn’t help, but imagine the Aborigines long ago walking up here in the summer time to scavenge among the rocks of this large mountain to find the bogong moths they loved to eat:

These moths have a high fat content and thus were very healthy for the Aboriginals to eat who did not have much fat in their diet.  The word bogong comes from the Aboriginal term “bogong” that is used to describe the rocky granite outcrops in the Victorian Alps and is thus this mountain’s namesake:

As I continued up the mountain I could see the summit of Mt. Bogong looming ahead of me, but this final stretch would be the most tiring of the entire hike due to the steep ascent and the continuing effects of the altitude.  Trust me, this is much steeper then it looks, but I do have to say that I liked the red color from the surrounding grasslands as I trudged up this ridgeline:

Often times when walking through the Australian bush like this I see plenty of wildlife and on this walk I had so far only seen birds.  It is not unusual for me to spot a wallabies or kangaroos while walking in the bush, but unfortunately on this trip I didn’t see any.  However, something I hadn’t seen before so high up above the tree line in the Australian Alps was a lizard:

I have no idea what kind of lizard this is, but it was living high up in the cool region of the high country.  I figured a lizard would want to live somewhere warmer, but I guess he has some how adapted to living at such a harsh climate.

Here is the view looking back down the ridgeline of the Staircase Spur that I had just hiked up:

Directly in front me at this point was a monument constructed in memory of the three skiers, George Gadsden, Edward Welch, and John McRae who got trapped in a blizzard on this mountain and died back in 1943:

Here is a closer up picture of the plaque on this memorial:

This wasn’t the first time people have perished in the freezing cold blizzards that hit the Victorian high country every year.  The most well known person to die on these mountains is probably a fella by the name of Cleve Cole who died on this mountain back in August 1936 and a hut on the mountain was constructed in his honor to assist any other skiers that get trapped in the area because of a blizzard.


Cleve Cole

There was no possibility of a blizzard happening on the summer day I hiked up Mt. Bogong, but there was plenty of dark clouds hanging around and the weather was quite cool.  It is not uncommon for snow storms to happen in the Australian high country even in the warmer months.

As I got towards the top of the mountain I actually walked right by a number of springs that had water bubbling up out of the mountain.  That crystal clear water I saw in the creeks further down the mountain all start up here in these springs:

With such springs and a vast grassland it is no wonder why the stockmen used to drive their cattle up here to graze during the summer months.  The stockmen can no longer graze in the high country any longer, which continues to be a point of contention in Australia due to many people thinking the stockmen are part of Australia’s natural heritage and that the grazing reduces the risk of fire danger.  The environmentalists on the other hand say the grazing harms the environment and so far the environmentalists have won out on this debate.

Just ahead of me I could see the cairn that represented the summit of this 1,986 meter (6,520 feet) mountain:

As I trudged up the last stretch of the trail I couldn’t help but be impressed by the rugged scenery around me:

And then finally I was on the top of the mountain and was rewarded with great views all around me.  For example I could see off in the distance to the south the most impressive peak of the Victorian Alps, Mt. Feathertop:

It had taken me about four hours to reach the summit of the mountain and this was actually the most tiring of all my hikes I have done in Australia.

Looking westward I could see the end of the ridgeline that composes Mt. Bogong.  If you look closely in the picture below in the distance on the far right of the photograph is Mt. Buffalo:

As can be seen in the above photograph as well is the fact that the weather was turning colder, windier, and cloudier which was my cue to get off the mountain before some nasty weather struck, but now before taking in one last view of the valley where the city of Mt. Beauty lies that I had saw earlier in the day when crossing over the Bright-Tawonga Road:

Finally something I found of interest on the summit of Mt. Bogong was these unusual yellow flowers I had never seen before on any of my hikes up in the high country:

I have no idea what type of flower this is or even if it is a native Australian species but it was an unusual plant I had never seen before except on the summit of Mt. Bogong.  So if anyone knows what plant this is feel free to leave a comment because I would like to know.

