Friday 1st July:
Camped at Scotts Reserve just out of Woods Point named after Jack ‘Warrigul’ Scott. After moving to Woods Point when he was 16 years old in 1936, which he called home for 68 years before death in 2004.
The town of Woods Point was wiped out by fires in 1939 Black Friday fires, Jack was known as ‘a man who got things done’. Jack got himself into the town’s rebuild before going to the War at Borneo.
Upon his return Jack leased out the Commercial Hotel and Kevington Hotel at the same time. He worked as a wood cutter, logger, gold miner, builder and you name it he could do any job he put his mind to. Jack was all so involved with the Woods Point Gun Club in 1970 and was Honorary Treasurer for 34 years.
Our trip had 12 vehicles heading in towards Woods Point on the Friday afternoon, some getting in camp at about 9.30pm, the fire was going really well so seeing that we were excited about the weekend, some of us sat up to 2.00am in the morning.
Saturday 2nd July
We woke up between 7.30am and 8.00am to -2° with a nice frost on the ground we had a fire going again, quick breakfast and a briefing on the day’s events, leaving camp at 9.00am.
We headed out of camp up Mansfield/Woods Point road for roughly 5 kms we got to Frenchmans Gap turning left onto Frenchmans Gap track where we were straight into Low Range which has a fairly steep and rocky climb up to Corn Hill @ 1326m, stopping here for a bit to see, if we could see any snow on any of the peaks. We thought we could see snow on top of Mt Matlock so we headed for there, taking Corn Hill road up to the top of Mt Matlock @ 1377m, we had no snow just a frost, so we had a smoko break for 20mins. We headed of again heading towards Mt Terrible, taking the Corn Hill road around to Ryan’s Spur track turning right here we headed down here, at the start it was over grown a bit, we turned left onto Cambarville logging track, very easy track with some slippery clay sections, but a good drive.
We got down onto Big River road turning right and back into 2wd we headed along the river, then we got to Hope track back into Low Range, straight into the steep climb, halfway up has a rocky section that has a rock face you climb but plenty of Momentum wasn’t to bad. At the top we stopped for lunch for 30mins. After lunch we headed along Mt Terrible track up to the Mt Terrible Hut @ 1316m. It was perfect weather not a cloud in the sky, so the view to Mt Buller with snow on the peaks was Spectacular.
I got the drone up and got that perfect photo:
We headed back along Mt Terrible track taking all he off chute tracks making the drive a lot harder and interesting, getting back to the intersection we took Moonlight Spur track for a bit then turned right onto Ryan’s Spur track now coming the other way, this section is really wide and was slippery in sections, passing the Ryan’s Spur Hut, we got back to the overgrown section and out of here we went straight across Corn Hill road up a off chute track which was very slippery as the sun hadn’t touched that section of track all day, then back onto Corn Hill road. We then turned left onto Frenchmans Gap track and back up and over Corn Hill, then down the rocky section which was 1 st gear Low Range to Frenchmans Gap. Turning right and back into 2wd to camp, we got back at 4.30pm, lighting the fire again and plenty of firewood we had a huge fire again as the cold weather came in the fire got bigger, we enjoyed the night some staying up to 2.00am again.
Sunday 3rd July
As we woke Sunday morning it was really slow, it was -2° again making it very cold, we had our breakfast and coffees, we decided to head for Mt Selma to see if we could get snow up there. We headed into Woods Point township then at the Commercial Hotel you veer left towards Comet Flat, as you pass all the houses at 10kms an hour there is the first river crossing, as I went through and the water came up over the bonnet on the Toyota, everyone else went through with some good photos taken. Down a bit further we turned right into Comet Flat then through more river crossings, then a little track that had 7 more river crossings winding its way through to Johnson Hill track at the little Hut beside the river.
We headed up Johnson Hill which is a easy Low Range climb to the Walhalla road, back into 2wd we drove along here to Mt Selma road. The road up there is rough with a lot of potholes. We got to the top of Mt Selma @ 1469m and no snow, we had a little break as the wind chill felt like -5°, so back in the vehicles and headed back down to Comet Flat and stopped at one of the campsites for lunch besides the river, stopping here for 30mins we headed back into Woods Point and pulled up for a look around town. Five vehicles headed off back home as they had to work the next day, so the rest of us headed back to camp enjoying the fire and a few beers again, going to bed a bit earlier.
Monday 4th July
As we woke we had to pack up camp, so we had breakfast and everyone packed up in their own time and headed off, along Mansfield/Woods Point road through Jamieson then onto Mansfield.
Participants
Russell – 105 LandCruiser
Andrew – Triton
Dale H – 105 LandCruiser
Phil and John – BT-50
Allan B – Triton
Glen – Nissan Patrol
Lou and Mick – Triton
Geoff – Isuzu
Paul and Crystal – 79 LandCruiser
Allen W – Hilux
Sam L – Colorado
Wayne – Hilux
