A journey to Hades aka a Sunday afternoon drive in the Styx River State Forest

[Paddler Ed]

Now this report is going to be Land Cruiser free, as the vehicles are our 4Runner, a Ford Ranger, a Range Rover P38 and possibly a new Holden Colorado.... but Ben was on my case the other day to do a trip report for our local runs.

In planning this trip (which is happening this Sunday, so a full report will follow) I was talking to a mate (who has the RR) about it, and he asked "Do I need to pay the ferryman?" Initially I had no idea what he was on about, wondering if it was a reference to a film, but he replied that the Styx River features in Greek Mythology as the boundary between this world and the underworld.

This area is our local haunt, and is full of trails; some of them we did when Scott and Steph were visiting, and in fact we will be doing a number of those on this trip, but we've had some rain so the river is up a fair bit, and there was bit of mud when we went out last week.

We're lucky in that 35km after leaving town we're off the bitumen and onto dirt, and another 20kms after that we're properly into Bush as opposed to the paddocks of the local stations (traditionally merino and sheep, but now more commonly cattle) as we head into the State Forest... So the plan is to head out to one of the picnic areas, and from there do a bit of a loop/squiggle with 2 creek crossings, climbing about 500m in total on some nice little trail sections, and make our friend in the Ranger learn what her car can do... but for the rest you'll have to wait! All we know at the moment is that the average river level is hovering around the 0.8m mark and 110 mega litres/day, and when we crossed it last week it was at 0.77m and 89 mega litres/day...

 

[clivehorridge]

Not sure of the judicial consequences of no Land Cruisers Ed, but I'm certainly looking forward to Monday's write-up and all the photos you're going to upload (hint) Good luck on the trip...

 

[Paddler Ed]

Well we all got back, no fires, only one check engine light, and no one got stuck...

The Range Rover has caught fire in the past, and has also lost one silencer (care of a tree stump), so the 4.0 V8 makes a great noise... he's brilliant as a tale end charlie as the exhaust note reverberates down the hills nicely! The Ford has a nasty habit of throwing the check engine light on every so often, and we were unsure what some of the trails were going to be like.

One of our biggest concerns was we've (finally) had some rain... but the river had shot up in height and flow, upto 200+ Mega litres per day and 0.95m on the gauge 3km or so down stream of the creek crossings, compared to a nice level of 0.7ish and 60-70 mega litres per day... so this decided that we would be heading into the picnic area and then heading out on the trails from there. In the end it was 0.83 and 123 mega litres average for the day we were out.

At the picnic area I got sent off into the creek to check the depth, and it was only up to my knees so we were quite happy with that! Still came upto the bottom of the bar on the 4Runner, and a bit higher on the Ranger as Annie gunned it a bit too much!

Now we didn't get a Ben quantity of photos (I was driving at the front, and our friend with the Ranger isn't the most confident driver - this was only her second trip out -, so stopping to take photos would put her off) but I've managed to find some, and will get some more over the next couple of days from the others with a bit of luck!

This trail out of the creek was one that we found with Scott and Steph, and we now use quite often; it's the quickest way into the camp site area if you find the really old State Forest information that is around... but it isn't sign posted until you're about 10km along the track to it!

We then dropped back down to the creek after 500m of climbing; some interesting mud holes on the back sides of the drainage runs, and lots of bush pinstripping...

This descent is a bit more technical in places, but still not Ben level... it's a nice touring trail that we often do as a single vehicle. On the other hand getting out of there via the creek crossing (a bit faster as it's a much narrower point the the first one) is a bit more technical, with L4-1 used, as opposed to L4-2 or -3.

Combined with the fact it was Burns Night on Sunday, and Australia Day today, there was much climbing on the 4Runner:

The next section was a rerun of a trail we did with Scott and Steph almost 12months ago! What it was a good example as to how much a trail has changed in 12 months... I'll get the video off of Delz and post it later on, but she did a sterling job hanging out of the window as we went down it filming in front and behind us!

We continued onto another trail, and then found a technical hitch... we thought if we hit 50 or 60kmh we might clear it, but getting to that speed (and 3 vehicles it might not be our best idea ever)

Someone had helpfully marked the collapsing bridge (if you jumped on it, the whole lot moved, and more of the bridge fell down...)

So a bit of reversing, and we were good once more.... however, we now no longer knew where we were going to come out, and the non-local Range Rover was now in the lead... and we were at the back...

All of a sudden we popped out at the old State Forest depot, so a photo opportunity for the 3 vehicles,

and a quick run through the muddy puddle (in Delz' case I shall check her speed on Memory map...) and then it was home time for roast lamb, potato bake and beer!

Next time will be less rushed (we only had a couple of hours that afternoon) so I will try to get some more photos, especially of the technical parts, and we won't miss out all the section; we only did the Eastern section of the map, and that still took nearly 3 hrs to get round.

 

[clivehorridge]

Nice one! Good day out by the looks of it!

Looking forward to the vid(s)...

Thanks for posting

 

[Paddler Ed]

OK, now have some more photos... added into the original post, so hopefully it'll make a bit more sense now!

 

[Gav Peter]

Looks like a nice trundle out Ed ;-) Thanks for sharing

 

[Paddler Ed]

Now(finally) have the video uploaded onto Farcebook... clicky here for it hopefully. It's only short, and filmed by Delz hanging out the window with her phone!

 

[Ben]

Looks like a fun day out Ed.

Must get up your way some time.

 

[Paddler Ed]

The best bit about that was it was just an afternoon out! We (me and Delz) only finished work at 1pm, and got home for about 1.30pm, turned round and out the door by 2pm and home by 6pm!

 

[clivehorridge]

Nice link, ED, sure it wasn't "wobbly" operating the camera?