With the poor weather moving I hurried back down the mountain.  It had taken me four hours to get up the mountain and it only took me about 2.5 hours to get back down.  Counting the half hour I spent on the summit it was about a 7-8 hour day on the mountain and incredibly I had saw only one hiker, an older gentleman who had stayed at Cleve Cole Hut the prior night before hiking down today.  He thought I was nuts hiking up to the top of Mt. Bogong and back in one day, but I did it.  I have done tougher hikes before in Colorado so this wasn’t as bad, but I was still quite tired and I still had a four hour drive to get back home.  It was worth it though and I highly recommend everyone into bushwalking to take the time to hike the mountain, but I think next time I do it I will bring my sleeping bag.

On Walkabout On: Mt. Bogong, Victoria – Part 1

Australia’s southeastern state of Victoria has a number of great mountains to hike such as Mt. Buller, Mt. Buffalo, Mt. Macedon, Mt. Hotham, or Mt. Feathertop.  However, the state’s highest mountain Mt. Bogong at 1986 meters (6,520 feet) is also no where near as visited as much as the various other peaks I listed in Victoria.  A lot of this has to do with Mt. Bogong’s remote location in the Australian Alps.

Reaching Mt. Bogong takes about a four hour drive from Melbourne up the Hume Highway before getting off on the Great Alpine Road.  About an hour drive up the Great Alpine Road is a turn off to Mt. Bogong via the Bright-Tawonga Road.  This road twists and turns up the mountains where a lookout on the summit of this road provides spectacular views of Mt. Bogong:

From here it was just a short drive back down the mountain and across the valley the valley to the campground that the trail head is located at:

The campground like many areas in the Australian Alps was just extremely scenic and would just be a lovely place to spend a weekend camping.  However, on this trip camping wasn’t on my agenda, just getting to the top of Mt. Bogong was.  The trailhead at the campground is actually the beginning of a four wheel drive road known as Mountain Creek Road that takes bushwalkers to the actual trailhead to the top of Mt. Bogong, which was 2 kilometers away:

Due to the amount of rain that had fallen recently I wasn’t about to try and drive to the trail head on this muddy road:

Once I started walking further up the road, it actually began to dry out pretty well:

There was also a river crossing along the road where fortunately Parks Victoria was kind enough to build a bridge for hikers to walk across:

There are a number of streams that flow from the slopes of Mt. Bogong that need to be crossed along the trail and it is just incredible how clean this water is:

I usually drink some of the clean water while hiking around Australia and the water at Mt. Bogong is about as refreshing as it gets.  After trudging through mud and water along the four wheel drive trail, I finally came upon the trailhead to Mt. Bogong, which is known as Staircase Spur:

Six kilometers to the top of the mountain doesn’t seem that far, but as I would find out this was a long six kilometers because Staircase Spur did live up to its name because it was literally all up hill from here.

The first part of the trail took me through a very dense forest of gum trees:

I just love the smell of eucalyptus and it was especially strong in this forest.  These trees were no where near as big as the monsterous mountain ash trees in southern Victoria, but they were still scenic none the less.  There was also a lot of wildflowers that carpeted the side of the mountain as well to add a splash of color to the surrounding scenery:

Besides the incredibly lush foliage there was also a number of birds I could see and here in the bush around me such as this kookabura:

As I continued my steady ascent up the mountain I eventually came to a large section of the forest that had been scorched by a bushfire two years prior:

The forest was actually recovering really well from the fires as the Australian bush typically does.  About two hours into the hike I came to one of the cabins on Mt. Bogong that is free of charge for hikers to use:

These huts that are spread around Australia’s Alps are really one of the great features of hiking in Australia due to the safety and convenience they provide for bushwalkers.  I wasn’t staying at the hut but I sure was going to use it to take a break at because  I was actually pretty tired by the time I reached this hut due to the fact I had literally been walking for two hours straight up.

I stayed at the hut for about 30 minutes eating my lunch before heading back up the trail again.  Past the hut the trail becomes quickly engulfed with these scenic snow gums:

The further up the mountain I hiked the more the snow gums began to thin out thus providing with my first views of the hike:

As I broke through the tree line I could see I still had a long ways to go as the high ridgeline of Mt. Bogong loomed in front me:

Next Posting: Mt. Bongong, Victoria – Part 2