Todd and I always go camping in June/July each year after Todd has finished his mid year Uni exams. We have gone to Coral Bay many times and thought this year we would go to Karijini National Park.We packed the car on Thursday night and got to bed early for an early start. We left home (Perth) at 3am and headed off with a full tank of petrol I started driving while Todd had a bit of a sleep in the car. We headed off through New Norcia, Meekatharra and stopped for breakfast at Mount Magnet. We also take some home made sausage rolls and home made egg and bacon pie for our trips. My mouth is watering now just thinking about them, because they are scrumptious. (We make the best sausage rolls and pie – okay you probably think you do too and I am not going to argue with you, but I do like ours). Anyway we eventually arrived at Dale Camping ground at Karijini NP about 5pm. We set up camp and had a look at some pamphlets of what we would do the next couple of days and had an early night. It was very hard going to bed because the skies really come alive in the Pilbara with stars in all their glory.
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The next day we went gorge walking and the following day is what my story is all about. We were going to walk up Mount Bruce. Mt Bruce is the second largest mountain in Western Australia at 1235 metres. The brochure rates the walk up Mt Bruce as a level 1, class 4.
This means they are for experienced, fit walkers. Trails may be unmarked and go over steep, slippery and unstable surfaces. Few, if any, improvements have been made. It also says the walk to the summit is a 9km walk and 6 hour return. We have done quite a lot of walking including extended walks on the Bibbulmum Track (that is another story). We are also both reasonably fit. (Okay Todd is very fit and he was in the middle of his hockey season, and I am sort of fit – so together we are reasonably fit).Karijini can get very cold at night time during winter and on this Saturday in late June the temperature had got down to zero during the night. We had some breakfast and left out camping site at about 6.30 in the morning to get an early start. We had not seen Mt Bruce before and Karijini is very hilly. We saw a large mountain and thought that must be it. As we drove closer and closer to this mountain we continued to think that was the one. We then turned around a corner in the road and off in the distance we saw this huge thing and knew the mountain we had thought was the one was only a little bump in the landscape.We pulled up at the car park and started to walk. Even though it was still very cold we started off in shorts and t-shirt and obviously had plenty of water and something to eat plus some warmer clothing just in case.We headed off at 7am. We had not travelled too far and off to our right we saw Marandoo Mine. This is a huge mining operation in Tom Price and the ore is railed to Dampier for shipping overseas. As we were walking, still relatively gradually at this stage, we were looking all around us at the vast array of flora and fauna but continually looking over at the mine. During one of these looks towards Marandoo we saw a train coming from Newman to travel through Tom Price onto Dampier to unload. We stopped walking and started to count the carriages of the train. We both got up to 200 and agreed to stop counting because we were not even half way through counting the carriages – it was veeeeeery long.We got as far as Honey Hakea which is 4.6km from when we started. The walk at this stage was alternating between very steep to a relatively gradual incline. We stopped here for a bit of a rest and something to eat; we had been drinking our water as needed up to this stage anyway. The view here gave us a great site of the mulga surrounding Mount Bruce.Continuing on we came to a steep rocky section with a couple of rock cairns to show us the way. At one stage we took the wrong turn and came to an impassable section. Back-tracking we found our mistake and had to actually walk around the face of this rock. There was a chain hammered into the rocks here for safety because if you fell it was good bye. (It was safe though). After negotiating our way around the chain we then came to a fissure in the rock we had to climb up. This was vertical and obviously for safety sake we took our time here.By this time, we were well and truly over 3/4 of the way and equally we (okay, I) was starting to feel the pinch a bit. We are both very determined when it comes to physical activity and there was no way we were not going to make it all the way to the top.We eventually made it to the summit and the view of the landscape was absolutely spectacular. We saw an eagle soaring below us. We saw the road we drove on to get to the base of the mountain and low and behold way, way down there we saw a car towing a caravan. It looked like a little ant or maybe a little toy car like the kids have.We took our obligatory photos, had something to eat and drink, signed in the book that we had made it (noting the last date someone else had reached the top was 8 days before) and felt fairly pleased with ourselves and started back the same way we came.On the way back we saw a young couple walking up who said they were going all the way. (I hope they made it). We saw an older couple who had stopped for coffee and cake and they said they had gone far enough and were going back down.We arrived back at our car and felt quite pleased with ourselves for achieving this magnificent walk.If you get the chance to go on this walk up Mount Bruce, make the most of it. If you get all the way like Todd and I did - fantastic, if you get part way the walk will still be well worth it with some spectacular views.
