Yellow Cliffs
Saturday 5 April 08
Parks have improved the area at the Myrtle Forest picnic area by renovating the vandalised hut and installing a toilet. The initial section of track has been further upgraded and a wooden viewing platform placed at the first waterfall. It all looks good and it is hoped does not get ruined by louts.
The approach to Yellow Cliffs was from Myrtle Forest using the Collins Cap track then downhill on the old Glen Dhu fire trail, which is even more overgrowing in the lower section than last year. The walking pad down to Glen Dhu Rivulet has been fairly recently marked with yellow tapes, but does not appear to be overly used. After crossing the Glen Dhu Rivulet we split and some went around the cliffs to the right whilst Sue and I went left. We rejoined again further up the slope without either finding any more cliffs. A steep ascent followed and even though we veered to the right we did not meet any more cliffs until close to the top. All agreed that the return route would be via the old and initially quite overgrown old logging track on the plateau above and fortunately it was not too hard to find and got clearer the closer Ringwood Fire Trail got. It was a straight forward walk back to the cars.
Note that since the 2013 bushfire the route above Yellow Cliffs is difficult to use. (see the comment below)
Motor bike tracks were most noticeable on the East West Fire Trail and were seen from when we reached the junction with Ringwood and continued past the walking track turnoff to Myrtle Forest on the Collins Cap Fire Trail. Although signs ban vehicles the bikes did use the short cut from the bend near Trestle Mt and caused some breaking up of the track.
The larger cliff area was not reached during the walk so it would be good to return. The access to this main section of cliffs looks feasible via Glen Dhu Road although a mere 100 metres is through private land but this appears to be bush and may not be fenced. From there it would be about 500 metres to the base of the cliffs. See map
Click for more photos
Peters description of the track out to Ringwood Trail from the top of the Yellow Cliffs was correct until January 2013 Molesworth bushfire that threatened all of Wellington park but only burnt up around Collins Cap. The Parks fire brigade ran a bulldozer in along this lovely old track and possibly did a back burn from the old track across to the top of the cliffs or stopped the fire from getting over toward Mountain River. They have since widened the track to about 20+m and laid the trees and bushes across the swathe as slash to encourage it to revegetate. It make for very slow walking, 1.5km/hr and is not very pretty. So best return via the Glen Dhu Trail. The Glen Dhu Rivulet valley escaped most of the fire as far as we could see.
ReplyDeletePosted by RAMBO Bruce 17/02/14