Arve Plains

Thursday 11th December 2014

Huon River

As the name suggests, Arve Plains is near the Arve River and is on the southern side of the Huon River. To reach the walk start, drive out from Judbury, past the Southwood Mill, over the bridge on the Huon River and turn right into Edwards Link Road and follow this to park opposite a large quarry. Edwards and Edward Link Roads connect Southwood Road to the Tahune Air walk and are good gravel roads.

4WD track near the start

After parking the car I walked along Edwards Link Road to a track that headed off in a northerly direction. This track had been used by 4WDs and was quite eroded in places with some puddles. I found the track that parallels the river and walked along it to find a track heading off north once again. I was hoping that this would lead down to the river, and it did, almost anyway. It lead across the plains where there were areas of black soil.

Black soil country on Arve Plains

The track stopped abruptly about 100 metres short of the river, so I scrub bashed down to the waters edge. The river was quite picturesque and I stopped for a few minutes enjoying the view.

Huon River

Huon River

I retraced my steps back to the main track with the intention of following it to gain access to the junction of the Weld and Huon Rivers. I reached a point where the scrub didn't appear to be too thick, so I headed across country to eventually come out right at the junction. Both rivers were flowing reasonably well and I found a good log down on the waters edge to have a sit and a snack.

Weld (straight ahead) and Huon Rivers

Weld and Huon Rivers

Huon River

Huon River

Nice tall trees at the junction

From here I walked back to the track and carried on until the track came to a sudden halt. I searched around for another track, but without success, so I started heading back to the car via an alternate track and finally Edwards Link Road. I have since looked on Google Earth and it appears that I was not far from another track which appears to head west down to another section of the river. Another day.
This was an enjoyable, easy and fairly flat short walk with lovely views of the river.
Distance: 10.4 kms.
Time: 3'30"
Ascent: 170 metres
Click here to download GPX file.

Arve Plains

Mount Frederick

Track heading towards the river junction

Eddy Creek Karst

Saturday 15th November 2014

Largest Cave

I have been going to do this walk for some time and decided that today would be a good day for it. For those who don't know, a karst is a limestone or dolomite region in which erosion has produced fissures, sinkholes, underground streams and caverns. This area around Eddy Creek is a dolomite area and there is currently a quarry where the dolomite is extracted. I had a list of locations of various caves, sinkholes and springs that I wanted to check out.

Road to the quarry

To reach the walk start I drove out on Weld Road and turned onto Eddy Road near Southwood Mill and then into Eric Pettits Road and parked just before the locked gate. It is more or less the same starting point as Fletchers Eddy. As there was about 4 kms. of road walking involved to reach the quarry access road, I rode my bike instead of walking which saved some time. It was quite easy riding and not too steep. After reaching the quarry road, I stashed the bike in the bush and began the short walk up the road. No doubt someone younger or fitter than I could have ridden to the quarry but I found it easier to walk.

Dolomite Quarry

It did not take long to reach the quarry, where there were great views of Glovers Bluff. I walked up the right hand side and then into the bush heading for my first point of interest, which was the largest sinkhole in the area. The trees that had been pushed over made it a little difficult but I was soon in clearer territory. The sink hole was just past the quarry boundary and was not very impressive - merely a small depression.

Largest sinkhole

I then carried on to a small cave and a spring and cave that seem to be joined underground and then to the largest cave around the area. It was quite deep and I had too be extremely careful near the edge. The walking was fairly easy with no scrub bashing involved but there were plenty of trees to clamber over, both large and small.

Largest cave from up the hill

From here I walked uphill to locate a couple of sinkholes, one of which I found and one I didn't and then onto another vertical cave to the northwest. When I found it I stopped for a snack before heading back down the dry creek bed to look for more features.

Vertical Cave

I found some more springs and another cave whilst walking down the creek and once I reached the last spring I headed uphill to come out at the quarry, thus completing a small loop. I then walked back to my bike and then headed down the road because I wanted to check out the access for a future walk to Bernard Spur. There was a tree across the road at the Eddy Creek crossing and this proved to be a good seat for lunch.

Lunch at Eddy Creek

I rode on up the road to the end which is near Bernard Spur. There were good views of Glovers Bluff along here and I also watched an echidna for quite some time. After finding out what I wanted to, I simply rode back to the car.
This was an enjoyable short walk through some nice bush and with some different points of interest.
Distance: 15.8 kms. Bike 9.1 kms. Walk 6.7 kms.
Time: 5'06"
Ascent: 490 metres
Click here to download GPX file.