Visit the Break Loose Marketplace for the latest outdoor gear provided by EBay Australia.
The next day we went gorge walking and the following day is what my story is all about. We were going to walk up Mount Bruce. Mt Bruce is the second largest mountain in Western Australia at 1235 metres. The brochure rates the walk up Mt Bruce as a level 1, class 4.
This means they are for experienced, fit walkers. Trails may be unmarked and go over steep, slippery and unstable surfaces. Few, if any, improvements have been made. It also says the walk to the summit is a 9km walk and 6 hour return. We have done quite a lot of walking including extended walks on the Bibbulmum Track (that is another story). We are also both reasonably fit. (Okay Todd is very fit and he was in the middle of his hockey season, and I am sort of fit – so together we are reasonably fit).Karijini can get very cold at night time during winter and on this Saturday in late June the temperature had got down to zero during the night. We had some breakfast and left out camping site at about 6.30 in the morning to get an early start. We had not seen Mt Bruce before and Karijini is very hilly. We saw a large mountain and thought that must be it. As we drove closer and closer to this mountain we continued to think that was the one. We then turned around a corner in the road and off in the distance we saw this huge thing and knew the mountain we had thought was the one was only a little bump in the landscape.We pulled up at the car park and started to walk. Even though it was still very cold we started off in shorts and t-shirt and obviously had plenty of water and something to eat plus some warmer clothing just in case.We headed off at 7am. We had not travelled too far and off to our right we saw Marandoo Mine. This is a huge mining operation in Tom Price and the ore is railed to Dampier for shipping overseas. As we were walking, still relatively gradually at this stage, we were looking all around us at the vast array of flora and fauna but continually looking over at the mine. During one of these looks towards Marandoo we saw a train coming from Newman to travel through Tom Price onto Dampier to unload. We stopped walking and started to count the carriages of the train. We both got up to 200 and agreed to stop counting because we were not even half way through counting the carriages – it was veeeeeery long.We got as far as Honey Hakea which is 4.6km from when we started. The walk at this stage was alternating between very steep to a relatively gradual incline. We stopped here for a bit of a rest and something to eat; we had been drinking our water as needed up to this stage anyway. The view here gave us a great site of the mulga surrounding Mount Bruce.Continuing on we came to a steep rocky section with a couple of rock cairns to show us the way. At one stage we took the wrong turn and came to an impassable section. Back-tracking we found our mistake and had to actually walk around the face of this rock. There was a chain hammered into the rocks here for safety because if you fell it was good bye. (It was safe though). After negotiating our way around the chain we then came to a fissure in the rock we had to climb up. This was vertical and obviously for safety sake we took our time here.By this time, we were well and truly over 3/4 of the way and equally we (okay, I) was starting to feel the pinch a bit. We are both very determined when it comes to physical activity and there was no way we were not going to make it all the way to the top.We eventually made it to the summit and the view of the landscape was absolutely spectacular. We saw an eagle soaring below us. We saw the road we drove on to get to the base of the mountain and low and behold way, way down there we saw a car towing a caravan. It looked like a little ant or maybe a little toy car like the kids have.We took our obligatory photos, had something to eat and drink, signed in the book that we had made it (noting the last date someone else had reached the top was 8 days before) and felt fairly pleased with ourselves and started back the same way we came.On the way back we saw a young couple walking up who said they were going all the way. (I hope they made it). We saw an older couple who had stopped for coffee and cake and they said they had gone far enough and were going back down.We arrived back at our car and felt quite pleased with ourselves for achieving this magnificent walk.If you get the chance to go on this walk up Mount Bruce, make the most of it. If you get all the way like Todd and I did - fantastic, if you get part way the walk will still be well worth it with some spectacular views.
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