Dolomite quarry

Dolomite quarry

Largest Cave

Bush

Spring flowing over dolomite

Glovers Bluff

Dolomite quarry

Dolomite

Echidna

The Weld - Short Walks

Saturday 20th September 2014

Junction of Huon and Weld Rivers - Weld enters on the right

A friend had suggested that they would like to see some of the Weld area. I had previously done a little walking in the lower reaches of the Weld so I put together a few short walks so we go experience some different aspects of the area. The walks planned were to the junction of the Huon and Weld Rivers, Fletchers Eddy, Reubens Falls and lastly to the giant trees(Centurion and Triarius), which are more in the Arve area.
We drove out from Judbury and onto Weld Road and Eddy Road to a 4WD track on the left.

4WD track

Over the last few days we had received some rain so I was expecting that there would be some water lying around and also some mud. Both of these proved to be true. We set off along the track and, after dodging puddles and mud we soon reached the junction of the Huon and Weld Rivers. It was a little hard to get a good view of the junction as it was obscured by vegetation somewhat. Both rivers were flowing particularly strongly. We headed back and reached the car in no time.
Distance: 2.4 kms.
Time: 45"
Ascent: 72 metres
Click here to download GPX file for Huon and Weld junction.

Fletchers Eddy

I had to break out a couple of towels to place on the car floor to protect it from muddy boots, as we didn't want to have to take them off each time. Little did I know how useful that would prove. We drove  about 2.2 kms. further up the road to Eric Pettets Road on the right and found a convenient parking spot and commenced our walk to Fletchers Eddy.
Initially the track went downhill to Barnback Creek. It was quite muddy and slippery and when we reached the creek there was no other option but to walk through the water. Once on the other side is where it became interesting, as 4WDs had recently been through here and churned it up massively. My friend managed to step in some mud and sink quite a lot thinking it was solid ground. After dodging mud and water we eventually made it to Fletchers Eddy. The Weld was flowing strongly and it presented a beautiful picture. It is indeed a lovely spot. We had a snack and returned to the car. As we were walking up the last rise I managed to slip over in the mud and my friend ended up sinking once again which resulted in particularly muddy boots this time.

How is this for a muddy good time

Distance: 4.4 kms.
Time: 1'45"
Ascent: 130 metres
Click here to download GPX file for Fletchers Eddy.

Fletchers Eddy

Fletchers Eddy

Fletchers Eddy

Huon and Weld junction plus Fletchers Eddy

The towels definitely came in handy this time. We drove just down the road to the bridge over the Weld and stopped for a look.

The Weld from the bridge

Impressive engineering

The Weld from bridge

From here we drove on up to Glovers Bluff to overlook Fletchers Eddy and the Weld valley and then on to Reubens Falls. South Weld Road now finishes here as the crossing over Isabella Creek has been washed away. The road used to continue on further to provide access to Mount Weld. We walked along the creek on a rain forest type track to Reubens Falls. The track was easy to follow and the falls were really flowing well.
Distance: 2.8 kms.
Time: 1'20"
Ascent: 140 metres
Click here to download GPX file for Reubens Falls.

This was the road crossing over Isabella Creek

Isabella Creek

Reubens Falls Track

Reubens Falls

Reubens Falls

It was then on to the Giant trees which are more near the Arve area really, but adjacent to the Weld.We drove along Southwood Road across the Huon River and stopped at the bridge for a look see.

Huon River

Huon River

It was then on to Edwards Link Road and a selection of forestry roads and then a disused track to the starting point of the walk. Along the way we spied a wombat casually walking along the road, which was a real treat. We set off walking, and, much to my surprise we were following a well taped track. I had been expecting a scrub bash, so was it was easy going. The track went uphill through beautiful mossy rain forest country to the trees location. There are 2 trees, Centurion and Triarius. Both are Eucalyptus Regans - Swamp Gum. Centurion is 99.6 metres tall and is the tallest Eucalypt, tallest hardwood and tallest flowering plant in the world, so it is something special. It is supposed to be 500 years old. There are also some other tall specimens around as well. we returned to the car well satisfied with our exploits of the day.
Distance: 1.4 kms.
Time: 50"
Ascent: 107 metres
Obviously the photos below don't do the trees justice as they were absolutely massive. It gave one a special feeling to think that these giants have now been preserved for the rest of there lives.

Triarius

Centurion

Triarius

Two Giants together

Giant trees